I’m all worked up about pizza right now because our beloved President Obama has chosen to fly his Deep Dish Chicago style pizza from …
ST. FREAKIN LOUIS!
I’ll chalk this one up to higher priorities (fixin our economy, iraq, afghanistan, flying in the Jonas Brothers for his daughters ) and a limited experience with St. Louis and their history of ‘pizza’. Mister President, not all midwest pizza is the same.
Normally, when talking about pizza, people divide into two categories and start a ‘NY vs Chicago, Deep Dish vs Thin Crust’ war. Often, I argue that you’re comparing apples to oranges. Few can argue that pizza started in Italy and the original American concept of pizza was created (quite nicely) by east coast Italians in the US. Chicago Deep Dish is a different animal. It is only part-Italian and was a collaboration between an Italian American and a Texan who originally came to Chicago to run a Mexican restaurant .
Now we come to St. Louis. This city has embraced the “bar” or thin crust style pizza which is done quite well in many places in Chicago and other cities. I have no problem with thin crust pizza, and in fact am a fan of a few places in the Chicago area that make it well (Rosati’s, Barnaby’s, Jakes, Nick and Vito’s – or is it Vito and Nick’s – to name a few).
St. Louis, however, has chosen to top their version of thin crust pizza with an abomination, a processed cheese called PROVEL . This ‘cheese’ , created over 50 years ago by Hoffman Dairy (and Kraft) , ‘was developed to meet perceived demand for a pizza cheese with a “clean bite”: one that melts well but breaks off nicely when bitten.’
Sticks to your teeth like the worst movie theatre nacho cheese is what it does! Falls off the crust onto your lap is what it does! Silly St. Louisans! Pizza cheese is supposed to be gooey and stringy!
QUESTION: How can you think you’re going to get anything close to a Chicago style deep dish pizza from a city that created Provel? ANSWER: YOU AREN’T. You cannot trust any culinary expertise from a city that justifies ‘Provel’ as an acceptable cheese for a pizza.
More pizza rants to come. I have more about deep dish pizza, and a tasty anomaly originating from Morton Grove called Pequod’s. mmmmm…. Pequod’s