THE KEY TO SUCCESS IS EATING 2 1/7 SLICES OF PIZZA A DAY. SCOTT WIENER IS PROOF.

A discussion with Scott Weiner

September 26, 2022 | JIM SERPICO

In the latest podcast episode of Bread For the People, I sit down with Scott Wiener, the founder of Scott’s Pizza Tours. Scott is a monthly columnist for Pizza Today magazine. Here’s an excerpt of my interview with Scott.

Thanks for joining me today.

It is my pleasure. Thanks so much for having me, Jim.

Yeah, it’s so cool to meet you. Ever since I started getting heavily into bread and pizza and doing my own thing, your page was constantly recommended on Facebook and Instagram, which is how I first heard about you.

Sorry if it annoyed you; they weren’t boosted posts or paid promotions! 

Hah, no. It was all organic, and I would watch it, and I was fascinated by it, and I was fascinated by your passion. I kind of share that passion. I’ve always loved eating pizza. I got into bread baking first and then started talking to some pizza makers before I started the podcast. What started you on your journey?

Probably the same as you. I just love eating pizza. It’s delicious. That’s really it.

Really?

Yeah. I mean, from a very young age. 

Did you grow up in the tri-state area, in the New York region?

Yeah, I grew up in the suburbs out in Jersey. And pizza is a part of everyday life. You know, we order pizza at least once a week. I would stop by and get a slice on my way home from school. It’s typically what I think of as typical after the Little League game, after the soccer game, just pizza’s part of life.

Absolutely. Have you had pizza today?

Not yet today, because I have a tour tonight, and I try to budget my pizza intake to 15 slices a week as a maximum cap. So if I’m going to do that, I have to regulate so that every day I’m eating an average of two and one-seventh slices. And so I know that tonight I will have at least one, probably two.

And then, at some point this week, I’m going to be doing a double tour, or I’m going to be going to a new place that I haven’t had before. So I got to save my slices.

Now, look at you. My face is taking up more than half this window, and I don’t eat 15 slices a week. How do you eat that much pizza in a week and look like you? You look great!

Well, first of all, pizza is not bad for you. I don’t know why everybody thinks that pizza is junk food pizza. The beauty of pizza is that it can be anything you want it to be. It could be garbage, or it could be lovely and great for your body. It all depends, you know. When you’re eating bad pizza, you know it. 

It’s not a surprise when you’re eating it; you’re like, ‘this is bad pizza.’ You can still love it. But you should try to eat as much good pizza as possible. And then the other side of the coin is I get a lot of exercise. Just because I live deep in Brooklyn. Most of my tours start in Manhattan or at least further north in Brooklyn. And I bike everywhere. So I’m getting 5 to 20 miles a day on the bike.

That’s big. That’s big. Yeah.

It’s huge.

I used to love biking around Manhattan. I was one of the early adopters of City Bike. I would go in every day for 25 years and get around on the bike. I haven’t been going in the last couple of years, but I miss that.

Biking is the best way to get around the city, but it’s also the most dangerous and the most terrifying. 

People don’t have patience for bikers. Do you know what I noticed right now in the farmer’s markets and talking to the passers-by? Of course, I love my customers and people who want to buy our bread. But at least half the people at these markets will stop by and say; I don’t eat carbs. Some so many people believe carbs are the death of you and it’s the reason you can’t be fit. How do you feel about that, and how do you come across that on people on the tours?

Very rarely does somebody show up on a tour and say they don’t eat carbs because if that’s the case, you’re in the wrong spot.

Unless they were brought there, right?

Well, yeah. And sometimes it happens where somebody’s gluten-free or gluten intolerant, or celiac. But, you know, when I hear somebody say, oh, I’m not interested in eating bread because I don’t eat carbs, my immediate thought is to ask them why? Because I feel like a lot of people don’t know why they do the things they do, especially when it comes to dietary restrictions, because the bottom line is carbohydrates are a source of energy for your body.

And if you don’t consume that energy, that energy usually gets stored in fat cells or takes on water, which adds weight to your body. So if it’s out of moderation, then yeah, of course, it’s not great for you, but anything works fine as long as it’s moderated. And I eat carbs every single day because I’ve found a way for it to work for me.

I’ll tell you this, though. If eating pizza was unhealthy, then at this point more than 14 years and eating pizza for a living, essentially, I would be in trouble.  Or I would have stopped by now. I’m in better shape now than I was when I started doing tours.

Follow Jim Serpico on Facebook @bread4thepeoplepod and Instagram at @jimserpico

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