International Pizza Expo continues to grow each year
The International Pizza Expo rolled through town once again earlier this month, taking over the Las Vegas Convention Center’s massive South Hall in what seemed like the biggest pizza show of all time.
More than 12,000 attendees from across the country and around the world were expected for the 34th annual convention, March 19-22, which featured hundreds of exhibitors and suppliers of ingredients, kitchen equipment, marketing, promotional and packaging materials and everything else you can imagine having anything to do with the ever-growing pizza industry.
The expo is not open to the public but if it were, it would sell out. There were approximately 1,500 booths large and small lining the South Hall, many of them cooking and offering samples of their doughs, sauces, cheeses, toppings and more.
Genuine Broaster Chicken, a supplier based in Beloit, Wis., maintained one of the more popular booths, offering an endless supply of crispy poultry snacks to boost its reputation as the perfect pizza partner.
Carrot Top, resident headliner at the Luxor, presided over a chicken wing-eating contest at the La Nova Wings booth … not that the centrally located kiosk needed the comedian to spice up its party. For three days, dance music blared from the booth as a chicken mascot danced and girls in short-shorts served up boneless chicken bites in various flavors. The Pizza Expo is very Vegas.
When he wasn’t leading demonstrations in one of four expo arenas with bleacher-style seating, pizza champion and restaurateur Tony Gemignani — who operates two Pizza Rock locations in the Las Vegas Valley as well as Little Tony’s at Palace Station — posed for photos and signed copies of his book “The Pizza Bible” for his fellow pizza proprietors. Las Vegas’ own John Arena, who founded Metro Pizza with his cousin Sam Facchini in 1980, bounced between booths to host various demos, too, teaming with baking educator and author Peter Reinhart for one infomation session titled “Why Are You Still Buying Bread?”
One new-to-las Vegas chef was on hand to promote a new product scheduled to arrive in stores next month. Los Angeles food truck legend Roy Choi, who’s developing a Korean restaurant for
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