Is Wolfgang Puck the N.W.A. of pizza? The answer to this and other provocative questions that could get you punched right in the mouth is to be found in the foodie baiting documentary The Best Pizza Is In L.A., written and directed by Peter Ferriero. Ferriero immediately opens with a declaration that, being a good Jersey boy, he always felt the finest cheese slice ever is served in Brothers Pizza on Long Island. After establishing that Ferriero understands the basic laws of pizza gravity, he turns around and makes a nutso statement like Los Angeles has the best pizza in the country. That is blasphemy with the works; I am talking heresy with extra cheese. Ferriero visits several Los Angeles pizzerias, several bent on innovating and elevating the famous foldable street food.
To join him on this journey into culinary delusion are essentially three separate groups of fellow travelers: celebrity chefs who have won TV competitions on Food Network, famous writers and performers, as well as cast members from Ferriero’s longtime favorite show, Beverly Hills 90210. Apparently, pizza is the gateway Ferriero uses to travel back to a simpler time of a childhood world filled with Super Nintendo and 90210 episodes. While he never manages to get Wolfgang Puck to do an onscreen interview, he lands two dream dates with Donna Martin, I mean Tori Spelling. In another interview, Brian Austin Green warns Ferriero that by declaring L.A. pizza has outrun N.Y. pizza, he is starting a war that he will not be able to contain.
First off, let me establish my background pizza perspective. I grew up on weekly doses of Ryan’s Pizza back in the 70s and 80s in Bar Harbor, Maine. It was New York Style, advertised as the best pizza north of Flatbush. It was. Every bite of pizza I have had ever since Ryan’s shut down has been chasing that ooey gooey yesterday, as the stretched mozzarella strings never broke. It wasn’t until I moved to Tucson that I came close to capturing that elusive taste of pizza perfection. Part of Tucson’s dominance among cities in the foodie realm is the pizza. As it is a desert city made up of transplants, the different regional pizza traditions brought with them have made Tucson a tomato sauce-filled melting pot of great pizzerias. As it said on a Brooklyn Pizza ad on a bus bench twenty years ago, pizza is Tucson’s favorite narcotic (and that’s saying something)!
A chef adds fresh ingredients to a pizza inside a Los Angeles restaurant kitchen.
“The best documentary to start a serious food fight over, so watch it already.”
However, Ferriero has it pointed out in The Best Pizza Is In L.A. that everyone feels like their city has the best pizza in the country. It is also pointed out that the universally held view that New York has the best pizza is enforced by the same people who throw spark plugs and D-cell batteries at umpires in baseball games in the Bronx. There is also an interesting parallel brought up between pizza and hip-hop, as rap started in New York, but was later enhanced in Los Angeles. By applying that model to pizza, that would put Puck’s Spago in the N.W.A. comparison. But a large part of the film is spent debating whether what Puck does is even pizza. A $130 Spago take-out pizza is tasted, with pink salmon and caviar on top of a dry wood-fired crust. Is this an expensive pizza or a glorified cop-out for a bagel?
The Best Pizza Is In L.A. also shows how L.A.’s lack of reputation on planet pizza eventually positioned it on a path of constant innovation of the form. New York pizza will be forced to stay the same, as classics remain classics. Chicago will always have the pendulum swinging over the deep dish as to whether it is a casserole or a pizza. Detroit style is crack, and because it is crack, you will just keep eating it. But if any of those cities tried to radically advance their versions of the pizza, then it stops being what the city is tied to. That’s why the West is the best for pies, as we have nothing to live up to and nowhere to go up up. So maybe the shifting plates of time slipping into the future created the perfect pizza quake that now covers L.A., as some of those pies look really good. I also happened to eat some amazing New York-style pizza slices at TNT Pizza in Chula Vista last weekend. So maybe this West Coast pizza thing is something that is possible, despite sounding like a Ripley’s Believe It or Not.
The quality that The Best Pizza Is In L.A. seeks is twofold: of course, the innovative pies are showcased, particularly those that incorporate other culinary traditions. The other yardstick is how close the slice can get to the gold standard of the East Coast slice. It is interesting to see which ones come close, but it starts getting a little dizzy when they find slices even more New York than New York. And I trust the palates at work here, as I watch all the chefs here, like Brooke Williamson, Stephanie Izard, Mei Lin, and Joe Sasto every night on streaming while I eat supper. The actors highlighted, like Ray Romano and Joseph R. Gannascoli, are tri-state enough to know what they are talking about pie-wise. And the journalists like Allen Salkin are pitch-perfect, bitchy, making every bite reaction venomous gold. I never watched any 90210 except that made-up U4EA drug episode with Jennie Garth, but I like that Ferriero likes it so much. The Best Pizza Is In L.A. is the best documentary to start a serious food fight over, so watch it already. And order a pizza while you are at it.
"…the best documentary to start a serious food fight over..."
