Consider the Cannoli: Subjective Preferences and Conversations about Geek Media

[Blue Orange]

"You can't make the bagels right without the New York water."

The Secret Behind Why New York Bagels Are So Good

Hint: It's not the water.

spoonuniversity.com

Chew On This: The Science Of Great NYC Bagels (It's Not The Water)

Popular myth has long credited New York's soft water for the city's irresistibly crusty, chewy bagels. But the chemistry behind a superior bagel is more complicated.

www.npr.org

Apparently it's not the water but leaving them to ferment overnight and boiling them before baking.

 

[Umbran]

Apparently it's not the water but leaving them to ferment overnight and boiling them before baking.

Who on this planet thought that boiling wasn't part of making a bagel?

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Who on this planet thought that boiling wasn't part of making a bagel?

“You said the bagels needed to be boiled. So I took that Lenders frozen bread and boiled it!”

-Proud 80s suburban mother.

 

[Umbran]

“You said the bagels needed to be boiled. So I took that Lenders frozen bread and boiled it!”

-Proud 80s suburban mother.

Yeah, well, some bread-product-calling-itself-bagel deserves to be treated that way anyhow.

 

[Blue Orange]

Ironically, despite having been born and raised in NYC I never liked bagels, so I can't comment.

 

[Mallus]

You almost went full David Foster Wallace, @Snarf Zagyg. Never go full David Foster Wallace. Look how that turned out for David Foster Wallace...

Some unsolicited advice: if you should ever find yourself in Philadelphia, do not share your opinion of cannoli. Dissing cannoli risks bodily harm. Bodily harm is a tradition is a tradition here. Look, we beat the stuffing out of that poor hitch-hiking robot, and it wasn't even capable of feeling pain.

If you do end up in Philly and feel like tilting again at a certain Italian pastry-shaped windmill, try Isgro's on Christian Street (or Termini's in Reading Market - which is a touristy place but still frequented by locals).

You're absolutely right in that art's a relationship. It matters where you are when encounter a work, just as it matter where and when a work comes from. Somewhat recently my wife and I watched Philip Glass's Satyagraha on the Met's nightly pandemic opera stream. We've seen the production before. I listen to it occasionally. But that night, the Satyagraha hit we with a force & clarity that surprised me given that a) I'm familiar with it and b) its almost three hours of repetitive minimalist music sung in language no one speaks anymore, without supertitles. It was revelatory.

 

[Umbran]

Ironically, despite having been born and raised in NYC I never liked bagels, so I can't comment.

Well, a bagel is topologically similar to a cannoli, so that's understandable.

 

[Umbran]

You're absolutely right in that art's a relationship. It matters where you are when encounter a work, just as it matter where and when a work comes from.

And we can now insert the words "palate" and "taste" (as in, "there is no accounting for...") into the discussion, only semi-ironically.

 

[dragoner]

Ironically, despite having been born and raised in NYC I never liked bagels, so I can't comment.

When I moved back to the US, it was NYC, and my first job was at a bagel bakery, where I could take home bags of the day olds. It helped feed us all in our crummy little Bowery apartment, but I don't think I have ever really enjoyed a bagel since.

 

[MarkB]

This is great, and the key difference in this piece is that you didn't stupidly say Cannoli isn't Dessert.

He did declare the entire concept of fried pastry with a soft filling to be fundamentally flawed, though. Which, as someone who has never experienced cannoli, but has risked many a burned tongue on a fast food fried apple pie, I take issue with.