Blogetry in Motion...

Those of you that know me, know that I am a self proclaimed pizza snob. I am always on the search for the perfect slice. I even attended the International pizza expo in Las Vegas a few years ago. I think it's safe to say that I am a very dedicated pizza lover. Well, tonight we tried a new pizza place and it happened to be pretty good, especially for mid-west pizza which can be absolutely terrible. It was the inspiration for this post about pizza. Here goes:

We'll start with a little background. In my opinion, there are two basic types of pizza out there. There's New York style which is thin, a little crispy on the bottom and slightly floppy at the end when you hold it by the crust and Chicago style which is a thick, deep buttery crispy crust. Chicago usually has more sauce, more cheese and in some cases, the sauce is on top of the cheese. Chicago pizza is not my thing, I'm a New York style pizza kind of guy. Here's a list of what makes up the perfect slice.

• The first bite of the first slice should burn the little part of the roof of your mouth right behind your top two front teeth. This means the pizza is fresh out of the oven and has not been sitting around and reheated. The little piece of skin that dangles down for the next two days is a small price to pay for pizza perfection.

• There should be just enough sauce to very lightly cover the dough. Large globs of sauce should never spill out from the slice when taking a bite, that means there is too much.

• The sauce mixed with the cheese should give the area where the cheese meets the crust a nice orangey color. If it's a darker red, it's no good. Any place that uses the same sauce on their pizza as they do on their pasta should be shut down for pizza abuse.

• When holding a fresh slice the proper way, (with the thumb and middle finger below the crust and pointer finger above, bending the crust slightly) the bottom of the crust should stay flat until about 1-2 inches from the end where it should start to dip. If it dips earlier (or not at all), it's too crunchy, later, too soggy.

• Barbeque chicken, artichoke-sundried tomato-balsamic goat cheese, Buffalo Chicken, Thai peanut-sprout-zucchini, are not pizzas, they are flatbreads. I enjoy some of them, but don't consider them to truly be pizzas. Pepperoni, sausage, peppers, olives and onions are more traditional toppings. I however, consider myself a purist and almost always go with just pepperoni.

• Finally, pizza slices are triangles, not squares! Square slices are total bullshit and should be banned worldwide. I freakin hate that. There's no crust to hold, it gets it all over your hands and you always end up with those stupid little corner triangle pieces that are almost all crust. Pahhhh-tooey!

Now for the artistic component of this post. Pizza inspires me so much, that it brings out the very, very hidden sensitive artistic side in me. In honor of pizza I have written the following poem. While at first you may think it's a little on the "simplistic side", take a closer look. Yup, it's written in perfect Iambic Pentameter.


This poem's about the best food you can eat
The taste of it is one you cannot beat.

With cheese and sauce and toppings you can choose
"We're having pizza" is my fav' rite news.

That pepperoni on a mound of cheese
Just give another slice to JewBoy please.

A crust that's crisp then soft is where it's at
I don't want one that is too thin or fat

In summary, I'll tell you how I feel
I'd love to have pizza for ev'ry meal


You may be asking yourself why this type of poetic meter sounds familiar? Well, that's because it's what Shakespeare used in his plays and sonnets. You weren't expecting that level of sophistication from this blog were you?