Changes in the Chow

Though soccer players for the German national team have threatened to quit if they can't wear the shoes they want, they aren't that picky when it comes to what's on their plates.

"They all like Italian food the best," team cook Saverio Pugliese told the the Stuttgarter Zeitung. Fish, meat and pasta -- easy on the sauce -- were among the team's favorite foods, he said.

Pugliese, who was responsible for making sure German coach Joachim Löw's players got the 3,000 to 3,500 calories they needed for peak performance for two months straight during last summer's World Cup, said he had decided to hang up his black, red and gold spaghetti spoon after five years with the team.

"That was the highpoint of my life," Pugliese said of the World Cup. "I couldn't have dreamed of anything better."

Originally from Calabria, at the bottom of the Italian boot, Pugliese immigrated to Germany when he was 17 and by chance opened his own restaurant near the headquarters of the German Soccer Federation (DFB).

Obviously pleased with a meal he enjoyed at Pugliese's Alten Haferkasten eatery, then-team coach Rudi Völler asked the lifelong soccer fan if he'd whip something up for the national team before its next match.

Over the ensuing years, ravenous German players came to love Pugliese's cooking.

"There were some players who, days ahead of time, would look forward to joining the national team just for the food," he said.

Starting with the Germany-England friendly on Aug. 22, it will be up to Bavaria's Holger Stromberg to fill Pugliese's shoes and the national team players' stomachs.

Pugliese has said he intends to use the time freed up by not having to cook for a team of top-notch athletes concentrating on his own restaurant and taking more vacations.