Okay, today's Letter U might be a stretch, but we are coming down to the end of this A-Z so please humor me and allow letter U to represent Unique Eats. Yes, today's post is going to be all about some foods that are extremely popular here in New Jersey, but I'm not too sure about the rest of the country...
It's funny, because of NJ's location (between New York and Pennsylvania) you can always tell what part of Jersey someone is from, by how they order their food.
You will most likely call it pork roll, if you are from South Jersey or the Philly area. But it is also known as Taylor Ham to North Jersey folks and most New Yorkers. The Hawaiians have their spam, but here in Jersey we've got our pork roll. And man, oh man, there is nothing better than a hot pork roll, egg and cheese on a hard roll for breakfast!!
What is pork roll, exactly? It's a pork based processed meat originating in New Jersey. It was developed by John Taylor of Trenton, NJ back in 1856. Pork roll is not available on the West Coast, so whenever we had visitors from back East, we told them not to bother coming, if they didn't stuff their luggage with some good old fashioned pork roll.
Another unique food item that originated and was created in Atlantic City, New Jersey is salt water taffy. What kid from Jersey hasn't been caught walking down the boards with a piece of salt water taffy stuck between their teeth? Forget ta bout it!! Now, millions of boxes of salt water taffy is sold world-wide. But it all started in little old Jersey.
I'll never forget when we moved out to California, and my dad called for pizza the first time. He said, in his super North Jersey accent, "I'd like to order two large pies please."
After a full minutes pause, the girl on the other side of the phone said, "Um sir, we um, don't like, sell pie here. This is a pizza place!" Ha.
To us Jersey folks, pizza has always been known as "pie". And let me tell you how disappointed we were with that West Coast version of pizza. If you can't fold a slice in half, it's not real pizza!! At least, not to us.
 |
This is how we eat pizza in Jersey. Folded in half!
|
So, what about you? What foods are unique to your neck of the woods? Do you fold your pizza in half? Have you ever tried a porkroll, egg and cheese on a hard roll? (You don't know what you're missing if you haven't!) What about good old fashioned Atlantic City salt water taffy? Ever tried it?