Schenectady Versus Troy

It kills me that these two great cities more often than not get brushed over when people talk about Albany.  And by people, I include myself.  After all, we live in the Albany-Schenectady-Troy DMA.  If the city of Albany was up here on the Hudson River surrounded by nothing but farmland and foothills, it would not enjoy the amenities it has today.

Oh yes, I called Schenectady and Troy great cities.  Surely they are not as great as they once were.  But man, I love to spend time there.

Troy has the four-season farmers market and Schenectady has its four-season greenmarket.  Troy is getting Dinosaur BBQ and Schenectady will soon have a Mexican Radio.  Troy has Bella Napoli and Schenectady has Villa Italia.  Each city has its own personality, and each one has something to offer that cannot be found in Albany.

And soon, one of them will be able to claim the best pizza in the region.

The finals of the All Over Albany 2010 Tournament of Pizza are almost upon us.  And as a judge I couldn’t be more excited.  The two finalists are DeFazio’s of Troy and Marino’s Flying of Schenectady.  They will go head to head, each submitting whatever pie they think will bring home the victory.

Hopefully, they will take this decision seriously.

Schenectady has made it into the finals before, yet Pizza King failed to seal the deal in the first ever Tournament of Pizza.  They daringly decided to enter a chicken marsala pizza with mushrooms against Pasquale’s margarita pizza of fresh tomatoes, basil, tomato sauce and mozzarella.  Despite how popular the chicken marsala pizza may be at the store, this was not a tournament-winning pie.

Albany won, handily.

I actually made a pilgrimage to The Pizza King recently to try a hot slice of this stuff myself.  What really made it work in the restaurant was the contrast of the crisp under crust and the velvety, creamy butter chicken.  This is a nuance that gets lost in pizza destined for delivery.

Last year’s final match was a battle between Pasquale’s of Albany and Nunzio’s of the more food-centric Saratoga Springs.  The mood around the judges’ table at the finals was somber.  We had all experienced better pies from each of these establishments during earlier rounds of the Tournament.

Personally, I thought the Nunzio’s pie was beautiful with its pinwheel design of nightshades.  The other judges were less impressed by the toppings themselves.

Pasquale’s entry was more like a flatbread than a pizza, which they had dubbed a bruschetta pizza.  This was a monstrosity*.  Each slice had a mound of chopped fresh tomatoes spiked with basil and raw garlic.  Eating it was a mess.  Plus it was missing the shop’s amazingly bright and delicious sauce.  All the same, the sheer aromatic power of shoving one’s nose into the tomato mixture was remarkable.  Still, I believe Pasquale’s lucked out that Nunzio’s pizza had a critical flaw with the crust that sunk its bid for the win.

Albany won again, but by a nose.

This year is different.  Albany is already out of the picture.  Pasquale’s vegetable pizza was poorly constructed, with too-large chunks of green pepper (some of which still contained an unforgivable quantity of seeds), undercooked cheese, and a soggy crust towards the point of the slice.

This year is an epic battle.  And again I go into the finals full of great expectation.

Marino’s Flying of Schenectady made it to the semi-finals last year, only to be edged out by Pasquale’s.  For the past two tournaments everything Marino’s has made, with the exception of their white pizza, has been a winner.

DeFazio’s is one of the great culinary destinations in Troy.  Ask anyone.  In the first Tournament of Pizza this beloved pizza shop was unceremoniously eliminated in the first round, as the pie seemed to suffer more than others in real-life take-out conditions.  But so far this year DeFazio’s hasn’t been beleaguered with this problem.  Now they have the opportunity to redeem themselves by taking the top slot for Troy.

I’m pumped.  Apparently there is going to be a video by Steve Barnes profiling each of the shops.  Let’s just hope each place chooses wisely when deciding which pie to enter.  There is a lot at stake here.  The winner could very well tip the balance of power in the region and definitively decide the larger question about which city is the best.  Sure some people might think this is better determined with things like schools, public safety, economic opportunity, yadda yadda yadda.  But for me it’s farmers markets, ethnic restaurants, bakeries, and pizza parlors.

Stay tuned.

* I’m sticking with “monstrosity” even though Mrs. Fussy thought this was an overly harsh assessment.  But I firmly believe in pizza as street food, and a slice that you cannot eat while walking is akin to a taco that needs to be eaten with a knife and fork.  It’s as wrong as pants on a trout.