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PaperclipPerfector  15d ago (text post)   2889 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for March 14, 2025

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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Does pizza count? By now, most people's image of pizza is the American pepperoni style rather than the original Neapolitan Margherita style.

I had a chance to try Neapolitan style pizza by actually visiting Naples some 20 years ago. It was ok, but also not categorically different from other decent pizzas I’ve had. The ”authenticity” is much overrated.

Pizza definitely counts. I love American style pizza, but it's pretty much nothing like the Italian dish that it shares a name with.

New York pizza (by far the most popular US style I guess) and Neapolitan pizza are different, but not so much so that they’re wholly different dishes. For example, they use pretty much the same ingredients and are recognizably the same dish. Even in Italy Sicilian pizza is called ‘pizza [Siciliana]’ and is more different from Neapolitan pizza than New York pizza is.

I would say the most popular US style by far is mass market pizza chains, which is closest to NY style but isn't exactly the same. When I see NY style it's big, floppy slices which have maybe one or two toppings and you fold up to eat. I agree that's not super far off from Neapolitan pizza, but a Papa John's slice loaded down with toppings is a lot further away imo. And of course once you get to Detroit style or Chicago style (the best pizza style by far, don't @ me New Yorkers) it barely resembles the original any more.

NY style is crispy, while mass market Papa John’s / Pizza Hut are floppier, like the original Neapolitan (albeit with a heavier, thicker dough). Yes, you can add many weird toppings, but the Italians do that too (see their beloved “american” pizza with mini hot dogs and french fries on it, unironically a favorite of many Italians). Yes, you can get it with barbecue sauce as a base instead of marinara, but Italians have their own white pizzas that don’t have marinara either. Order a Pizza Hut pizza with tomato sauce and cheese for an Italian and they might call it (quite justifiably) a bad pizza, but it is pizza.

Huh, I'm not sure. Pizza took off so hard that now it's like there's competing visions of the food rather than one clearly right one and one clearly wrong one. When I was in college, I liked the margherita pizza they served, but it was mangled too. Big, round slices of tomato on each slice of pizza, along with basil in roasted whole leaf form. I'm not sure if I've actually ever tried the proper kind yet. Might be something you have to go to an urban area to get.

This reminds me of American sushi versus Japanese sushi. I think I prefer American by a lot -- maki rolls are way better than nigiri. Raw fish all tastes very similar to me, and I am apparently too unrefined to get much out of raw fish. Interesting texture, I guess.

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