Beaunehead, I actually chose my words carefully on this post. I certainly wouldn't blindly claim that one style of pizza is any better than another. I actually rotate between a number of different styles of pizza that I bake at home including Neapolitan, New Haven, NY coal oven, NY street style, and Chicago thin crust. I think they all have the ability to be a perfect 10 in quality. I was in no way showing a preference for any style, as I really do love them all equally.
Now after re reading my comment, I do agree that I should have elaborated on what I meant, but I was working when I saw the thread and just wanted to shoot out a quick post. There were actually major defects with all of the pizzas I had, and my last few UPN pizzas have not had any defects. Here is what I found:
Patsy's was using an extremely over fermented dough. There was very little residual sugar left in the dough because of the long ferment, so the crust was actually very pale and lacked the oven spring that one would usually find in a pizza baked at those temperatures. If a dough is left to ferment too long the gluten mesh breaks down and the crust is adversely effected because the mesh can not trap the gas bubbles produced by the yeast.
I understand that with the extra long bake times used in New Haven style pizzas you get tons of flavor from char, but there is a trade off when it comes to the texture of the final product. I always expect a somewhat tough pizza when compared to just about any other style, but the pizza I had at Modern was MUCH tougher than a typical New Haven style pizza. The dough had obviously been over mixed producing such a sturdy crust that my jaw actually hurt by the time I was done with my pizza.
The pizza I had at Luzzo's on this visit was very soupy, floppy, and much too thin in spots. With any Neapolitan style pizza it is very important to form a dough skin that is very uniform in thickness because the dough is on the thin side to begin with. There were a number of spots on the pizza where the sauce soaked right through the bottom and produced sink holes in the pie. When we picked up our slices to eat everything fell out of the sink holes and on to the plate. It was virtually impossible to eat with your hands, necessitating a knife and fork to eat the pizza. On top of that the buffalo mozzarella was not drained properly, and that combined with a very wet sauce made for an unpleasant Neapolitan experience!
