On our first date wifey took me to Talayna's pizza in St.Louis. The place was
dirty, but the pizza was the best I had until we moved to Connecticut.
Couple of years later they relocated and the pizza never tasted the same. Yes,
the oven gives character to the pizza. I found that the best pizzerias here in
the Northeast usually have a very old brick oven in the kitchen.
Also, it seems like regional tastes vary. For example the pizzas in St.louis
and the Midwest in general tend to have a thicker, very buttery crust and are
soaked in sauce. I am not sure about the "NYC acidic taste", I usually barely
taste it, since it seems that the Northeasteners use sauce very sparingly.
I dont use sauce on my pizzas. I use sliced tomatos, but I am also used to
cooking every meal from scratch. We eat pizza at least four times weekly,
never the same of course as we also eat the white variety such as, white clam
with garlic and gorgonzolla cheese or the spinach and feta.
The worst pizza we had was here in the Italian section in Providence. It is a
funny story that starts with the statement that my son made about not wanting
to go there, because the Italians dont know how to cook pizza. Needless to
say, he had a point that night...:) When the pizzas came, they were so badly
burned, that we even grabbed a piece and hit each other to see how badly it
hurts. Mind you, this was not a cheap restaurant. We had other stuff and it
was fantastic. We did not ask for a refund, but got one for some reason, which
was nice.
Subject: Re: [OM] pizza, was Re: Oh gawd...
From: Ken Norton <ken@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sat, 5 Feb 2011 12:39:43 -0600
> BTW, AFAIK, the Italians refer to Chicago style pizza as we would refer to
> the food at fairs in the Midwest and South. The most flattering comment I
> ever heard was from some chef who politely referred to it as "focaccia".
Actually, that's probably pretty close to accurate.
However, a Pizzeria Uno pizza served inside the original store is
unlike anything else in the world.
OK, OK, I can't resist this topic...
My #1 favorite pizza in the world is Mama Mia's Pizza in Mackinaw
City, Michigan. Upstairs is the bridge-builder's museum which you can
go through (and watch the film) while your pizza is cooking. It's a
cross between NYC and Chicago style pizza. Really, it's a best of both
worlds Pizza.
My #2 favorite pizza is at the above mentioned Pizzeria Uno in
Chicago. It MUST be in the original red-brick building, though. It's
the oven and the years of embedded odors which make it different.
I don't know if it's a firm #3 or just at this point in the list there
are so many wonderful pizzas to choose from, but a Veggie pizza from
"Big John's" in Whitehall, Michigan is the way to go. It's much closer
to a NYC pizza, but without the acidic pizza sauce. It is almost
identical to Tower of Pizza in Quincy, Illinois.
Here in Iowa, Pagliai's Pizza has an awesome Margherita Pesto Pizza...
Throughout my global travels I've had some mighty good pizzas, but
I've noticed that in almost every case, the best ones are served in
restaurants with certain types of odors. An Uno pizza, for example,
tastes totally different in all the other stores, and the frozen
bake-at-home kind taste even different yet. I believe the primary
difference has to do with the type of oil used in combination with the
type of pan as well as what the walls are made of. It seems that wood
paneled walls seem to capture odors and enhance them in some
way--probably not unlike whiskeys in oak barrels.
AG
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