Oh, yeah. I challenge you to find a restaurant in Russia that doesn’t have it on the menu as a salad/appetizer/starter.
You can buy it in supermarkets too, prefabricated in little plastic tubs or scooped up from a tray.
I had a pizza in China many years ago. The sauce was red but otherwise not resembling any tomato-like characteristics. The cheese tasted most like someone had drizzled sourdough starter on top, otherwise we were at a total loss as to what the substance might really be.
I had Italian food in Paris (my bad) and it wasn’t good.
Also a cheeseburger at an American style joint and the beef tasted, um, differently.
Chase it down with enough vodka and it is great. If you drink enough to throw up, so much the better.
Pizza Hut has Backyard BBQ Chicken Pizza on their menu so I’m pretty sure it is a THING everywhere in the US.
I was in a barbecue joint in rural Arkansas that had fresh catfish on the menu. A friend of mine ordered it against my recommendation, we were in barbecue joint for God’s sake. The waitress came back 20 minutes later and asked if he could order something else. The fish was frozen to the wall of the freezer and wouldn’t come loose.
I really hate hot dogs, unless they’re from a Coney Island. Then you know it’s not just lips and assholes, but also cow hearts. I’m saying that unironically. I’ll let interested readers Google that.
That’s, uh, unusual. In fact, ham is kind of unusual in Mexico. The only place I can remember having it is a restaurant in Valenciana, Guanajuato.
On the other hand, many years ago, there was a restaurant in Manzanillo, Colima, Mexico that was named “Hamburguesas sin Microbios” (hamburgers without microbes) that made pretty damned good hamburgers. I didn’t get sick, so I guess their name was accurate.
I’m always conscientious when I review pizza places on Yelp, because not every place serves perfect, Detroit-style pizza. Therefore I always point out, I’m not a fan of this style of pizza, and it’s awesome anyway (Chicago, but not Chicago-style), or I’m not a fan of this pizza, and it sucks (Chicago style), or I’m not of fan of this pizza, and I don’t see the big deal (NYC), or I’m not a fan of this style but it was freaking awesome (local brick oven place), and try to detail the experience will have aside from the pizza.
The Chicago style at Pizza Uno sucks, plain and simple. It was a fantastic restaurant, though, and as long as you order something besides Chicago style, you’ll have a great time.
That’s like what pimento cheese spread would be like in the Upside Down…
English pizza. Pineapple is still weird but ok, it’s a thing else ware. Sprouts though?
This is a big part of why I think “authentic” is a weird thing to pursue. That reviewer clearly didn’t like this kind of pizza, and that’s totally fine. Instead of complaining about how it wasn’t real, she should’ve complained about how there wasn’t enough sauce for her tastes.
And if you’re more looking for adventurous eating, not something you know you’ll like, authenticity still isn’t much help: instead, you should look for places with interesting menus.
Authenticity seems both reductive and beside the point.
I once ate at an “American”-style restaurant in Scotland called “Uncle Buck’s” The cuisine was pretty much American (although the meat was kinda gristly), but the “fail” part was the “chocolate” syrup they used on their sundae. I’m not sure what it was, but it was definitely the wrong color for chocolate. Wrong taste, too.
What many of these stories prove is that, “In the land of the blind, the one-eyed is king.”
When a cuisine is introduced into a country in which it has been previously unknown, some pretty poor restaurants can get away with some pretty poor food.
After a late night of drinking in Acapulco we ordered an “authentic Italian” pizza to our villa. It looked awful and tasted worse. Pretty sure it was processed cheese, ketchup, sliced up hot dogs, on a soggy thin crust.
Listen, I love pizza and will eat pretty much any incarnation… but this was so gross I could barely take a couple of bites without gagging.
When I was in boot camp at Great Lakes, for boot liberty about six of us went to Kenosha because it was close but not as expensive (we hoped) as Chicago. When we got there, we went our various ways and joined up several hours later. The guy from Philadelphia spotted me and came galloping up. “Hey! I was in this diner and I ordered a steak sandwich—”
“—and it was one hunk of meat on a round bun,” I interrupted. “A thin slice of ribeye if you were lucky.”
“Yeah! How did you know?”
“That’s what most of the country expects when they order a steak sandwich. You should have seen me the first time I had one in Philly!”
Mr Sizzle.
We live in Wolverhampton. Mr Sizzle is a trap set late at night, and around the football matches, to catch the unwary and drunk. It is almost like a soberness machine, you never forget your first and only Mr Sizzle burger, because you’ll remember it forever.
Horrible.
Mr Wimpy’s Quarter Pounder and Cheese is still my favourite burger. Over Five Guys and the Ilk.
The chain was bought out by Burger King in the early 90s, half of the restaurants got converted to BK, and I think the brand was sold off. They exist in the south of London still and some weird spots (disappeared from Service stations), but I live 100 miles from any of them.
Still miss 'em.
I’ve lived in England (largely, here and there), for the last thirty years.
I’ve never seen Brussels sprouts on Pizza. Or Bean Sprouts.
So that’s not “English pizza”. Or at least, not in England.
do they let you pay on Tuesday for a hamburger today?
The weirdest thing I’ve had on pizza is hearts-of-palm in Argentina, but it wasn’t bad at all. But with a large Italian immigrant population, Argentinian pizza is usually great.
Word.
To begin with, they never use Philly cream cheese (or even a store-brand/generic cream cheese). It’s always Cheez-Whiz, or something similar.