Downtown Toronto’s pace of population growth triples, outpacing suburbs’ ...

[harls]

Wtf is a Michigan dog? Those are all over Montreal. A steamed pork anus with sauerkraut or something. I always wondered what that had to do with Michigan.

[kool maudit]

i think they call them "coneys" in actual michigan.

[dc_denizen]

Originally Posted by isaidso

And why doesn't the pea meal bacon sandwich cut it? At one point it was to Toronto what the smoked meat sandwich was to Montreal. That it's popularity has waned is unfortunate, but I think it will make a come back as Torontonians rediscover themselves. Torontonians always seem in such a rush to embrace anything that's from somewhere else, but ignore anything that's their own. They have a 'foreign = good/sophisticated; local = low brow/to be discarded' mentality, but it's slowly changing as the city matures.

Montreal beats Toronto hands down when it comes to this, but Toronto is starting to look from within rather than simply mimicking everybody else.

Quebec: poutine
Montreal: smoked meat, steak spice, bagels, montreal hot dog
Halifax: donairs
Ottawa: beaver tails
Toronto: pea meal bacon sandwich (it used to be a Toronto staple, but not well known any more)
Calgary: ginger beef
Nanaimo: Nanaimo bars

Boston doesn't have a fishing industry for starters. Clam/sea food chowder is a food of the Maritimes and New England, but you can't get any more specific than that. The Campbell's Soup likes to put the word 'New England' on their cans, but they're a US company so that's what you'd expect.

Btw, deli and pizza aren't New York products. Most north American food is simply a north American adaptation of European or Asian food. Burgers, pizza, spaghetti and meat balls, steaks, etc. It's north American, but you can't really narrow it down any further than that.

This a risible argument. North Americans have their own distinct food culture. You might as well say Italians eat Chinese because noodles originated there. Jewish delis in NY, LA and Montreal are their own special thing that has evolved beyond the connections to immigrant cultures in the old country. Similarly for pizza, barbecue, etc etc.

In my view, New Jersey is entitled to claiming that's it's a mecca for pizza, for the simple reason that you can walk into nearly any random pizza place (and there are tons of them, nearly all indepedent, across the state), and know that you're going to get a pretty knockout product. In LA, or Toronto, or Phoenix, not likely. Similar concept for barbecue in TX or TN, etc. This is what allows a place to claim a specialization of a certain type of cuisine.

[MTLskyline]

Originally Posted by isaidso

And why doesn't the pea meal bacon sandwich cut it? At one point it was to Toronto what the smoked meat sandwich was to Montreal. That it's popularity has waned is unfortunate, but I think it will make a come back as Torontonians rediscover themselves. Torontonians always seem in such a rush to embrace anything that's from somewhere else, but ignore anything that's their own. They have a 'foreign = good/sophisticated; local = low brow/to be discarded' mentality, but it's slowly changing as the city matures.

Anthony Bourdain had one at Carousel Bakery in the St. Lawrence Market on his show. Next time I'm there, I'll definitely try one. I had never heard of it before!

Originally Posted by harls

Wtf is a Michigan dog? Those are all over Montreal. A steamed pork anus with sauerkraut or something. I always wondered what that had to do with Michigan.

I always thought it was a hot dog with spaghetti sauce on it?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_hot_dog

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

This a risible argument. North Americans have their own distinct food culture. You might as well say Italians eat Chinese because noodles originated there. Jewish delis in NY, LA and Montreal are their own special thing that has evolved beyond the connections to immigrant cultures in the old country. Similarly for pizza, barbecue, etc etc.

Nonsense. Europeans/Asians moved to north America and brought their cuisine with them. Over time it food morphed into something else. Nowhere did I say that it wasn't distinct. I clearly mentioned that it was adapted from the Old World ... which it was. To argue that it wasn't is risible.

In my view, New Jersey is entitled to claiming that's it's a mecca for pizza, .....

I don't care how popular or good people in NJ are at making pizza. It's not a NJ/NY product and isn't seen as one. NJ has no monopoly on good pizza; there are many cities that do it very very well. Quite frankly I find it arrogant and presumptuous to suggest that your neck of the woods has some sort of claim on it.

I've had your pizza and Halifax does it better, imo. Toronto? Surprisingly it's not something it does well.

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by MTLskyline

Anthony Bourdain had one at Carousel Bakery in the St. Lawrence Market on his show. Next time I'm there, I'll definitely try one. I had never heard of it before!

I watched it on youtube and Carousel's does look tasty. Torontonians over 40 seem to know what it is, but the newer generation and recent immigrants do not.

It's quite a shame really as it's a great sandwich and does speak to Toronto's passed as a hog processing centre ... they call this place Hogtown for a reason.

[losername]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Keep saying the same thing in spite of quite a few others contradicting you. Stop acting like your namesake, newbie. 48 posts, and perhaps you wasted a quarter of them on this topic.

And quite a few contradicting you so it seems. Stop sounding how your profile pic looks.

[kool maudit]

pizza is a new york metro thing. i mean, i love neapolitan/italian-style pizza -- it's all you can get here, and it's great, but it's a different animal. i miss american pizza. and that comes from new york.

halifax's pizza corner might be decent, isaidso, but there are at least 300 such corners in just the jersey side of the tri-state.

[dc_denizen]

Originally Posted by isaidso

I don't care how popular or good people in NJ are at making pizza. It's not a NJ/NY product and isn't seen as one. NJ has no monopoly on good pizza; there are many cities that do it very very well. Quite frankly I find it arrogant and presumptuous to suggest that your neck of the woods has some sort of claim on it.

I've had your pizza and Halifax does it better, imo. Toronto? Surprisingly it's not something it does well.

I have had good sushi in New Jersey, and good barbecue in DC. Neither of these meals led me to proclaim that NJ beat Tokyo for sushi, or that DC does barbecue better than Memphis or Nashville. Certain areas of the continent can be claimed, with out being arrogant, to specialize in certain foods, and lack in others. NY has bad Mexican food. the West coast has bad pizza, generally. NJ is lacking in good steakhouses.

Halifax is in Nova Scotia, not exactly the heart of Italian communities in North America which brought over and subsequently adopted their ancestral foods into things like NJ/NY pizza. Do I need to spell out the size and influence of the NJ Italian community, or are we going to get in a pissing match where you claim Halifax has more Italian influence than NJ?

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

i miss american pizza. and that comes from new york.

what, you no like pizza that looks like a fucking cake?


http://www.womansday.com/cm/womansda...ed-Pizza-2.jpg

or like someone puked on a piece of cardboard (i'm partial to this one)?


http://kitchenhacks.com/wp-content/u..._o-640x480.jpg

just defending our midwestern perversions of pizza....for the record i'm perfectly satisfied when i can find a good slice of NY/NJ style pizza that makes a little grease reservoir just so when you fold it and the cheese is freshish.

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

In my view, New Jersey is entitled to claiming that's it's a mecca for pizza, for the simple reason that you can walk into nearly any random pizza place (and there are tons of them, nearly all indepedent, across the state), and know that you're going to get a pretty knockout product.

It's true, and my favorite "New York" style pizza place here in St. Louis actually touts itself as being New Jersey style (my first and second fav are both proudly "NJ style"), although someone needs to hold my hot clammy midwestern hand and explain to me the difference between NY and NJ style pizza besides all of the pictures of The Boss.

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

Halifax is in Nova Scotia, not exactly the heart of Italian communities in North America which brought over and subsequently adopted their ancestral foods into things like NJ/NY pizza. Do I need to spell out the size and influence of the NJ Italian community, or are we going to get in a pissing match where you claim Halifax has more Italian influence than NJ?

No, we just need to establish that NJ/NY is just one region that does pizza very well. As has been said, north Americans adapted food that was brought over from the Old World. You don't need to be Italian to do that. Halifax and Toronto are testament to that.

Toronto has one of the largest Italian communties outside Italy and doesn't do it very well. Halifax has no Italian community to speak of, but across the board does pizza very very well. You can go to some hole in the wall and have confidence that it will be amazing. In Halifax is seems to be a Lebanese/Greek thing.

Your contention that you need to have an Italian community to specialize in pizza is based on the association between the two in NJ/NY. In other places it was other ethnicities that perfected the 'great north American pizza'.

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

halifax's pizza corner might be decent, isaidso, but there are at least 300 such corners in just the jersey side of the tri-state.

We're going to disagree here. NJ has 9 million people compared to 400,000 in Halifax? Of course there will be more outlets in NJ. Doesn't mean it's better; it does mean that more people will know about it.

Btw, I'd go to one's off Gottingen or Queen over Pizza Corner. Pizza corner is standard Halifax pizza, but the best ones I've had aren't on Blowers.

[Razor]

Here in Ottawa it seems like all the Italian named pizza places are owned and ran by Lebonese people...Go figure.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

I have had good sushi in New Jersey, and good barbecue in DC. Neither of these meals led me to proclaim that NJ beat Tokyo for sushi, or that DC does barbecue better than Memphis or Nashville. Certain areas of the continent can be claimed, with out being arrogant, to specialize in certain foods, and lack in others. NY has bad Mexican food. the West coast has bad pizza, generally. NJ is lacking in good steakhouses.

Halifax is in Nova Scotia, not exactly the heart of Italian communities in North America which brought over and subsequently adopted their ancestral foods into things like NJ/NY pizza. Do I need to spell out the size and influence of the NJ Italian community, or are we going to get in a pissing match where you claim Halifax has more Italian influence than NJ?

This seems a little mixed up to me. You're responding to isaidso's subjective claim about quality by making an abstract appeal to history and culture that seems to include a bunch of presumptions about what Nova Scotia doesn't have. Nova Scotia is a place that, understandably, Americans tend not to know the first thing about, so I am usually a little suspicious when see arguments like yours. In any case, you don't have to be Italian to make or eat good pizza, and a region doesn't have to be full of Italians in order for pizza to be popular there. Italians could make the same argument about New Jersey that you made about Nova Scotia.

I am also suspicious whenever I hear claims about food that are based on numbers of restaurants, how big the food is, how cheap it is, or how long it's been around for. I'd rather live in a city with a couple of good pizza places than a city where there's a mediocre one on every corner. The West Coast is not so bad now that Neapolitan-style pizza has become trendy (you are supposed to use San Marzano tomatoes, 00 Italian flour, etc., and each major West Coast city has a few of these places now), although that is a different animal from what you find around NYC or Chicago.

[dc_denizen]

Originally Posted by someone123

This seems a little mixed up to me. You're responding to isaidso's subjective claim about quality by making an abstract appeal to history and culture that seems to include a bunch of presumptions about what Nova Scotia doesn't have. Nova Scotia is a place that, understandably, Americans tend not to know the first thing about, so I am usually a little suspicious when see arguments like yours. In any case, you don't have to be Italian to make or eat good pizza, and a region doesn't have to be full of Italians in order for pizza to be popular there. Italians could make the same argument about New Jersey that you made about Nova Scotia.

I am also suspicious whenever I hear claims about food that are based on numbers of restaurants, how big the food is, how cheap it is, or how long it's been around for. I'd rather live in a city with a couple of good pizza places than a city where there's a mediocre one on every corner. The West Coast is not so bad now that Neapolitan-style pizza has become trendy (you are supposed to use San Marzano tomatoes, 00 Italian flour, etc., and each major West Coast city has a few of these places now), although that is a different animal from what you find around NYC or Chicago.

My original point that certain regions of the continent can claim to be meccas or certain cuisine, including pan-American foods like pizza or burgers. And tha there's nothing arrogant about recognizing NJ as such a region. Similarly for barbecue in TX, etc. Perhaps the number of Italians living their is important, perhaps not; I tend to think it is.

(Side note: I would be interested to know how many Italians were living in Toronto in 1900 vs today, and compare this percentage to that in NJ or Philly. Some people on this site want to overstate Toronto's history as a locus for immigration, which it really hasn't been until comparatively recently).

In New York City, there is indeed a crappy pizzeria on nearly every corner. NJ > NY pizza anyday. Thus, I'm certainly not arguing that quantity alone makes a region's specialization in a given cuisine. I'm also skeptical of any pizzeria that claims to only use Italian tomatoes and flour; shouldn't we support local ingredients and farmers?! This kind of uppity artisanal attitude usually means the cuisine in question is novel to the area, doesn't have the pedigree there etc...

isaidso seems to perceive that there is a US media bias or conspiracy to neglect Canadian contributions to North American culture, thus Halifax pizza isn't receiving its due. Halifax may be many things and not known to Americans, but can we really claim it as a "node" for good pizza? If we allow this to Halifax, shouldn't we allow it to about 50 other N. American cities and areas?

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

My original point that certain regions of the continent can claim to be meccas or certain cuisine, including pan-American foods like pizza or burgers. And tha there's nothing arrogant about recognizing NJ as such a region. Similarly for barbecue in TX, etc. Perhaps the number of Italians living their is important, perhaps not; I tend to think it is.

Why? Is this just a "hunch" sort of thing or is there actually something quantitative behind it?

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

(Side note: I would be interested to know how many Italians were living in Toronto in 1900 vs today, and compare this percentage to that in NJ or Philly. Some people on this site want to overstate Toronto's history as a locus for immigration, which it really hasn't been until comparatively recently).

If you don't actually know the statistics, then on what do you base the assumption that it's being overstated?

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

isaidso seems to perceive that there is a US media bias or conspiracy to neglect Canadian contributions to North American culture, thus Halifax pizza isn't receiving its due. Halifax may be many things and not known to Americans, but can we really claim it as a "node" for good pizza? If we allow this to Halifax, shouldn't we allow it to about 50 other N. American cities and areas?

Are you saying you're an expert on the caliber of Halifax pizza (and of the local pizza scenes across the rest of N. America) and therefore are personally qualified to testify that it's no better than these "about 50 other" places? Or are you simply assuming that to be the case?

And are you also doubting that the US media is more likely to recognise and publicize things within its own borders? I know that's definitely the case for the Canadian media...

[someone123]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

isaidso seems to perceive that there is a US media bias or conspiracy to neglect Canadian contributions to North American culture, thus Halifax pizza isn't receiving its due. Halifax may be many things and not known to Americans, but can we really claim it as a "node" for good pizza? If we allow this to Halifax, shouldn't we allow it to about 50 other N. American cities and areas?

I don't think there's a conspiracy, but US media coverage does tend to favour domestic events and culture, even if there may be more important or interesting things happening abroad. Actually many high profile chefs etc. have complained about how Americans prefer endless BBQ shows to more interesting international food shows. Memphis and Kansas City are more popular than Bangkok and Tokyo.

If we want to talk about food, one example where I see the double standard is when US TV shows talk about "Maine lobster" as if the state and the animal are practically synonymous. In reality, Atlantic Canada produces more lobster and even in New England some restaurants actually buy NS lobster, even though it can be more expensive. Americans aren't necessarily aware of any of this and watching TV won't teach them about it but it is nevertheless true. Americans typically don't appreciate this because they never see the outside perspective. They just figure that the foreign stuff isn't as important.

The idea of NJ being a pizza "node" doesn't bother me (I'm not sure what that really means to be honest), but it may be a contrived idea if the reality is that many different places all have their own variety of pizza and if preferences come down to a matter of taste. People often want to proclaim meccas even if that model doesn't fit reality very well.

Peameal bacon sandwiches are at least clearer because they are so obscure that there is no competition.

[dc_denizen]

Originally Posted by someone123

I don't think there's a conspiracy, but US media coverage does tend to favour domestic events and culture, even if there may be more important or interesting things happening abroad.

If we want to talk about food, one example where I see this is that US TV shows tend to talk about "Maine lobster" as if the state and the animal are practically synonymous. In reality, Atlantic Canada produces more lobster and even in New England some restaurants actually buy NS lobster, even though it can be more expensive. Americans aren't necessarily aware of any of this and watching TV won't teach them about it but it is nevertheless true. Americans often don't appreciate this because they never see the outside perspective.

The idea of NJ being a pizza "node" doesn't bother me (I'm not sure what that really means to be honest), but it may be a contrived idea if the reality is that many different places all have their own variety of pizza and if preferences come down to a matter of taste. People often want to proclaim meccas even if that model doesn't fit reality very well.

Dunno, I see PEI mussels and fish from the grand banks / nova scotia in the store all the time, advertised proudly as such, sometimes with little Canadian flags! Unfortunately, Americans have neglected much of their fishing industry allowing many fish products to be imported, as anyone shopping these days can see.

My own subjective experience is that one can walk into nearly any random shopping center or main street in NJ, and odds are you will find good pizza. This goes beyond just taste and preference--I have never lived anywhere else, or visited anywhere else where this is the case to the same extent. THis is my criteria for being a "pizza mecca".

[J. Will]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

(Side note: I would be interested to know how many Italians were living in Toronto in 1900 vs today, and compare this percentage to that in NJ or Philly. Some people on this site want to overstate Toronto's history as a locus for immigration, which it really hasn't been until comparatively recently).

I don't think there's any truth to your insinuation that people have claimed Toronto had a higher percentage of Italians than NJ or Philly in 1900, but you're welcome to give a link to this mystery post where this claim was made if you link. I suspect that as per usual, you won't be backing up your assertion that such a claim was made, because it's not true.

[J. Will]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

If you don't actually know the statistics, then on what do you base the assumption that it's being overstated?

Because that's what dc_denizen does. He makes things up and pretends that claims were made that were not.