Dear Mr. Stewart,
I noticed that in your recent rant against Chicago deep dish
pizza, in which you attacked it for its size and thickness (Freudian jealousy, Jon?)
and the fact that the sauce is on top, you didn’t say a word about the element
that matters most: the taste. I find it ironic that someone who routinely mocks
Republicans for being close-minded (which I totally agree with, by the way) would
attack something simply because it’s different. I find it even more surprising
that someone in New York City, which prides itself on having a million
different types of cuisine, would be so hostile to a different spin on a type
food, especially when it makes that food better (which deep dish does).
Full
disclosure: I’m not actually from Chicago. I’m a
lifelong resident of Lake County, Indiana. But would it surprise you to
learn
that we have our own New York Pizza place here? It’s called Sbarro, and
it’s in
the local mall food court alongside such fine eateries as Cinnabon and
Arby’s. Almost every mall across
the country has one, too, and people apparently love it so much the company went bankrupt.
And before you retort that that’s not real New York Pizza, I’ve been to
New York and have eaten real New York Pizza, and it’s just as
floppy and flaccid, bigger in total area per slice than in substance and
flavor.
Despite some unspoken animosity Chicagoans may harbor at
always being marginalized as “The Second City,” I actually like New York very
much myself. The culture, the things to see and do, the music, the food (joking
aside, I even do like your pizza, as a respectable second place). But one thing
I don’t like is your vanity, the belief that you’re number one in everything,
and your need to shove it down our throats. You added an antenna to make your
new building taller than the Sears Tower (we’ll never call it Willis), a move
everyone else can see is cheap. Before that, Macy’s bought out Marshall Field’s
and wouldn’t even let them keep the historic name, which they did for your
original Bloomingdale’s.
But you’ll never be able to beat our pizza with such cheating
tactics, let alone in a fair fight based solely on deliciousness. Chicagoans,
as well as Illinois suburbanites and wannabe-Chicagoan Region rats like myself,
are proud of our pizza, and no matter what you say on your show or at your
waste-of-time variety show rallies, it will never be second to anyone.
I’ll close with a little anecdote: I have family who live in
New York. Every time they come here to visit, we make sure to go to their
favorite pizza place (shout out to Aurelio’s Pizza), and it’s always a
highlight of their trip because they can’t get it in New York. And it’s not
just the deep dish they love; most often we get the thin-crust pizza. That’s
right: lifelong New Yorkers like our square-cut pizza better than the stuff in
their home city. And who can blame them?
Come to think of it, I stand corrected: Our thin-crust drops
New York Pizza down to third place.
Sincerely,
Bill Koester
Jim Cramer 2016!
