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Comment by _ZeD_ | Hacker News Reader

As an Italian, that... "things"... in the article are not pizzas

The most important lesson I took from living in new england was to never argue food with anyone from Boston, Chicago or New York. Pizza and the regional opinions surrounding it, are more part of their identity than language or religion.

Baseball and politics are the safe topics. An article about pizza and subways ... say far away.

The examples shown are all quite traditional and conservative.

If you go to a lot of college towns you can get a pizza topped with taco ingredients, or fried chicken and bleu cheese, or even pesto sauce and cheese-filled tortellini.

Having these flavors in college towns may explain why midtown pizzarias catering to commuters dabble in these strange combinations as well.

But fried chicken on pizza is literal heaven.

- Use buffalo sauce, top with bleu cheese and bacon, and dip the crust in ranch for an amazing Buffalo chicken pizza.

- Use ranch sauce, top with pickles and jalapenos, and at the last second (like before the bite) top with a very acidic slaw for a Hot Chicken Pizza.

Any culture can redefine what pizza means.

There are quite a lot of foods and beverages which have a protected name bound to the ingredients that are allowed to be used to create it in a specific way. Take Mozzarella in general or for a local example beer in Germany(Reinheitsgebot).

It is not far fetched that Italian Pizza could be a candidate for a TSG marking. There are individual pizzas which already are protected, take Pizza Napoletana for example.

We're talking about NY Pizza, not Italian or Napoletana.

But it's usually labeled with the regional descriptor intact, e.g., New York Style Pizza or Chicago Style Pizza. I think OP was just referring to the fact that pizza's region is Italian by default, and they are taking exception to the article omitting "New York Style", even though it was heavily implied, and apparent to all but a pedant.

You may have invented it, but NYC perfected it.

The only thing more overrated than New York pizza is New York bagels.

(Ok, I take that back, In-n-Out Burger is more overrated than both.)

But outside of New England "New York Bagel" is polite code for Jewish bagel, ie the type using unleavened bread. It means actual bagel, not bagel-shaped bread.

(I say jewish rather than kosher, because many of the best bagel places don't qualify as kosher. At Vancouver's best bagel place (siegels) you can get cheese on your Montreal smoked meat bagel.)

What's a non-Jewish New York Bagel?

I've never heard of "Jewish bagel".

Montreal bagels are "Jewish", and are the opposite of New York bagels.

A Jewish bagel weighs about three times as much as a non-Jewish bagel, and is about three times as dense. It doesn't have the airy, bread-like consistency that a non-Jewish bagel has. As my Jewish friends like to say (paraphrasing), "If I can throw it at your head and risk knocking you out, then it's a Jewish bagel."

I've never had a bagel that was "airy", but I've also never had one that was made without yeast. They're normally pretty chewy, but definitely not unleavened. You boil and then bake them.

Jewish bagels have holes. Non-jewish bagels, the ones with yeast, often rise so much as to occlude any hole. They are more hamburger bun than bagel.

Are "Jewish bagels" what you call matzoh? Or is this a type of bagel with which I am unfamiliar?

No, they're referring to real bagels (chewy, with a shiny exterior) as "Jewish", as opposed to fluffy-white-bread-roll-with-a-hole that is sometimes marketed as a bagel.

I am certain that "chewy with a shiny exterior" bagels that I get at a bakery are made with yeast. They aren't some sort of secret or rare thing any place I've been, from New York to Arizona.

The mass-produced-in-a-factory-with-lots-of-preservatives bagels (e.g. Lenders) are very different, but also obviously made with yeast, and they don't really resemble fluffy white bread IMO.

When I go to my local grocery store in the northeastern US (the chain is in fact owned by a Jewish family), both kinds are available, the one in the bakery area and the other on the shelves with rolls.

Talking about these as though the dividing line was Jewishness or the use of yeast strikes me as both weird and incorrect.

Absolutely, sandworm101 is wrong about yeast and I clarified that up-thread.

All bagels are leavened (real bagels with yeast, whether commercial or sourdough, but I'd be surprised if even 1% of bad bagels are made with non-yeast leavening). The difference between an airy bagel and a tough bagel is the type of flour (high gluten) and the cooking process (boiled then baked).

New York style pizza is frickin horrible. those thin floppy slices can't support any reasonable amount of toppings. I actually prefer Domino's over most New York style pizza, and Domino's is pretty bottom of the barrel. The worst offender is the New York style cheese pizza which is basically just an oversized soggy triangular cracker which appears to have been dipped in oil. Blech.

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