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Volcano Pizza
JOHAN ORDONEZ/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
CRISPY CRUST: Chef García inspects a pizza he’s cooking on the Pacaya volcano in Guatemala.
Restaurant Pizza Pacaya doesn’t prepare its pizzas in a piping hot oven. Instead, the restaurant’s chef, Mario David García Mansilla, cooks up his signature dish using heat from an active volcano!
(left) NATURE’S OVEN: Lava flows from Guatemala’s Pacaya volcano. (right) EAT UP: García serves pizza to tourists.
JIM MCMAHON/MAPMAN ®
García’s business sits atop Pacaya volcano in southern Guatemala. The volcano produces lava that’s extremely thick. Sometimes, large bubbles form as hot gas tries to escape the viscous molten rock. As the lava cools, these bubbles form little caverns. García bakes his pizza on metal trays inside these crevices, where temperatures can reach up to 1,000°C (1,800°F).
Volcanic cooking gives pizzas a unique flavor, according to García. “You can’t describe it,” he says. “You have to taste it.”
Pacaya volcano has been erupting on and off since 1961. The graph below shows other volcanoes that have been erupting periodically for decades. Approximately when did Bagana begin erupting?
SOURCE: GLOBAL VOLCANISM PROGRAM