Originally Posted by
braslvr
It's all about the toppings. Do these highly rated NY and Chicago style pies have all these choices? I ask because the NY/NJ pizza joints I have been to are lucky to have 5-6 topping choices.
Weird, my neighborhood places in Queens always had more than 5-6. Maybe not some of the weirder ones below, but a lot more than I'd eat.
In any event, while "it's all about the toppings" is a one way of taking your pizza - de gustibus and all that -in the end not everyone holds with it, and it's one that's a lot more common California than NYC. I can't speak for any other New Yorkers, of course, but as an expatriate Queens boy, I'd say that if the pizza's good enough it doesn't need any toppings at all, and if the pizza isn't good to begin with, toppings aren't going to help it any.
A few of those things (zuchini, shrimp) brand it as very clearly a CA or CA-inspired list.