THE Lowly Peon

Simplicity & Pizza 
18 January 2010, 10:41am

Some things are just left best to their most fundamental elements. Pizza is one of them.

I've been thinking about simplicity a lot lately.

Mostly because of web design, and how I'm really starting to passionately hate complex or "busy" websites. But also because of bentomas and how he refuses to buy new things because they inevitably make life more complicated (except iPhones, which makes life a million times better, and much much simpler. I don't agree 100% there).

And also because of this video about Una Pizza Napoletana, a pizzeria in New York that prides itself on only making simple pizza that allows you to see a taste the quality of its few ingredients. The place has four kinds of pizza, each with a variation of cheese, tomato sauce, garlic, and basil. That's all they have. Nothing else.

While I have nothing profound to say, except that simplicity is really beautiful, I do want to express some grief for people who don't allow me to have simple things.

Let me rephrase that: I want to explain to the people who disagree or don't understand that I truly love simple things.

If I go to a pizza place, for example, as I just did, and I order a margarita pizza, I want a margarita pizza. No, I don't want to add toppings. Yes, I understand you have some deal where I can add thirty pounds of pig and three pounds of onion for a mere $2. I don't want it. Yes, that's right. I want a simple pizza. If I order a margarita — which really isn't boring, just simple — all I want is basil, tomato, high grade mozzarella, some seasoning and sauce, on some nice dough.

Please don't give me ten times more cheese because you think a margarita pizza isn't a meal. I'm not in Texas, where I need to argue with everyone that a meal doesn't require certain things — like ten strips of chicken on an already delicious salad. (And don't even get me started about Chinese pizzas, which have thirty toppings that I can't even recognize...)

Sigh. Maybe I just need to return to Chicago. I'd even go so far as to say I want to go to Naples to try the pizza, whatever it costs. See what all the hype is about.

Note: according to the guy in the video (at 2:48), not a single pizza place in New York makes good pizza (I assume he excepts himself from that statement). I like this guy. I may make a trip to New York just to have his Margarita pizza. And maybe convince him to move to the pizza capitol of America, sweet home Chicago.