By CHARLES FERRUZZA
I get so many questions about food and eating out here in the Fat City that we've added a new category: Ask Charles Ferruzza. Ask me a question and I'll do my best to answer it or, if I'm stumped, throw it out to you, our loyal readers. After all, you not only have excellent taste and firm opinions, but you're scattered all over the place.
Pitch reader Rich wrote us to say that he had recently moved to Olathe from the East Coast and likes the Kansas City metropolitan area -- who wouldn't? -- but has not been happy with the pizza, chicken wings and hot dogs he's finding here. "Where," he writes, "in this Midwestern city can I find REAL pizza, REAL wings and REAL hot dogs?"
I'm assuming that real, in this particular case, means the thin-crust pizza one can buy and eat on the streets of New York, the spicy chicken wings like those invented by the legendary Anchor Bar in Buffalo, New York and those fabulous Sabrett hot dogs.
I've never found New York street pizza to be particularly "artisan," so I'll risk the ire of Pizza Bella and Blue Grotto fans by not recommending the tasty, stylish wood-fired pizza at those venues.
I do like the less-glamorous but emotionally satisfying pie at Avellutto's Italian Delightin Mission, the popular Waldo Pizza, and Kelso's Northtown. But one thing I've learned over the years is that people are very particular about pizza and hardly anyone agrees on which pizzeria serves the best.
I'm probably the last person to ask about Buffalo-style chicken wings. I have eaten them in Buffalo -- and a lot of other cities too -- and never found this unique delicacy all that interesting. And they're messy! But if I was seriously craving a hot wing, I'd go in a completely different direction and head for one of the five Thai Placerestaurants around town for some Spicy Basil Chicken Wings.
And you haven't lived until you've eaten the quarter-pound, spiral-cut deep-fried hot dog at Quick's Barbecue on Merriam Lane.
Those are my picks. Now, Fat City readers, who else can help out reader Rich?
Showing 1-13 of 13
