Atsa Spicy Opena Thread

by Enrico Martino

NYC Food-Themed Open Thread:

New York City (more Manhattan than the boroughs admittedly) has a dirty little secret that I'm forced to confess every time I entertain an out-of-towner in search of good pizza: Manhattan doesn't really have any.

It's easier to walk into to a random pizza place on Long Island or New Jersey and get a quality slice than it is in NYC.  Sad.  But true. 

The vast majority of slice houses in NYC produce a dull, doughy, chalky crusted pie with an uninspired out-of-the-can sauce and cheap, monotonous cheese, all prepared by disinterested non-Italians (my father, he shakes-a-his-upturned-a hand). Those coming from out of town looking to try New York's legendary fare are (almost always) getting a crass replica of past glory.

Now, there are exceptions:

Brooklyn has some dynamite spots (my favorite slice in the history of ever comes from DiFara's). Other boroughs (Queens, Staten, the Bronx) can also hold their own with the best of the burbs as well (Umberto's - where God orders from when he wants a Sicilian pie).  But I'm talking about frequency, consistency and density.  Despite these stalwarts, Long Island and New Jersey are pulling away using those criteria.

On the other hand, Manhattan still has some good brick oven/gourmet locales (Lombardi's and John's, while Grimaldi's in Brooklyn is also top rate gourmet/brick oven).  But those aren't really pizza parlours in the sense of coming in off the street and grabbing a slice or two.  In order to locate the truly enjoyable pizza-by-the-slice experiences, you have to undergo a painful trial-and-mostly-error ordeal that can take years (Joe's is one of the rare exceptions).

While I'm slagging Manhattan, I'll hit you with a couple more heresies. Long Island, New Jersey and the boroughs blow Manhattan out of the water when it comes to two other culinary categories:  Delis and Diners.  Again, exceptions exist, but as a general rule your odds of finding quality by happenstance are greater in the burbs and, to a lesser extent, the boroughs.

My friends, this is unacceptable.

Comments

[Jesurgislac]

Ever since I started making my own pizza, 90% of boughten pizza is unacceptably bad, and the remaining 10%, while almost as good as I can do myself, is unacceptably overpriced.

[Gary Farber]

Two Boots.

[Joel]

New York's slices are still better than Boston's (gourmet pizzas are excepted from comparison) and that's coming from a native Bostonian.

That's even considering the outer suburbs of the city; it all sucks. Seattle is actually pretty decent, but the parlors are more local-chainish and the prices are high.

[Eric Martin]

My mother makes pizza sometimes, and it's phenomenal. But not as good as DiFara's.

[Eric Martin]

Not a fan of Two Boots, Gary.

And it's not even traditional slice-house fare. It's some funky cajun hybrid with cornmeal on the crust and other eccentricities.

[Blutarski]

The best places in midtown won't even sell slices, and quite right too. They sell pies. Slices are for tourists.

[Gary Farber]

"Brooklyn has some dynamite spots (my favorite slice in the history of ever comes from DiFara's)."

I was about to recommend the old place I grew up with, but that's it. It's on the corner of 14th and Avenue J., just a block away from the D train off 16th St. I grew up at 1047 East 10th St., between J & K, after the age of 5 or so. (Earlier we were in Flatbush.)

[Gary Farber]

"Ever since I started making my own pizza, 90% of boughten pizza is unacceptably bad"

I'm very out of date, since I was in Britain in the mid-Nineties, but I never saw anything there called "pizza" that wasn't horrific.

[washerdreyer]

Heretic! Also, while it's more towards the gourmet side, Una Pizza Napoletana rivals Di Fara.

[Gary Farber]

"...but that's it."

That is, "Di Fara," your fave, is the place I grew up with as my after-school pizza. (Whether P.S. 99, or later, Midwood H.S.)

When I was young, there was also a place on the corner of 15th, and 13th, but one went kosher, and the other disappeared, in my late teens.

The deli across the street is good for take-out, too.

[Gary Farber]

"The best places in midtown won't even sell slices, and quite right too. They sell pies. Slices are for tourists."

Oh, bs. I was born and raised in Brooklyn, in Flatbush and in Midwood, and slices are what we ate. Pies rarely.

[Gary Farber]

I also remember slices going up from a quarter to 35 cents....

[tgirsch]

I'm going to have to disagree with Joel, although we may be talking about apples and oranges, since he limited his comment to pizza by the slice. I'll take a plain cheese pizza from the original Pizzeria Regina in the North End over anything I've had in NYC. (Which, to be fair, is pretty limited.)

[Jesurgislac]

My mother makes pizza sometimes, and it's phenomenal. But not as good as DiFara's.

I have to admit: DiFara sounds good: as good or better as the best places I can think of to buy pizza. But, it shares the same problem they have: once you make your own pizza, you discover what an incredibly cheap meal it is - and by how much it's being overpriced.

It's like CDs. It feels sensible to be paying double for a CD than for a cassette because a CD is higher quality... but the CD will have been cheaper to produce.

[tgirsch]

I'd also like to take this opportunity to give a shout-out to Milwaukee pizza. You don't hear much about it, but I love the stuff. (Disclaimer: I grew up there, so I'm decidedly biased.)

Unlike the abomination that is Chicago Style "pizza" (they've got a lot of nerve calling me a cheesehead when they're the ones with an apparent most-cheese-per-slice arms race going on), or New York pizza, known for the floppy, foldable crust, Milwaukee pizza is known for a crispy, thin crust which has sauce and cheese ratios similar to what you'd find in New York or Boston.

And for whatever reason, four out of five Milwaukeeans will order the "CSMO" -- cheese, sausage, mushrooms, and onions. The CSMO and the plain cheese are my litmus tests for a pizza place. My wife, on the other hand, is a pepperoni purist, and gives the "best pepperoni slice ever" award to Pizzeria Regina in Boston.

[tgirsch]

Jes:

Perhaps you can help me. I can never get the crust to come out right. I suck at baking in general, for that matter, so perhaps that's part of the problem.

[Phil]

Over the last couple of years I've discovered that I can barely stand to eat pizza at all anymore. Certainly not any of the crappy chain pizzas with their oregano-heavy sauces and their awful crusts. Pizza has to be, like, delivered-on-the-hand-of-god-itself good before I'll eat in anymore.

That said, I'm going to be spending two days in Chicago next week -- where's the absolute best pizza to get there?

[Bernard Yomtov]

I think the ad-within-the-ad referenced in the title is for meatballs, not pizza. Just for the record.

The real ad was for Alka-Seltzer, who had some genius commercials.

[tomeck]

Manhattan, Shhmanhattan.

If it ain't Chicago Deep Dish, it ain't pizza.

[tgirsch]

Phil:

Even though it's been chainified for a long time, if Chicago-style pizza is your thing, I'd put my vote in for the original Pizzeria Uno or Pizzeria Due (a block away at Wabash and Ontario). There's no real difference between the two -- same ownership, same menu. It was just cheaper to add a location than to expand the first one.

[The Crafty Trilobite]

Gary, paisan! I grew up in Canarsie between J & K. Now I'm in your previous city. Does this mean I am fated to end up in Texas?

Oh, dear.

We grew up on slices, the way G-d intended. It is, unfortunately, entirely possible that in the last 20 years Manhattan yuppiedom has converted to the heresy of pies, leaving slices for the tourist trade. That would explain why, even 10 years ago when I last lived there, I couldn't find good pizza in the West Village, Soho, Upper West Side, or Wall Street. I could usually find okay pizza in the East Village and the Upper East Side.

[Jesurgislac]

Perhaps you can help me. I can never get the crust to come out right.

With homemade pizza, you cannot bake a superthin crust to the crispness you can get from the kind of hothothot oven that a professional can afford. But (and I credit Elizabeth David for pointing this out to me) pizza was invented originally for the purpose of using up bread dough. To make delicious pizza, start with good bread dough. You really don't need much of anything else - layer of sauce, layer of cheese, and tiny amounts of sliced toppings.

(After I'd listed everything else in my kitchen I could put on a pizza, two kids agreed they'd try chips and baked beans on pizza. I was slightly surprised to discover that it was basically quite good... and I doubt they'd have been so enthusiastic about cheesy baked beans on toast. I do not recommend it for aesthetic appeal, however...)

[Warren Terra]

Another vote for home-made. Regarding the above question about crust, I cheat and use a bag of pizza dough from the deli section of the local supermarket, and it's OK; Trader Joes and Whole foods sell similar. Flatten and bake 5 minutes at 425F on a sheet, then take from oven and flip over before the subsequent steps. I've tried dry powder pizza dough mix (add water and maybe some other things, I forget the details) and Pillsbury rolled-up pizza dough in a tube, and can endorse neither. Boboli and the equivalent are the worst of all; you're better off adding sauce and toppings on top of a store-brand frozen pizza for price, texture, and taste. The important thing is the sauce: avoid "pizza sauce" and use a decent Marinara (I use Trader Joes) to which you've added some extra oregano, basil, fennel, garlic powder, and either pepper flakes or hot sauce, and add some fresh tomatoes and whatever else, then the mozzarella. 20 minutes at 400F.

[tgirsch]

Jes:
start with good bread dough

You realize how unhelpful that is, right? :) I've tried this recipe, but I can't find the "instant yeast" that the recipe calls for, and have been largely unsuccessful at trying to substitute ordinary "bloomed" yeast.

It should be noted that I've never, ever successfully baked anything with yeast. My only quasi-successful baking projects have involved chemical leavening...

[freelunch]

Strokos, up by Columbia, is decent. For a place that appears to sell pizza as a afterthought, it's not bad at all.

[Gary Farber]

Open thread: It's the Same Old Song; RIP Levi Stubbs.

[Gary Farber]

"Does this mean I am fated to end up in Texas?"

Texas? The most I've ever been in Texas is changing airplanes in Houston, and once riding across the top of the panhandle.

[Joel]

If you're pressed on time, Trader Joe's pizza crusts are about $1.29 last I checked and they make a fine pizza dough so long as you let it sit at room temperature for about an hour before use.

Very convenient way of consuming the garden harvest this time of year.

[joel hanes]

Eric :

now you've done it.

The New York pizza vs Chicago deep-dish pizza vs California fusion "pizza" war is a religious conflict, and like all religious conflicts (vi vs. emacs, Linux vs. Mac OSX, Ayn Rand vs. the real world) it generates enormous heat and smoke and flammage but remarkably litte light.

That said, while I understand the aesthetic behind NY-style thin foldable pizza, I prefer a properly-prepared Chicago-style for my actual repast. I don't know where tgirsch had his unconscionably bad experiences, but overwhelming cheese is not a characteristic of the genre.

Village Pizzeria in Truckee, California makes outstanding pizza in hand-tossed and California styles (their Piadine Italiana is a wonderful meal, too).

Old Town Pizza in Auburn is another outstanding pizza joint. They use whole-milk mozzarella, plenty of sauce, and I think their pizza would maybe make tgirsch unhappy, but I purposely detour to eat there on the way to and from Lake Tahoe.

But the subjectively-best pizza experience I remember was the house-special calzone from the little pizza place across the Herrnstrasse from the 1/94th Field Artillery W O Darby Kaserne barracks in Furth, Germany, back when I was a recent draftee. The blend of meats and vegetables and sauce and olive oil and just enough cheese ... Google doesn't find a pizza place at that location, so I suppose it's gone, but on a Sunday evening, and with a couple German beers, that seemed a religious experience worth having.

[Bobb]

Nick's Pizza (aka Not Ray's) upstairs from the Lafayette stop on the G.

[JanieM]

Mozzarella? Slices of things on top?

No no no no no no no....

My grandma (born in Naples, 1896) is rolling over in her grave.

She (thus we) made pizza with dough (homemade or bought from a bakery for a quarter) spread on a pan oiled with Filippo Berio olive oil from the big can that sat by the stove. Not thick crust or deep dish...but not especially thin either.

On top of the dough: sauce made by simmering Contandina canned sauce and paste (diluted with water to the right consistency) with parsley, oregano, garlic, salt, and pepper.

On top of the sauce: more lightly sprinkled parsley and oregano, and freshly grated parmesan cheese.

No no no no no mozzarella. Also, no sausage, no pepperoni, no green peppers, no onions, no hamburger, no other heretical abominations, especially no pineapple.

Also, no chips, and no baked beans. Yikes, that sounds awful. (I assume you mean what we in the US call French fries, jes. Either way. ;)

And certainly not the broccoli and walnuts I used to put on homemade pizza (I never confessed these aberrations to the family) before I stopped eating pizza (I can't eat wheat or tomatoes, woe is me, but I do keep a can of Filippo Berio by the stove for everyday cooking, in Grandma's memory).

[JanieM]

tgirsch -- Have you considered finding someone who knows how to make bread and pizza dough, and learning that way? There's an element of just getting a feel for it -- temperature, timing, etc. -- that might be easier if you watch and do it with someone than if you try to read and follow a recipe.

My grandma had no written recipes, and she didn't make things exactly the same way 2 times in a row. You just had to hang out with her and take note of what she did.

[freelunch]

tgirsch,

Pizza dough doesn't have to rise very much, you just need the yeast to be working. That said, I've found that my pizza dough turns out fairly well with this very simple recipe:

Yeast
1 part water
3 parts flour
Some good olive oil
Salt

Everyone has an opinion how much you need for a pizza, but a cup of water and three of flour should give you plenty of dough for one huge or two smaller pizzas. Take any old yeast (if it comes in the cute little three packs it costs a lot more per use than in a jar or another larger container), a couple of generous teaspoons is plenty, mix them in with a half-cup of warm water and a quarter cup of flour. Stir to make a thin paste. Let it sit in a slightly warm spot (a gas oven with a pilot light or an electric one with the oven light turned on work well) until it's bubbling.

Mix in the rest of the flour and water and a couple of Tbsp oil along with a teaspoon of salt. With pizza dough, unlike bread, it's okay to make the dough a bit too dry. If you have a mixer with a dough hook, mix it for a while. 5-8 minutes should do. By hand, mix it until you have to work it on a breadboard, then knead it for about five minutes. You can let this sit (it doesn't need 18-24 hours) while you prepare the other ingredients. If that's all ready, grab a beer and watch the news for a bit. You need to let it sit for a little while so you can roll it out. The fun, cool dough spinning in the air is optional and recommended for rookies only if they have a really clean floor. Brush the bottom of the crust with oil.

If you like thin crispy crusts, roll it thin and put it on a pan to parbake the crust in a hot, 450 F or hotter, oven for about 5-7 minutes.

If you have a pizza stone, put it in the oven and preheat it, again to 450 F or so -- you will get a better crust than one in a pan, but you have to be able to transfer the raw crust to the stone.

Thicker crusts in a pan can also be parbaked, but they won't be as crispy, even with a hot oven start and the oil brushing.

Grate your own mozzarella or other cheese. Assemble the toppings that appeal to you.

Turn the oven down to 400 F when you put the pizza in. Check to see when it's done, the thickness of the entire pizza really affects how quickly it gets done 12-25 minutes.

[Roger Moore]

It should be noted that I've never, ever successfully baked anything with yeast.

My experience is that the hardest part of baking with yeast is getting the temperature right. You need to make sure that the water you're using is warm enough for the yeast to do well but not hot enough to kill it. If you can't judge the water temperature with your finger, buy a good thermometer. Make sure that the water is within a few degrees of body temperature (i.e. 35-40°C/95-105°F), and the yeast should do OK.

The dough will rise fastest if you keep it at body temperature or a bit higher, but it will still rise slowly even at much lower temperatures. It will even rise slowly in the refrigerator, as in that Alton Brown recipe you linked to. You just need patience. If you can get it to rise at all, you can just keep it going until it doubles in volume. Again, the key is not to overheat it. The yeast is more active at higher temperatures, but too much heat will kill it. Be patient and give it the time it needs to rise at the lower temperature.

[Jesurgislac]

You realize how unhelpful that is, right? :)

'Fraid so. FWIW, I think the two essential elements are time and good flour.

(Baking with yeast, you need to remember primarily that yeast slows down when it gets cold, but dies when it gets too hot.)

[JanieM]

Second what Roger Moore said.

The test I used was to warm the water, stick a finger in it, and drip a drop onto the other wrist. If it didn't feel either cold or hot, that was about right.

[freelunch]

JanieM, yes, I concur with working with an experienced baker. Knowing when the dough feels right helps. Second best is just practicing. If you pay close attention to what works and how things go wrong, your results will get better quickly.

[joel]

The big snag with yeast is patience. If its old, for example, it will take a long time to get working. A lot of people like to use instant rise yeast because it activates faster, but there are drawbacks (i.e. all my internalized timing comes out wrong).

[Incertus]

Prop 8 in California is getting all the gay-hating publicity, but in Florida, we have a gay-hating amendment to fight as well, and a gay group at the FIU Law School has taken some interesting measures to fight it. When local fundies wouldn't debate the measure, they invited the Phelps clan. The fundies are a little upset about being tied to the Phelps, and I'm eating it up.

[Jesurgislac]

Oh god, Obsidian Wings has fallen: the comment threads are paged.

[Prup (aka Jim Benton)]

Okay, I give up. I live on E14th between K&L, and have for 6 1/2 years, and 11 yrs before that on Coney Island Ave between M & N, but I've never been to DiFara's. I've never been a big pizza lover, and my wife has a tomato allergy so I decided it was one thing I could give up -- I won't give up on baked ziti or good sausage and peppers. But I'll have to get a slice there tomorrow.

I've got about 200 pages left in the Val McDermid book I'm reading, so I've got something to do while I wait on line -- the place is ridiculously popular -- and my budget has expanded enough to afford it.

I'll report back to you all tomorrow night. (Btw, my wife has lived in the area all her life, we're in her parent's house, but she's P.S. 199 and Murrow, so maybe I shouldn't be talking to you.)

[joel hanes]

I assume my comment that disappeared somehow offended the Gods of Moderation. I would repent my offense and atone if I knew what I had done to offend. Is it a rule that one can recommend a commercial establishment only as long as one does not link to their site?

[dons sackcloth and smears ashes on forehead]

[Incertus]

Sorry about that. I completely missed the whole food theme--I was too excited by the open thread. But if we're talking about pizza, about the best you can do in Fort Lauderdale is a little place near A1A on Sunrise named Franco and Vinny's. Great crust, and that's the real challenge down here.

[hairshirthedonist]

The pizza's generally good around Philly, but the cheese-steak dynamic is similar to what Eric describes for pizza in and around NYC. The best cheese steaks are found in South Jersey and the PA suburbs. Pizza shops in the burbs almost universally sell cheese steaks and they're way better than the ones you're likely to find in Philly (unless you go to Tony Luke's). Better bread and more meat. Geno's and Pat's both suck AFAIAC.

[JanieM]

Oh god, Obsidian Wings has fallen: the comment threads are paged.

As if that's not bad enough, it appears that if you click on a comment (in "Recent Comments") that appears on the 2nd page of a thread, you get taken not to the 2nd page, but to the 1st page. I hope that's a temporary quirk. Who's going to want to click past 10 or 15 pages of a long thread to get to the most recent comments?

:(

[Roger Moore]

FWIW, I think the two essential elements are time and good flour.

Absolutely. It's definitely worth getting proper bread flour rather than ordinary all-purpose flour. Higher gluten flour is good for bread, but it's especially important for making pizza crust. I also find that I like stone ground flour better than roller milled flour; at the very least the brand that I prefer is stone ground.

[vaux-rien]

Hey, I live within walking distance of DiFara's. They're charging $4 for a (small) slice now but it's still worth it, hell if anything it's cut down on the wait a little bit (although you still need lots of patience). Love that place.

I think that good Boston pizza beats average Manhattan pizza but I wouldn't say Regina rivals the places Eric mentioned (and to which I'd add Totonno out at Coney Island). Bertucci's makes a decent Neopolitan pie for a chain and the original Regina's is great for what it is but I'm partial to Little Steve's, Pino's in Cleveland Circle and of course Santarpio's in East Boston. On the other hand your average Boston pizzeria makes a better sub than anyplace I've been in New York.

Brooklyn does have an embarrassment of great pizza, it's still trial and error but it's rare to find anything that's not decent if not great. Brooklyn's like 3:1 good pizza to bad while midtown is like 1:4.

[Doctor Science]

Jes:

ordinary "bloomed" yeast

I wonder what you mean by that. Are there no bread machines in the UK? "Instant" yeast is the kind specified by bread machines: you mix it into the dry ingredients, with no need to proof it. Most US home bread bakers have moved to using instant yeast even for bread made by hand. I buy mine in quantity and keep it in the freezer.

Here's a page comparing the usual types of bread yeast sold in the US.

[Warren Terra]

If we repent of our manifold sins, is there hope of salvation from this Hades of paginated comments?

[Tom S]

V&T's also near Columbia U. is excellent. The best is John's pizzeria on Bleeker, as long as you eat it there.

The DC metro area is a pizza dead zone.

[Eric Martin]

Peeps: I have no idea why comments are now paginated, and in the absence of a suitable explanation, I recommend that we do the only logical and decent thing: blame publius.

Bad publius!

[Gary Farber]

I'm not sure anyone caught when I mentioned it in the earlier thread, earlier today, but, ow.

[Eric Martin]

Tom S: I mentioned John's in the post. Agree completely. Same with Lombardi's: they actually deliver to my apartment, but it just ain't the same.

[KCinDC]

Argh, please beseech Typepad to undo this incredibly annoying paging!

[orangejoke]

Ultimate Pizza on 57th & 1st Ave in midtown is good by the slice cheese pizza, assuming you stick to plain cheese or fresh mozzarella, the crust is thin and crispy, but still floppy and foldable. Not as good as DiFara's, but the best street pizza I've had in Manhattan in a long time. Not like the usual doughy mess that NY pizza has somehow turned into in NY. Anyone have any idea why? It used to be better.

[Bob L.]

My Bronx-born wife and I have lived in the DC area for four decades. She will not eat pizza here. When we used to visit her mother in the Bronx, we'd sneak off to Three Guys from Italy (on Burke Ave off White Plains Road) and bliss out. Our kids wanted to know why Mommy wouldn't eat pizza. "I do," she explained, "but there's no pizza in the DC area, just flatbread with cheese and ketchup." We finally got a couple of tolerable pizzerias here, but now my doctors won't let me eat cheese. Starving at the banquet.

Jersey diners are incomparable. Anyone who has occasion to drive near or through Exit 7 on the Turnpike must find the Mastoris in Bordentown, a legitimate competitor for best in the whole state. To my amazement, a few years ago a Jersey-style diner opened a couple of miles from where we live in Arlington, Virgina, and it's actually good. We hardly ever dine anywhere else any more.

Look at it this way: For the last 40 years we have lived almost 200 miles away from the Mastoris, and it's by far the restaurant we have eaten in the most.

(I have no interest in the Mastoris other than gastronomical.)

[Randy Paul]

Big Nick's on 71st & Columbus has a delicious whole wheat vegetarian slice: cauliflower, broccoli, black and green olives, spinach, feta, onions, bell peppers, zucchini, tomatoes, covered with tomato sauce and mozzarella. Terrific.

[Roger Moore]

they actually deliver to my apartment, but it just ain't the same.

Of course not. Great pizza is almost as ephemeral as souffle. You have to catch it during the golden time when the cheese has cooled enough that it doesn't burn the roof of your mouth (too badly, at least) but the crust hasn't turned soggy. Unfortunately, that period is shorter than the time it takes to deliver a pizza, unless you live so close to the pizzeria that delivery is pointless. Delivery is a choice of convenience over quality.

[The Modesto Kid]

I like the Lebanese places in Cobble Hill that serve something similar to but not exactly like pizza. Or did 10 years ago anyway -- I think they are still there.

I'm in Jersey (Essex Co.) and will affirm that the average slice around here is tastier than the average Manhattan slice IMO. Plus a friend of mine whose tongue I trust (the guy who hipped me to DiFara) just told me that StarLite pizza in West Orange is the best thing ever. (No slices though.)

[The Modesto Kid]

Is Sal and Carmines on the Upper West Side still good?

[Brian]

ALL the food in Manhattan is TERRIBLE. I just moved here from San Francisco, via Paris, and I am shocked, shocked at how terrible the food is here. Has something gone wrong? Has it always been a sham? I shit you not: the food in Fresno, CA is better than what you can get here for less than $200 per. What the fuck?

[Fraud Guy]

Best chicago pizza?

Skip Uno & Due--garbage; same with Lou Malnati's. You can eat them if you have to.

There's several spots on Taylor street where you can't almost pick wrong (wandered into some at random and were not disappointed after some wakes). Also various neighborhood south side places, though they tend to be sweet.

Re: Chicago Deep Dish, used to like Giordano's for a chain, but one spinoff in Naperville (Braconi's) took it to the next level.

[The Modesto Kid]

Brian: Have you spent any time on the Lower East Side? Some fantastically good and inexpensive Malaysian, Shanghainese, and Fujianese places there. Also: the best food in the world is close to Manhattan, at Kebab Cafe in Astoria.

[The Modesto Kid]

An interesting feature of the comments paging is, that it breaks the "Recent Comments" links on the front page -- they direct to the first page of comments for a particular post rather than to the last page.

[KCinDC]

Kid, by "interesting" you presumably mean "infuriating and criminally incompetent"?

Also, the paging starts at 20 or 25 comments. What's the point of that? Even if it didn't break anything, why would anyone want so few comments per page?

[Gary Farber]

Damn. The pain has just been getting worse and worse the past three hours. I've taken 3 oxycodone 325mg, plus ibuprofen, indomethicin, and aspirin, to no noticeable effect, in that time.

Many curse words. Ow.

I blame publius for biting me.

[The Pale Scot]

I unwillingly left the area some time ago, but back in the day Bella's on the corner 9th St.. and 6 Ave. was great, ( at least it seemed so late at night. There's a place on 7th Ave. between 45th and 44th and the Ray's 2cd Ave. and 13th was good.

Trust me, you don't know shitty pizza until you spend some time in Fl. I walked into a brick oven place that was run by Aussies! Everybody specializes in inconsistency.

As for the boroughs and Jersey, hey, that's where the Gumba's are!

[Surabaya Stew]

As a native New Yorker who spent 4+ years doing the reverse commute to Maplewood, New Jersey, I ate great pizza about 4 times a week from 3 different places in the small village center. Since returning to the city for employment last year, I have eaten pizza for lunch exactly twice! Sad to say this, but when it comes to pizza in the center of town, you're better off not bothering.

However, I do disagree with you about the delis and diners not being up to par in Manhattan. To be sure, you run even odds of being either satisfied or disappointed with your burger or sandwich, but one also finds those problems in Suburban and Outer Borough joints in about the same proportions.

[Jesurgislac]

Doctor Science: I assumed that what the commenter (not me, but I'd have to page back 3 to find out who) who used the expression "bloomed yeast" meant by it was the kind of dried yeast that comes in little greyish-white nodules that you put in warm sugary water and five minutes later they bloom, a garden of yeast in your bowl. (When I was small, that was the most exciting part of breadmaking: hovering over the bowl for the magic moment.)

KCinDC: This is a new function of Typepad's Six Apart blog structure. It happened to Slacktivist, too, also without warning, and also broke the "most recent comments" link. The 25-comments per-page is fixable - that's just what Typepad defaults to when it changes to paged comments, and it can be upped to 50 per page - but the pagination itself can't be got rid of, and the comments link is now permanently broken. This is Six Apart software, and from my experience with them on livejournal, they don't change "improvements" to their software just because customers asked them to: they probably don't regard ordinary blog users as customers, but as product that helps them sell advertising.

You can go to the latest page without paging through all the comments by changing the page number in the URL, of course - just pick a very high number and it defaults to the highest page number it can find.

[DN]

>> Jes: start with good bread dough

And there goes the argument that buying good pizza is too expensive. Outsourcing; good for the economy and good for pizza.

Man, how much time do you have on your hands, anyway.

DN

[LI Buffalo gal]

Thanks for the LI shout out for delis & diners too... so true. They're just not same, or really even available elsewhere. Especially the deli, they're everywhere, luckily it's one one of the survivors from the old neighborhoods amidst the "zip code as town" that is mostly LI.

My dad is a diner connoisseur (the retired fireman would never describe himself as such) and laments though that a good LI diner is getting harder to find.

As for Manhatten... I did find a good tiny place in the battery by accident, after previous days of mediocre mid-town pizza with Norweigan tourists (luckily they were happy with all pizza though).

Buffalo is currently my home, and they swear by their pizza... maybe compared to another part of the country, but it's just too thick for me.
Pizza, delis, diners & bagels, aahhhhh....that's what I crave every time I go back to LI.

[KCinDC]

Thanks, Jes. But the comments on Slacktivist have been paged for quite a while now. Why is ObWi only now being blessed with this "improvement"?

[KCinDC]

Hmm, Typepad introduced this idiocy more than a year ago and has been phasing it in. I guess we should count ourselves lucky to have escaped it for so long.

[russell]

It's some funky cajun hybrid with cornmeal on the crust and other eccentricities.

Dude, the cornmeal is keep the dough from sticking to stuff. There's nothing out of bounds about cornmeal on the bottom of the crust.

I have no comment on the "cajun" aspect, other than to say that pizza ain't cajun.

The best places in midtown won't even sell slices, and quite right too. They sell pies. Slices are for tourists.

Crazy talk, my friends.

Slices are for eating while walking around, or just while generally hanging out. If you know how to fold the slice properly, it's a one-handed meal.

Haven't had a slice in NYC for quite a while, so I can't comment on who's good and who's not. I will say that if you're talking about a national chain, you're not talking about good pizza. Period.

I'm also not going to wade into the Chicago-style issue, other than to say that where I grew up "pizza" did not mean "like lasagna, but made of bread".

Boston pizza is OK, but generally not world class.

I'm up on the north shore of Boston, my favorite slice these days comes from the Upper Crust. Dumb name, good pie. Thin, crisp, but flexible crust, pretty good tomato sauce, and the slices are big. One slice is a light lunch, two are a meal.

Not spectacular, but a good, solid, tasty, workmanlike slice.

"Hey, ya hungry? Let's get a slice."

Yum.

Thanks -

[BMAC]

Heresy! I have three words for you people: SAL AND CARMINE'S.

Broadway between 102nd and 103rd.

[Uncle Kvetch]

I'm going to put in a good word for John & Tony's West on 9th Ave between 40th & 41st. Granted, the place on the corner when I lived in Astoria was a notch better (and cheaper), but J&TW does a very solid NYC-style pie.

[Gary Farber]

"Hmm, Typepad introduced this idiocy more than a year ago and has been phasing it in."

That indicates that the owners have some control; certainly they can at least expand it to 50 comments per page.

[John]

If it ain't Chicago Deep Dish, it ain't pizza.

Gah, so annoying. I enjoy Chicago deep dish well enough, but thin crust pizza is pretty clearly the original form, with deep dish as a development of it. Question: which kind of pizza more resembles pizza in Italy? Answer: not deep dish.

If you prefer deep dish, more power to you, but don't pretend that it's the only true kind of pizza, because that's just totally absurd.

[bedtimeforbonzo]

As a fellow Italian -- my great grandfather and grandmother arrived at Ellis Island from Abruzzi -- my mouth did some major watering reading JanieM's post about her grandmom's pizza.

Nothing beats real Italian, minimalist cooking.

No fair, JanieM -- I really want some now.

And I'll join Warren Terra with some repenting if it gets our old look back.

To our recent denzien of San Franciso and Paris (I'm too lazy right now to remember if I have to "next page" or "previous page" to get his name): I've had some very good meals, and decently priced, in New York's Little Italy. (Also had some awesome food in San Fran's Little Italy; it was a long time ago, but I believe it's called North Beach or North Something.)

Hairshirt: This wait until Wedensday for the World Series to start is killing me. I hope it doesn't kill our mojo. Stairs' Game 4 home run started making me think this might really be our year. Go, Phils!

[JanieM]

bedtimeforbonzo: I really want some now.

Don't we wish.

Open thread or not, I decided I should cut that comment to a fraction of the size it wanted to be lest it grow into a full-blown memoir.

But who can forget the cavatelli (which we pronounced something like "cavadills," and which we also sometimes made from scratch -- great fun for kids); the minest' (a pot of greens always simmering on the stove); the quiche-like pie with ham in it on Easter; the fish feast on Christmas Eve, with a cold salad made with bacala (dried cod), the pizzelles...........

Sigh.

[JanieM]

Not to mention the smell of green peppers frying, or the supplies of fried green pepper and sausage sandwiches on crusty bread that my grandma and her friends brought along on our train trip to California when I was 11.

It's hard to believe I'm not that far from being as old as those "old ladies" (as they seemed to me at the time) were then.

[russell]

As a fellow Italian -- my great grandfather and grandmother arrived at Ellis Island from Abruzzi

Dude! Mine also (along with great-grandmother), from Emilia-Romagna, near Bedonia.

the quiche-like pie with ham in it on Easter

Pizza rustica!

Hey don't forget the arborio rice pie, also for Easter, or sfingi di San Giuseppe.

Also -- in Boston, pizza-wise there's Santarpio's, in Chelsea, right by the entrance to the tunnel. A local townie tradition. They're rude as hell (also kind of a local townie tradition) but the pie is good.

I'm going to go eat something now. Right now.

Thanks -

[The Crafty Trilobite]

Gary Farber, oops, you're in North Carolina, right? I think I memory-merged some posts from you and publius re primary participation.

Don't really wanna live in North Carolina either, but not as bad as Texas.

[JanieM]

Russell, I couldn't remember the name of the Easter pie, but I think we called it something else, not pizza rustica. Maybe something like "pizza-gain" (an attempt at the phonetics). (And google reveals that in fact it is called pizzagain. Color me bemused.)

In later life I realized that a lot of her words for things must have been dialect words, but that wasn't the kind of thing you could have a logical conversation with her about. Also, she left Italy at maybe 6 years old, so her memories of Italy itself were pretty faded; her "Italianness" was heavily shaped by the early 20th century Brooklyn immigrant version.

[Eric Martin]

As a fellow Italian -- my great grandfather and grandmother arrived at Ellis Island from Abruzzi

Bari and Napoli here.

I've had some very good meals, and decently priced, in New York's Little Italy.

It's gotten too touristy lately, and the quality of food has fallen off in recent years.

To our recent denzien of San Franciso and Paris...

Also pleading laziness in turning back pages to recall the author of the comment.

But as for NYC food in general: if you know where to look, it's some of the best anywhere.

Shoot me an email if you want suggestions. I'm always happy to talk food.

[Random Person]

You are right about Jersey. I've been away for about 15 years, they have the best pizza made in small family shops. They also have the best bagels.

[Gary Farber]

"They also have the best bagels."

Fighting words. Kossars. Bagel Hole?

I think not.

[Larry D.]

Check out Staten Island. DeNino's is my favorite all-around and they have a really good scungilli salad, but don't do slices.

Brothers II is great for a sicilian slice, and Joe and Pat's for thin crust.

The Roadhouse has a really good clam pie, and Royal Crown Bakery has a really good "grandma's" slice.

By all means, stop by Alfonso's for a canolli--best in North America.

[Anarch]

tgirsch: Unlike the abomination that is Chicago Style "pizza" (they've got a lot of nerve calling me a cheesehead when they're the ones with an apparent most-cheese-per-slice arms race going on)

Proper stuffed Chicago-Style pizza is food of the gods. Deep-dish is super good too, but it's hard as hell to do right and I don't know that I've ever had it done properly.

JanieM: No no no no no mozzarella.

Uh, what? If it's good enough for the Neapolitans, it's good enough for me.

Checking in from Madison, WI, we have two outstanding pizza places and several good ones. The outstanding ones are Pizza Brutta, which uses an actual Neapolitan wood-fired oven and makes true Neapolitan-style pizza; and Ian's Pizza, which is about as crazily innovative as it gets. [Most famous ones: mac and cheese, steak and fries, and chicken bacon ranch.] I'll also name-check Falbo's and Pizza Extreme for the best deep-dish and Chicago-Style stuffed respectively.

Gary, I think there's a new Neapolitan-style pizza place in Durham but I coulud be wrong. If you're able, check it out!

[Gary Farber]

Someone should mention that there's some good pizza in New Haven, too. There, I've said it.

But I'm still in a near-perpetual outrage over the hoax pulled on most of the country, if not the world, in making them think that bagels are crappy bread doughnuts.

It's just wrong.

Also, that there's such a thing as "nova lox."

[Gary Farber]

Anarch, my sweetie, J---- points out to me that it'd be hard to check out this place in Durham without a name, or some kind of clue.

[The Modesto Kid]

Gary: I would stand Sonny's bagels in South Orange up against Kossar's bagels. Though not of course their bialys -- I don't think Sonny's even makes bialys but they could certainly not compete.

[Anarch]

Anarch, my sweetie, J---- points out to me that it'd be hard to check out this place in Durham without a name, or some kind of clue.

I assumed your research-fu would be sufficient :)

[Slightly longer answer: I don't actually know. Hopefully a kind samaritan will drop by to tell us...]

[Anarch]

Also, that there's such a thing as "nova lox."

Sure there is. It's just bloody hard to come by.

[Gary Farber]

Open thread: it's all incidental.

And racists for Obama.

[Gary Farber]

"It's just bloody hard to come by."

Lox is salt-brine-cured salmon. Accept no substitutes.

It's salty.

Nova Scotia smoked salmon is smoked salmon.

Two different things entirely.

Salty real lox went out of fashion except with old-fashioned Jews decades ago. Even in the Seventies it was getting hard to find. Nowadays it's almost impossible.

[Anarch]

Salty real lox went out of fashion except with old-fashioned Jews decades ago. Even in the Seventies it was getting hard to find. Nowadays it's almost impossible.

My experience with NYC food is minimal to non-existent, but on one of his shows Anthony Bourdain claimed to have found true nova lox there. It's entirely possible that he was speaking imprecisely, as per the above, but I would think he's foodie enough to know (and care about) the difference.

[I should add, btw, that while my experience with True Lox is minimal, my uncle makes some seriously good gravlax...]

[hilzoy]

I put in a ticket to Typepad asking them to please please make comment pagination optional. While there, I switched it to 50 comments per page. I then got a response saying: the owner has to submit a ticket. So I turned into Moe and submitted the same ticket. We shall see what happens.

Argh.

[The Modesto Kid]

The place in NYC to get brine lox is Russ and Daughters' deli on Houston Street. You can probably also get it at Zabars or at the Sturgeon King.

Russ and Daughters' is one of the very nice food bits of NYC. Also, Jonah Schimmels' Knishes close by.

[Gary Farber]

I'm saying that "nova" isn't lox. It just isn't. It's smoked salmon. "Lox" is salt-brine-cured. There can't be any such thing as "Nova lox," by definition. No matter how many ignorant grocers say otherwise.

Lox:

Lox is salmon fillet that has been cured. In its most popular form, it is thinly sliced—less than 5 millimetres (0.20 in) in thickness—and, typically, served on a bagel, often with cream cheese and capers.

Noted for its importance in Ashkenazic Jewish cuisine, the food and its name were introduced to the United States through Eastern European Jewish immigrants.[1][2] The term lox derives from Lachs in German and לאַקס laks in Yiddish,[3] meaning "salmon". It is a cognate of Icelandic and Swedish lax, Danish and Norwegian laks, and Old English læx.

Sometimes called regular or belly lox, lox is traditionally made by brining in a solution of water or oil, salt, sugars and spices (the brine). Although the term lox is sometimes applied to smoked salmon, that is a different product.