San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Pregnant women say this pizza put them into labor. So I tried it
The famous Prego Pizza from Skipolini’s has 13 toppings, including six meats and extra garlic
I’m convinced that a Bay Area pizza put me into labor, and so are hundreds of other women.
The pizza in question was a kitchen sink pie stacked with virtually all the traditional toppings — 13 to be exact — including six types of meat, extra onions and extra garlic. Later that night, I experienced some of the worst heartburn of my pregnancy. But by morning, I was having contractions.
Before the pizza, once I had reached full term I tried several other popular yet unscientific methods to induce labor. I ate six dates a day; drank copious amounts of raspberry leaf tea; bounced on an exercise ball; and “curb walked,” the act of awkwardly waddling with one leg up on a curb.
Finally, a friend suggested the “famous” Prego Pizza at Skipolini’s, which I had admittedly never heard of. He swore it had worked for his wife and a co-worker, and a quick Google search revealed dozens of other encouraging tales. Only one day past my due date, yet feeling desperate, my husband and I made the drive to the nearest Skipolini’s in Concord that evening.
Thirteen toppings sounded like serious overkill. Like my daily dose of dates that I was completely sick of, I was worried I’d have to choke this pizza down. I even requested it without two toppings that I don’t particularly like (mushrooms and olives). But I was pleasantly surprised that, while the garlic definitely stood out, the flavors melded together quite well.
The Bay Area pizza chain started in Clayton in 1974 and there are now eight Skipolini’s restaurants, mostly scattered across the East Bay. Over the decades, the name Skipolini’s has become synonymous with the Prego Pizza, which was created in the early 1980s after a pregnant woman came into the restaurant and asked for something to kick-start the labor process.
“We basically took everything we had and put it on this pizza and she went into labor that night,” said Skipolini’s president Kent Ipsen, whose father founded the business. The resulting pizza clocked in at over 4 pounds. A friend of that woman’s, who was also pregnant, came in a couple of weeks later, Ipsen recalled. “We made her the same thing and she went into labor,” he claimed.
The legend of the labor-inducing pizza spread quickly around the Bay Area with the help of beloved KFRC disc jockey Don Rose. Known as Dr. Don, despite possessing no medical degree, Ipsen credited Rose for “broadcasting (the Prego Pizza) all over the place.” It’s a discussion topic on Reddit and has received national media attention, too, in the Wall Street Journal and on “Live with Kelly and Ryan.”
Skipolini’s sells thousands of Prego Pizzas a year ($21.75 for a small), plus baby onesies that read Delivered by Prego Pizza. The restaurant has even fulfilled requests to ship the pie out of state. This happens often enough that Ipsen said he’s working on a solution to make the Prego Pizza consistently available beyond the Bay Area. The Skipolini’s website showcases more than 100 testimonials, complete with each baby’s name, date of birth and weight.
No babies have been born at Skipolini’s, but on a handful of occasions, a woman’s water broke at the restaurant. (Ipsen said he’s still waiting for someone to name their baby Skip.) While many local doctors suggest the Prego Pizza to impatient expecting mothers, he admits there’s no scientific or medical proof that the pie can kick off the labor process.
Traditional methods for naturally inducing labor are largely considered old wives’ tales by the medical community. Limited studies on the efficacy of these practices, such as walking, acupuncture and sexual intercourse, have shown mixed results. A 2005 study revealed that nipple stimulation can be effective, but at the rate of one to three hours a day, one nipple at a time.
Ipsen’s wife, who happens to be a labor and delivery nurse, suggests there’s a placebo effect at play. “She believes in the power of positive thinking. People are so desperate, they come in and get their mind wrapped around it,” said Ipsen. “Maybe it starts with a little indigestion and that turns into labor. The extra garlic probably doesn’t hurt.”
Whatever the reason, and in spite of medical logic, I now count myself as a Skipolini’s success story: My son was born 48 hours after my visit to Concord. (While the pizza got things going, it did not make labor go particularly fast.) Of course, the Prego Pizza doesn’t work for everyone, but anyone who tries still gets to eat a pretty good pizza — and that certainly beats curb walking.