Here's some holiday spirit:  The owner of Hanover, Massachussets-based Baking Steel hosted a tasting featuring champagne pizza crust. The homeless enjoy holiday pizza thanks to a convicted man exonerated of his crime. Celebs get their pizza accessories on.

Looking toward the New Year, industry experts expect fast-casual pizza market to accelerate. Sorry Kevin Spacey but Joe's Pizza and Goldbely's have that 2,000-mile delivery ready now. Doesn't get better than free: ask Blaze fans in Morrisville, North Carolina. These Staten Island pizza chefs are hot themselves, earning their own Cooking Channel show. A mother of seven is a star in New Haven doing her part for the down-and-out.

Pizza news is full of labeling controversies like this update from the UK on very salty pies. The only way to label what the NFL Lions did for the Bills is "Thanks." More Midwestern holiday generosity from Santa at Chicago's Tano's Pizza. Heartfelt giving here, with Anna's Pizza baking around the clock and cheer on an Australian chef climbing pizza's Mount Everest of cheese.

Meanwhile, pizza takes its rightful spot at the top of the food chain in South Jersery and Connecticut's best pizza is heralded in the latest best-of listing. Speaking of national trends, a Domino's executive says the FDA's munu labeling mandate is heading in the wrong direction. 

Finally, holiday stories include a tragic account of the killing of an immigrant deliveryman and a free pizza Christimas tradition in chilly Minnesota to warm the heart.

New pizzeria openings 

The best of New York pizza travels west to Vegas, Akron is now famous for more than the Football Hall of Fame and real New York pizza makes its way out west to Las Vegas.