The Everything Edition
The first and only post about bagels on this Substack (we promise)
Ab Ovo is a twice-weekly newsletter produced by Clay Dillow (CD) and Tim McKirdy (TM). If you enjoy our work, we’d love to have you as a subscriber (it’s free!). If you already subscribe, we appreciate the support — and don’t forget to forward this to a friend. Thanks for reading.
If you’ve never been to Naples, chances are you’ve probably never enjoyed a bonafide Neapolitan pizza. I don’t mean to be pedantic about this, and sound like those bores who insist you haven’t truly experienced Boeuf Bourguignon unless you’ve savored it at a Parisian bistro, stars twinkling behind you in the Seine. It’s just a fact.
In June 1984, an Italian named Antonio Pace and a group of Neapolitan pizza masters put into writing the exact standards by which “verace” (genuine) pizza Napoletana must be made. Together, they formed the Associazione Vera Pizza Napoletana (AVPN), an independent organization tasked with upholding their rigorous set of standards, and maintaining the very reputation of Neapolitan pizza.
If it sounds like serious business it was — and continues to be.
The AVPN’s protocols are all-encompassing, dictating the ingredients, recipe, method, and equipment used to make the city’s famed pizzas. Only San Marzano tomatoes or Pomodorino del Piennolo del Vesuvio will do for the sauce, while certified Mozzarella di Bufala Campana D.O.P is an absolute must for the cheese. Proofing time for the dough lasts between 8 and 24 hours — depending on the ratio of yeast to flour used — after which the base of the pie must be rolled to a maximum of 0.12 inches thick, and a diameter not exceeding 13.77 inches.
For cooking, the pizza must be placed into a wood fire oven that’s running at a blazing 806 degrees Fahrenheit minimum, and sit inside for no more than 90 seconds. The finished product should then be soft and fragrant, and present a raised edge (or “cornicione") that’s swollen and free from burns.
Any restaurant seeking official certification can expect a visit from an AVPN delegate, who will conduct an on-site inspection verifying the pizzeria’s absolute adherence to the association’s rules. One can only assume these ispettori go about their day-to-day work carrying measuring tapes, thermometers, and Home-Depot-style color charts showing different shades of burn. All in the name of god’s work.
Now that the dust has finally settled on the flagrant New York Times article wrongfully declaring California as the home of America’s best bagels, perhaps we can consider a similar society stateside.
For too long, shameless imitators have tried — and failed — to co-opt one of the Empire State’s great gifts to American cuisine. Their shady schemes have included importing and even trying to replicate New York’s soft water, which is pure and all but free of harsh calcium and magnesium. We’ve seen abominations in the form of Pizza Bagels and the Bagelrito go woefully uncontested. (Google them, if you must.) And don’t even get me started on the “St. Louis-Style” bagel slice.
In the name of upholding the very honor of the New York bagel, reader, I ask you this: Has the time come for an Association of Verified New York Bagels? Is this our Antonio Pace moment?
With so many factors to consider and control, all signs point to the New York bagel being a prime candidate for such regulation. We can begin with the recipe, dimensions, cooking technique, and toppings. Then we arrive at the meat and bones of toasting vs. not toasting (always the latter), permissible flavors, and the number of decibels a chewy but ever-so-slightly crisp crust should register. While we’re in the nitty-gritty, we can also put to bed the question of the exact volume and weight of a perfect schmear. And we should definitely come up with a cuisson color chart and think about who should populate the inaugural group of certifying delegates.
But in raising the many questions that must be addressed, it starts to feel like answers may not be forthcoming. Those that do seem limiting. By dialing in on the minutiae of height, diameter, and audibility of crunch, do we miss the forest for the trees? We could define the perfect New York bagel in some way that quantifies and enshrines its best qualities, but doing so would also change its nature (like Shrödinger’s cat, but for breakfast).
In building a fence around their pizza, Neapolitans managed to define and protect their culinary heritage, but simultaneously outlawed experimentation, evolution, and individualism. And that’s just not the New York way.
Would we, as a city, really want to conform to one binding recipe, when one of our favorite pastimes is arguing over which joint makes them best? And if we impose uniformity, surely we also lose out on the delight of retorting to naive newcomers: “What do you mean you’ve never been to Bagel Hole? Getthefuggaddahere!”
Ultimately, the very fact that Californians (among many others) continue to use Gotham City as the yardstick by which all bagels should be measured says it all. What defines a New York bagel is being made in the greatest city in the world — and if they weren’t the best bagels everyone else wouldn’t spend so much time and energy trying to prove their imitations measure up. The Neapolitans got it wrong. Let the pretenders pretend. Those who know, know. —TM
The 100-Word Endorsement
As we’ve mentioned before, this is not — and will never be — a recipe blog. But this being a post about bagels, it would be remiss of me not to share what I consider to be the best tutorial online for making bagels. It’s a video from a guy named Josh Weissman. And if you can get past his slightly annoying personality, I recommend trying any and all of his recipes. He also gains marks for calling them New York Style bagels while making them in his kitchen in Texas. This is an important distinction because...well, I think you know why that’s important. — TM
Here’s how my last batch turned out:
What We’re Reading
Fictions not facts are driving bourbon’s most divisive debate — the Neck Pour