Pizza-consumption idiosyncrasies

[Chris Hennes]

That does sound good. Maybe next time... GR - never heard of it, what IS it?

[ambra]

Left over spaghetti is best pan fried in olive oil or butter til the some of the bits get crunchy. Fantastic.

For pizza, whether or not I eat the crust depends on how good or bad it is.

[KaffeeKlatsch]

Left over spaghetti is best pan fried in olive oil or butter til the some of the bits get crunchy. Fantastic.

This put on a slice of buttered bread that is folded over as mentioned further above is the best use of leftover spaghetti.

[Beebs]

And while we're on the subject, ain't nothing wrong with cold left-over spaghetti, either. What is it about those cold tomato-based leftovers? Why do they taste so good the morning after? Somewhere, were the great gods of partying taking care of us? Did one of them say to the other, "But Bacchus, what nourishment will your acolytes take the next morning?'

To which Bacchus replied, "Don't worry. Behold the tomato."

How about a cold left-over spaghetti sandwich? My mom would make a sandwich out of cold left-overs like spaghetti or navy beans or potato salad, but in these instances always one slice of bread folded over. Mmm, carbs and carbs.

I'll raise your carbs with more carbs - the Stuffing (Dressing) Sandwich. Leftover turkey bread stuffing between two slices of squishy bread and a drizzle of leftover gravy.

YES! One more month till Canadian Thanksgiving!

Back to pizza.... I bet a turkey dinner pizza would taste really delicious...gravy, turkey, stuffing, cranberry, on top of a pizza crust.

[Mr Holloway]

How about a cold left-over spaghetti sandwich? My mom would make a sandwich out of cold left-overs like spaghetti or navy beans or potato salad, but in these instances always one slice of bread folded over. Mmm, carbs and carbs.

Cold spaghetti sandwich

I love this place

Shane

[Jaymes]

Is this still a pizza thread? Did I take a wrong turn down to Hades? Who dunks pizza in anything, let alone salad dressing? At first I thought the posters were kidding, but now I'm not so sure. Pizza with ranch, russian or any kind of dressing is one of the weirdest things I can imagine. I'm not a big fan of cold pizza (yes, there are those times in life when it is unavoidable or preferable to nothing at all) but even cold pizza deserves better than dunking.

I grew up in New York. I lived in New Mexico for a few years, and then moved to CA. I have never seen or heard of anyone in these three places dunking a slice of pizza. If this means I've lived a sheltered existence I admit I'm glad. Where in America is this custom practiced?

And as for eating the middle of the pizza but not the edges, eating only the middle of anything is kinda creepy, whether it be pizza or a sandwich. And wasteful. If you don't appreciate the crust, you must be eating lousy pizza. In which case I'm guessing it isn't so great in the middle, either.

To each their own! I like the middle; the crust, not so much. But then, I am not big on bread in general. Does that mean I shouldn't be allowed to enjoy my pizza????

I am nominating this for one of eGullet's most silly threads of all time.

Golly. I was thinking it was one of the best.

[Mr Holloway]

Back to pizza.... I bet a turkey dinner pizza would taste really delicious...gravy, turkey, stuffing, cranberry, on top of a pizza crust.

MMMMM, I think this would work

Shane

[annabelle]

Cold spaghetti sandwich

I love this place

Shane

The cartoon show "King of the HIll" beat us to the punch on the spaghetti sandwich years ago. It is one of the character Bill's favorite things to eat.

[Katie Meadow]

The way this debate is being cast is sort of fascinating in and of itself: the pizza "deserves" better than dunking? What does that mean? How does the pizza "deserve" anything at all? Hot pepperoni pizza dunked into cold ranch dressing tastes good, in my opinion. I like the temperature, texture, and taste combination. I don't even think it's that unusual: ranch dressing is a pretty common dip for that appetizer that consists of pepperoni baked inside of dough (does that have a name?). The addition of cheese and tomato sauce doesn't seem like that fundamental a change, as to render the dipping offensive.

Right you are, and I apologize. I would still be curious to know where this pizza-dipping habit originated, as it's a new one on me. Clearly I don't hang out anywhere that it's practiced.

[Shelby]

The way this debate is being cast is sort of fascinating in and of itself: the pizza "deserves" better than dunking? What does that mean? How does the pizza "deserve" anything at all? Hot pepperoni pizza dunked into cold ranch dressing tastes good, in my opinion. I like the temperature, texture, and taste combination. I don't even think it's that unusual: ranch dressing is a pretty common dip for that appetizer that consists of pepperoni baked inside of dough (does that have a name?). The addition of cheese and tomato sauce doesn't seem like that fundamental a change, as to render the dipping offensive.

Right you are, and I apologize. I would still be curious to know where this pizza-dipping habit originated, as it's a new one on me. Clearly I don't hang out anywhere that it's practiced.

For me it seems it started when Pizza Hut began selling hot wings along with pizza.

[Chris Hennes]

I don't know if it's regional: I don't know that many people who do it, but I'm sure I picked it up in college (in Iowa). It might be more driven by late-night attempts to improve the garbage college-town pizza we ate than anything else.

[Mr Holloway]

Right you are, and I apologize. I would still be curious to know where this pizza-dipping habit originated, as it's a new one on me. Clearly I don't hang out anywhere that it's practiced.

Now you have me very curious as to when this trend started.

My first memory of dipping sauces, was when a local pizza chain would sell strips of crust (Crazy bread), with some different sauces. We would use the sauces for pizza too.

That is 20+ years ago.

Shane

[Mano]

Up until she was about 10 my daughter, who loved pizza always took off the toppings including the sauce and cheese, and ate only the crust.

[judiu]

Hungry Howie's still sell Crazy Bread,(urm...) Papa John's offers 'Garlic Butter sauce' for crust dipping (again, urm...), I find the cold, adhered toppings the best part of leftover pizza, and I think that Romaine might work better tempura'ed than iceberg. Mix the ranch with a little soy and a dribble of siracha, and Wong's your uncle! (Sorry)

[slkinsey]

The way this debate is being cast is sort of fascinating in and of itself: the pizza "deserves" better than dunking? What does that mean? How does the pizza "deserve" anything at all? Hot pepperoni pizza dunked into cold ranch dressing tastes good, in my opinion. I like the temperature, texture, and taste combination. I don't even think it's that unusual: ranch dressing is a pretty common dip for that appetizer that consists of pepperoni baked inside of dough (does that have a name?). The addition of cheese and tomato sauce doesn't seem like that fundamental a change, as to render the dipping offensive.

I would be the first person to say that you should eat what you like. It's hard to say that a foodstuff is "offensive" unless you're willing to lay down a few "standards" and of course not everyone will agree on those standards and the whole thing devolves into one of those tiresome "what is art" type conversations.

I personally, in my own aesthetic and tastes, find this sort of thing a bit horrifying. To me it represents a kind of college cafeteria derived layering of extra bland fat onto some other kind of fat. As if pizza piled high with meat and cheese isn't fatty enough. Fundamentally, a person might as well be dipping the pizza into sour cream. Or honey mustard. Or mayonnaise. Or whipped butter. Or cheese wiz. Or whatever a person's "universal dipping medium" might be. But why stop with pizza, right? Ranch dressing works just as well if you dip your breakfast sausage in there, or your roast turkey sandwich, or your strip steak, or your fried calamari, or your fried eggs, or your lasagna, or your braised pork belly, or your pot stickers or your carnitas taco. And so on. It's hard to think of anything that can't be a vehicle for the lightly-herbed, bland, creamy fattiness of ranch dressing if one is so inclined. But on some level all these practices boil down into vehicles for getting ranch dressing into one's mouth -- much in the same way that french fried potatoes for many people are fundamentally a vehicle for eating ketchup. And, of course, we all know people who will pretty much dip anything into ranch dressing (meaning, as far as I am concerned, that they more or less subsist on a diet of ranch dressing). I had a friend who, years ago, put mayonnaise on absolutely everything. Same deal.

All that said, I don't have a visceral reaction to dipping things in ranch dressing. It just depends on what it is that is being dipped. Something simple and unadorned that is designed to be adorned with a sauce (say, fried calamari or french fries or cut vegetables or even something like chicken nuggets) makes a certain amount of sense. But to my thinking, what makes dipping pizza into ranch dressing a little offensive to my personal sensibilities, is that pizza is a complete dish in and of itself that makes its own internal sense without the foreignness of the cool, bland, creamy fattiness of something like ranch dressing -- which to me in this context seems like an unwelcome "blanding down" and a gratuitous "fatting up" of an already whole food that should be delicious in its own right. If the pizza isn't delicious in its own right, that's a different problem of course. Personally, I'm not anxious to spend the calories on pizza that's not good enough to eat as-is. But I wonder: if this were a homemade pizza, if you had fermented the dough, ground the San Marzano tomatoes, sliced the artisinal soppressata, baked the pizza "Modernist Cuisine style" on a thick piece of aluminum under your broiler, etc... would you still be getting out the ranch dressing?

Again, in the interest of forestalling a potential flame-war, the above represents my own highly personal outlook which may not be relevant to most people. I'm sure I eat plenty of things that would horrify other people!

[Ufimizm]

I never heard of it or saw it until I went to college in 1994. I learned it from a friend who was raised in CA and TX, and we only ever did it with frozen pizza. It became much more common around here when a regional pizza chain (Topper's) started to sell Cheese sticks, Cheese on a buttered crust that came with your choice of ranch, nacho cheese, marinara, and garlic butter.

[Mr Holloway]

Slkinsey

I am going out to buy some ranch dressing right now

Very well written

Shane

Edited September 6, 2011 by Mr Holloway (log)

[Chris Hennes]

But I wonder: if this were a homemade pizza, if you had fermented the dough, ground the San Marzano tomatoes, sliced the artisinal soppressata, baked the pizza "Modernist Cuisine style" on a thick piece of aluminum under your broiler, etc... would you still be getting out the ranch dressing?

No, to be honest I've never put ranch dressing on homemade pizza (even that cooked non-MC-style!): I dip chain pepperoni pizza, and to the best of my recollection that's it. And I don't always do it. But you are right, I happen to like the taste and texture of the ranch dressing itself, and probably view the pizza as a condiment to the dressing, and not the other way around. Why they don't just sell "Hidden Valley Pepperoni and Tomato Ranch" is beyond me. Gel it up and serve it with a spoon!

[Katie Meadow]

Maybe a close second would be using ranch dressing instead of mayo on a BLT. That way you would get your cured pork, tomato and ranch in one bite.

[Shelby]

Maybe a close second would be using ranch dressing instead of mayo on a BLT. That way you would get your cured pork, tomato and ranch in one bite.

I've done that, too.

[heidih]

I have posed the question "When did Ranch dressing take over the world?" here. Chime in!

[Jaymes]

Many of the pizza joints around here (Houston) sell "pizza rolls." I have no idea if this is a nation-wide thing. As I have said before, the bread isn't my favorite part of the pizza to begin with, and these pizza rolls seem to incorporate an even higher bread-to-good-gooey-stuff ratio, so I like these rolls even less.

But I do note that they come with several small cups of ranch dressing for dipping.

They probably do deserve it.

[Jaymes]

A pizza restaurant has outlawed dipping its pizza into ranch dressing. A rebellion has begun.

It is speculated that the practice began with "inebriated college students."

Pizza & Ranch Dressing Rebellion

[jsmeeker]

I first learned of dunking pizza in ranch dressing when I was in college. The practice has been around for a long time.

[Kouign Aman]

I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one here that has eaten cold pizza 'the morning after' while standing in front of an open fridge.

I'll see your morning-after fridge pizza and raise you a few morning-after kitchen table "it should still be fine" pizzas.

How about some 'have it delivered to the desk on Monday evening, store it on the top shelf and have it for dinner Monday - Thursday" pizza? Where "some" = ~ 20 weeks thereof. Pizza is apparently indestructable, and my workplace is somewhat chilly.