The great pizza faceoff
DeB flack claims best pie is in Chi
Mayor de Blasio’s press secretary has found himself in a deep dish of trouble after cheesing off New Yorkers with a blasphemous proclamation that the country’s best pizza is in . . . Chicago.
“This is the best pizza in the United States and it’s not close,” Eric Phillips gushed Saturday in a tweet accompanied by a photo of an amorphous pile of pepperoni and sauce from Pequod’s Pizza, a deep-dish joint in the Second City’s Lincoln Park neighborhood.
The specious assessment did not sit well with Big Apple pizza aficionados, who were quick to pile on the misguided Midwest native.
“Everyone’s entitled to their own opinion, and it’s rare that an opinion can be wrong — but this is one of those rare cases,” said Scott Wiener, a slice expert who leads tours of Gotham’s greatest pizzerias.
“It’s an irresponsible statement to make as a representative of the city itself,” he told The Post.
But Phillips says New Yorkers should appreciate his honesty — no matter how hard it is to swallow.
“I don’t think anyone cares what type of pizza the mayor’s press secretary likes,” he told The Post. “I think they care more about someone not being a phony. Especially about pizza!”
But even after catching flak on Twitter, the flack doubled down and likened New York’s heavenly slices to the lowly Salisbury steak.
“I’ve lived in NYC for 12+ years,” tweeted Phillips, who hails from Wisconsin. “The flat, foldable, salt-less pizza is fine. I eat a lot of it. But it’s not as good as Chicago pizza. It’s like Salisbury steak vs. actual steak. Sorry.”
The unrepentant city employee even twisted the knife by revealing that he ate his pie with a fork.
Asked whether he had committed the pizza faux pas, he tweeted: “Like any good slice of pizza, yes. Foldable pizza is flimsy.”
Clearly, he takes after his boss, de Blasio, who was mocked for wielding a fork during a 2014 visit to Staten Island’s Goodfellas pizzeria.
The mayor, a longtime Red Sox fan, famously refused to root for the Yankees when the team made it to the playoffs.
“I’m not going to fake anything,” de Blasio told reporters. “I’m going to be myself. They’ll have their games and if they win in the end, we will honor them.”
Wiener, whose tour company is called Scott’s Pizza Tours, saw Phillips’ bluster as the manifestation of an inferiority complex.
“He came out swinging, but it’s so unnecessary,” he said. “It’s usually the Chicagoans who attack New Yorkers. They have a chip on their shoulder because you know after you eat a slice and a half of their stuff, you have to take a nap. Our pizza energizes you.”