But as of last night, when the winners of the James Beard Foundation's prestigious annual food-writing awards were announced, there's a distinction that may be even shinier: Carman won the foodie organization's award for best columnist, based on his work for Washington City Paper.

Carman's award was based on a trio of columns: A January column on a pair of dueling Maryland bagel joints; a July item on regulatory efforts to define the precise meaning of Neapolitan pizza; and another July column reviewing an unexpectedly ambitious steak house located inside a D.C. strip club. An excerpt from that piece:

The truth is, the Stadium Club’s prices are comparable to those at D.C.’s loftiest steakhouses, places where the only jiggling involves the flesh around one’s own waistline. Perhaps this fact alone isn’t enough to entice you to step foot into a gentlemen’s club, especially if you find the idea of slicing into dead animals while objectifying dancing ones rather distasteful. Morality, however, is relative. Strip club food isn’t: Most of it isn’t good enough for a second-rate diner still working through last week’s Sysco orders.

The Stadium Club wants to redefine strip club eating.

Carman left City Paper last fall to join the food section of the Washington Post, where he's continued his prolific output and steady supply of culinary wisdom (albeit without any further professional visits to strip clubs, at least as far as we know). But even though we wish he were still here to hang his big new award alongside the spice rack he left behind in his old cubicle, we couldn't be more please for him today. Congratulations!

The salsiccia pizza at Tagolio

Last week's Young & Hungry column flamed a pizzeria in Gaithersburg called Coal Fire, the second outlet in a budding  chain that takes its name from the joint's purported cooking method. The truth, unfortunately, is more complicated than that.

Yes, Coal Fire's oven is a giant Wood Stone unit that burns anthracite, a clean and virtually smoke-free coal, but the oven also generates gas heat and boasts an infrared element underneath the deck to keep the floor at a constant temperature. The contraption, in short, eliminates many of the frustrations of tending and maintaining (not to mention cooking with) coal heat.

But the unit also allows a pizza-maker, if one were so inclined, to produce pies with little char or distinction. Coal Fire is so inclined. I say this with no pride. Coal Fire is, at present, a small business run by a couple of Maryland guys. I generally prefer to root for the home team.

I could have perhaps saved Coal Fire from a public smackdown if I had only learned about Tagolio Pizzeria and Enoteca first. Located in Crystal City in the former Enjera space, Tagolio is everything that Coal Fire is not. Its small pizza oven burns only anthracite coal, which sits in a box right next to the unit. Its pies boast an excellent char. Its sauce is freshly crushed San Marzano tomatoes without a hint of added sweetness. Its crusts are crisp, bubbly, and blackened; they go down like thick slices of fresh and toasty bread.

The Margherita "DOC"

Tagolio is the first business that Gil Fornaris launched after he lost his job as vice president of operations with a high-end restaurant chain. With Tagolio, Fornaris is returning to his roots. He hails from Nice, France, which is located next to the Italian border. He was raised with the smell of pizza in the air. He even worked at pizzerias in his youth.

For his own take on the Italian dish, Fornaris hired a baker to develop his dough, and together they traveled to many of the country's best pizzerias, from Frank Pepe's in New Haven to Grimaldi's in New York, to figure out what kind of approach they wanted to adopt. As much as Fornaris liked the pies that he tasted on tour, particularly Pepe's, he didn't "think any of those guys had the dough that I wanted."

The dough that Fornaris and his baker ultimately developed is different from most pizzerias. It includes a sourdough starter that originated in Napa Valley from Chardonnay grapes; it has been kept alive for 30 years, says Fornaris, who feeds the starter twice a week.

That's a good story, of course, but I tell Fornaris that his crusts (or at least the ones that I tried) don't have a pronounced sourdough flavor. Certainly not as pronounced as the crusts at Pizzeria Orso, where Edan MacQuaid also incorporates a sourdough starter into his dough recipe.

The sourdough starter is also technically a no-no when claiming to make genuine DOC Neapolitan pizza (although MacQuaid makes a strong argument otherwise). So is the coal-fired oven. Any pizzeria that lays claim to DOC certification must bake its pies in a wood-fired oven.

Fornaris is quick to explain why he included the letters "DOC"  next to the Margherita and "Neapoletana" (which is how he spells "Napoletana") pies on his menu. He says he's not claiming his pizzas are certified DOC from VPN Americas; he's just trying to inform people that those two rounds are made with Italian Caputo flour, San Marzano tomatoes, and buffalo mozzarella — the key ingredients in genuine Neapolitan pizza.

I know I may be contradicting myself after giving MacQuaid a pass on his uncertified use of  the DOC stamp, but I can't say I agree with Fornaris' logic. The coal-fired oven, on the face of it, is a departure from DOC rules. But I will add this: Fornaris' liberty with DOC certification is the only fault I currently find at Tagolio. It would seem the D.C. area finally has a good coal-fired pizza.

Y&H has spent a lot of time (and newsprint space) talking about Neapolitan pizza and its variations in the D.C. area.  There are some who believe that genuine Neapolitan pizza is not as soft as the pies they produce around these parts.

This video doesn't really solve the crispiness issue of Neapolitan pizza — as in are they crispy or not? — but it's still worth a watch nonetheless. I say that, despite the fact that the secret ingredients in Naples apparently boil down to "passion," "soul," and "love." I can't stomach that kind of treacly stuff.

Melisse Baylor sent me an e-mail this afternoon, under the heading, "pizzeria orso — you mind want to amend your review." Never mind the typo, I got the idea. Melissa Baylor and her family had a bad experience at the new Falls Church pizzeria, which I had raved about earlier this week.

Below is the full text of her e-mail:

We read the reviews, including yours, that were in the Washingtonian and that were hyperlinked on the Pizzeria Orso website and were so excited to go. We love Two Amys and 2941, so we had high hopes. Our family went last night before 9p. We had to wait 15-20 minutes for a table – not a big deal, my husband and I got drinks at the bar. After getting a table, we had to wait another 5 minutes for a server. Her first words were – I have some bad news, we are out of pizza dough. She didn't apologize, make suggestions for other things to eat, or anything. When we expressed our shock without cursing or screaming – just pretty surprised that a pizza restaurant ran out of dough, she said I'm sorry, turned her back, and walked off. Our family of four was just left there. (While I appreciate the fact that dough is made daily there, the ingredients for dough are not massively expensive and they might want to consider erring on the side of having to throw some out).

As we were leaving, another group was being seated. My husband asked them if they knew the pizzeria was out of pizza, and they did not – the hostess had not warned them either! After that, I asked the bartender to get the manager – still calmly and politely – but the manager did not show up and after a few minutes we left.

I am shocked at the total disregard for the customer. At a minimum, we should have been told upon arrival that they were out of dough. I feel like we were almost tricked into spending money at the bar. In my mind, an apology and possibly an offer of a freebie on our next visit would have been much more appropriate – then we would have been disappointed but still would have returned.

I can only hope that food critics get much better treatment than the rest of us.

I contacted Pizzeria Orso's publicist, who put me in touch with Thea MacQuaid, the general manager and wife of pizzaiolo Edan MacQuaid. She said that they were expecting Tom Sietsema's First Bite column on Wednesday, but not the other reviews, like mine, which also came out this week. As a result, the husband and wife team had not prepared enough dough balls for last night. Edan MacQuaid had prepped 360 balls, which lasted until about 9:30 p.m.

"Because of the 36 hour fermentation, we can only plan so much beforehand," Thea MacQuaid told me. "When we're out, we're out."

The GM said that the Baylor family was unfortunately seated shortly before the kitchen found out about the problem. Thea MacQuaid and an assistant GM then went into the dining and started to notify customers. By the time, the managers had alerted patrons, MacQuaid added, the Baylor family had already departed.

"I feel horrible that we could not rectify the problem while she was here," Thea MacQuaid said. The diners who did stay despite the dough outage were treated to free gelato, she added.

Thea MacQuaid plans to contact the Baylor family and make up for the problem. Her husband, meanwhile, has prepped 500 dough balls for tonight's service.

The opening of the second outlet of Pete's New Haven Style Apizza provided me with the perfect opportunity to look into the classic pie and try to understand its defining qualities.  Here's one thing I learned during the process of reporting this week's Young & Hungry column: New Haven pizza-makers consider their product Neapolitan-style, which surprised me.

Rick Nuzzo, the owner of Grand Apizza in Cheshire, Conn., was one of those to make such a claim. But when I pressed him about the official rules for Neapolitan pizza, he backed down a little on his position. Here's what he told me in full, a quote that didn't make it into the final version of the story:

"I don’t think they tried to copy pizza from Italy, because pizza from Italy is not even the same as what we make here. Like you say, most of them use wood-fired ovens. They’re dough is a little different. It’s a little flatter. It’s a little crunchier than what we use. I just think the New Haven area, and what we call apizza around here, is a more perfected version of what maybe was meant to be to begin with. Now like you say, all these guys are copying what supposedly they’re learning in Italy and everything, and you said, and you just made a comment, I don’t remember exactly, you said something about that they’re doing it by the book and what they’re supposed to be doing. And you know what? I say all the time. I say it over and over again, 'This ain’t brain surgery.' I don’t understand why there is so much bad pizza out there. Don’t get me wrong. I’ve been doing this since I was 10 years old, and I have my own style. But what I do, again, isn’t brain surgery. I’ve put at least, at least, 10 guys in business if not more. They started with me and just went on to go and open their own places, and most of them end up doing it exactly the same. What happens is, everybody’s got a better idea."

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

This week's Young & Hungry will examine New Haven pizza from several different perspectives: What characteristics define it? What is its connection to Neapolitan pies? And how has it been interpreted by two separate pizza parlors in D.C.?

To put the column together, I conducted hours of interviews with pizza makers both here and in New Haven. I also made a trip to the cradle of American pizza with three of the owners from Pete's New Haven Style Apizza, and I tried like hell to understand the rules for authentic Neapolitan pizza so I could make a fair comparison between Old and New World pies.

Below are some outtakes from the interviews I conducted. They touch on a number of different topics that I couldn't examine more in-depth in the column. Take a look after the jump.

On real New Haven pizza and how it compares to pies in Naples:

"Everybody has their own perceptions on what it should it be and how it is. Our customers have gone to Italy, and they say our pizza is better than the pizza in Italy. They’ve even talked to pizzaioli in Italy, and they know of us. And they said, ‘We wish we could try some of their pizza because we’ve heard so much about them,’ and this and that. My grandfather just hit on a recipe, and we haven’t changed it one bit, even with our expansions. We try to keep that consistency the same. Like I said, the pecorino cheese we use: For a small pizzeria, they’re not going to buy it because it’s over $4 a pound. They’re not going to buy that to put on their pizzas. Our tomatoes are premium San Marzano tomatoes. They’re not going to buy that stuff, you know what I mean, because it’s not cost effective to them. They’re going to use the California six-in-one tomatoes, and it’s not going to be the same.” — Gary Bimonte, co-owner of Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana in New Haven

On the use of shaved pecorino Romano cheese on New Haven pizza vs. fresh mozzarella in Naples:

"Fresh buffalo mozzarella, that’s a whole different kind of pie. First of all, with fresh buffalo mozzarella, you’re talking about replacing the mozzarella, not the grated cheese. When you say pecorino Romano, that’s the grated cheese that we put on at the end. You’re going to find that a lot of these clowns, that these new guys like you’re calling that are supposedly trained, a lot of them, they’re not even putting grated cheese on the pizza….They don’t even use it at all. We use fresh pecorino Romano. Some guys will use Parmigiano-Reggiano, but that’s a little strong. That’s a little overpowering...I think one of the most popular pies still today is actually one of pies my father made famous and his brother, who had Modern Apizza, [and that] was the plain pizza, just the sauce and the pecorino Romano and a little oregano and olive oil, no mozzarella at all. I mean, that’s a delicious pizza. That’s where you really taste your tomatoes and your grated cheese. Just the grated cheese. And you go into these newfangled places nowadays, and you ask for a plain pizza, and you’re getting mozzarella. They don’t even know what plain is.” — Rick Nuzzo, owner of Grand Apizza in Cheshire, Conn.

On the idea that some New Haven pizzerias consider their pies real Neapolitan pizza:

“I’ve read a lot about the history of pizza and thought about it a bit….They’re in the same place as I’m going with this pizza. To me, what I’m making is American pizza. When they say it’s Neapolitan, it is because their style of pizza is based on a tradition of Neapolitan pizza…But it’s been interpreted by this layers and layers and years of Americanizing of things. If you’re an Italian, there’s this great history for them, I’m sure. But to me, what that is is American. It’s not replicating a Naples pizza. It’s making a traditional American pizza, which is what I’ve set up to do. My pizza is not supposed to be New Haven-style; it’s supposed to be American pizza, which means it’s interpreted through my layers of interpretation, which is like my father...a Greek immigrant and my mother, an English-Norwegian…That’s an American experience. To me, it’s just adding another layer.” — James Alefantis, owner of Comet Ping Pong, which is inspired by New Haven

On the use of breadcrumbs, not cornmeal, on the bottom of New Haven pizzas:

“That was another thing, it was a matter of taste between people. We didn’t like cornmeal because it smokes a lot. When you throw it into the oven, you get a lot of smoke. But even still, I don’t like the way it just kind of sits on the bottom of the pie and keeps the pie very uniform and white underneath, as opposed to that breadcrumb giving you all the different colors underneath, the golden brown, the little black. You know what I mean? It burns in pretty nice. I just like the flavor better with the breadcrumbs.” — Rick Nuzzo from Grand Apizza

On the differences between New Haven and Naples pizza:

“From my experience and having pizza in Naples and having pizza in New Haven, to me there’s quite a bit of difference. I think Frank Pepe is probably closer than almost any other New Haven pizzeria to Neapolitan/Naples pizza...[In Naples the pizzas in wood burning ovens] don’t have the same opportunity to get that same amount of crunch on the bottom and...they specify to use the double aught flour, and that flour is a little bit different than all purpose flour, which everybody in New Haven uses the all purpose flour. So you’re going to get a little bit more tender bread.” — Tom Marr, co-owner and executive chef of Pete's New Haven Style Apizza

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

As soon as the pie hit the table at Pizzeria Orso, I knew I was in the presence of Edan MacQuaid, the pizzaiolo who has worked the wood-burning ovens at 2Amys, Pizzeria Paradiso, and RedRocks. I'd recognize his margherita pizza anywhere.

It's not just the puffy crust, mottled with char and radiating a wood-smoke aroma as enticing as freshly baked bread. It's the careful arrangement of colors: the rosy splashes of tomato sauce, the white eggshell dollops of fresh mozzarella, the wilted myrtle-colored leaves of basil, and the pale green rivulets of olive oil, which, in turn, tint the exposed crust to the most delectable shade of yellow.

This is pizza-making as art.

The flavors are even more intoxicating than the colors. There's a balance to MacQuaid's margherita that I don't find with many other interpretations. The fresh acid sweetness of the tomatoes, the cool creaminess of the mozz, the salty smokiness of the cornicione, the cleansing licorice of the basil, and the....the incomprehensible sourness of the crust.

I keep thinking that I'm imagining the sourness, so I keep eating more crust to find out, even long after I'm full. The sourness is always present.

It's not until I speak with MacQuaid a few days later that it all makes sense. The pizzaiolo says he puts a little sourdough into his pizza dough, which I think is a great, ballsy move. It not only adds flavor, but it's a small razz to the Neapolitan polizia who want to dictate exactly how their pies should be produced, right down to the hydration level in the pizza dough.

But then I remember that MacQuaid has affixed the letters "DOC" next to his margherita pizza on the menu. The letters stand for "Denominazione di Origine Controllata," and they imply that MacQuaid is following the rules, set down by the Italian Ministry of Agriculture in 2004, for a genuine margherita pizza from Naples.

Now, I'm no authority on these Neapolitan pizza rules. Every time I think I understand them, someone tells me I don't. But from what I've read, I'm pretty damn sure sourdough is not allowed in a DOC margherita pizza. I ask MacQuaid about the addition. He has a ready answer.

Back before the invention of commercial yeasts, MacQuaid tells me, pizza makers used sourdough starters to facilitate fermentation in their dough. There is an strong argument among pizzaioli that such a method doesn't violate the spirit of the Italian government's Neapolitan pizza laws. I floated this theory by the notoriously scrupulous baker and occasional pizza maker, Mark Furstenberg, and he agreed that it makes sense.

So I asked MacQuaid the obvious question: Did he secure official certification from the pizza authorities for his margherita pie?

"All that I'm stating there [with the DOC on his menu] is that the margherita is authentic," MacQuaid tells me. "Is it certified DOC? No....But it meets the standards of the DOC certification."

You know what? I've come to the point where I don't care much about this whole authentic, by-the-book Neapolitan pizza certification puffery. At least not here in the states, where we have a culture of freewheeling experimentation. When I travel to Italy, then I'll care about authentic Neapolitan pizza. Back here, I just want a good, honest, full-flavored pie. If it's merely based on tradition, that's good enough for me.

Here's the bottom line for me: Authentic or not, legal or not by Italian agriculture rules, MacQuaid's margherita pizza is the best pie I've eaten in a long time. 2Amys, you've been officially put on notice.

Is it just me or has D.C. suddenly turned into a New World Naples? Discounting drunk slices and our lone New Haven connection, it seems that every pizzeria that opens in the metro area channels the spirit, if not always the technical requirements, of Neapolitan pies.

Il Canale has already made a name for itself in Georgetown. Former 2Amys and RedRocks pie-man Edan MacQuaid is expected to resurface next month in Falls Church, and the Pupatella Neapolitan Pizza Cart team has just moved indoors in Arlington.

Now, the Neapolitan pizza craze has officially hit Silver Spring with Pacci's on Georgia Avenue. Or as the place is officially known: Pacci's Neapolitan Pizzeria.

Owner Spiro Gioldasis, the long-time general manager at Mrs. K's Toll House, opened the stylish Pacci's in April in a space once occupied by a Polish bakery. Gioldasis has spent considerable time in Greece, his father's native land, where he learned about crispy Roman-style pizza, but when it came time to launch his own house of pies, Gioldasis decided to look toward Naples, not Rome.

Then he went out and found the right man for the job: Rosario Granieri, formerly of Oro Pomodoro in Rockville, who comes from a family stuffed with pie-makers. Gioldasis says three of Granieri's brothers run pizzerias back in Naples.

Granieri has all the proper tools and ingredients to produce his Neapolitan pies: a wood-burning oven, Caputo flour, San Marzano tomatoes, and fresh buffalo mozzarella. He even follows the proper technique of applying the freshly crushed tomato sauce without first cooking it down. It makes for a pie with a serious ambitions.

The interesting thing is how different Granieri's rounds are from the rest of the Neapolitan pizzamakers in the area. For starters, the crust is softer and more pliable than those produced by his peers; there's more chew and less crunch on Pacci's pies, with very little charring, particularly on the bottom. There's also an abundance of sauce (which I also found on the pizzas at Il Canale). Between the excess sauce and the soft crust, Granieri's pizza has a mushy mouthfeel, although I have to say that the flavors of his La Verace are terrific, at once tart and salty and creamy.

Some will tell you that this is the style of true Neapolitan pizza: softer, less crispy than the pizzas we tend to pull from the ovens in the states. I have my doubts about that, particularly after talking with an Italian chef who tells me that the crusts in Naples tend to be crispy before yielding to a softer interior.  He did say, however, that a true Neapolitan pie tends to avoid excessive charring, like Granieri's.

I'm not sure where this leaves us on the question: Who's producing real Neapolitan pizza in the area? All I know is that we have an increasing number of pizzerias claiming to do such pies, and no two seem alike. I'm beginning to think this whole pursuit of an authentic taste of Naples is a fool's errand.

They launched their Pupatella Neapolitan Pizza Cart in the fall of 2007. Last weekend, the couple made the jump that few street vendors do: They opened their own brick-and-mortar restaurant, complete with a wood-burning oven custom-made in Italy. The oven's refractory brick and lava-rock floor allow Algarme and Laufenberg to cook their pies just as God and the VPN intended: at temperatures well above 800 degrees F.

"I think our product now is the exact product we wanted to put out [at the beginning]," Algarme says during a phone interview this afternoon. "True Neapolitan pizza is different from what we were selling out of the cart."

The couple always had the ingredients — the Caputo 00 pizza flour, the San Marzano tomatoes, the fresh basil — but now they have the right wood-burning oven. "I'm just happy," Algarme says. "When I taste it, it just brings me back to Naples."

The first weekend went well — or as well as could be expected for a group of first-time restaurateurs. Algarme said they served about 200 pizzas on Saturday alone and feel capable of turning out even more in the future. "There's definitely some kinks that we have to fix," he says, "but I was fairly happy with the ways thing went."

Pupatella is aiming for a true Neapolitan experience, and not just with its pies. Its menu also features arancini, calzones, gelato, and even wines sourced from Naples. Does this mean that Pupatella will eventually apply for VPN certification?

"That was always our original plan, mostly for our marketing," Algarme says, "because I feel the pizzas we are producing are Neapolitan."

And what about the pizza cart that started it all? Will it go into mothballs?

"We'll still keep it going," Algarme says. "We'll just settle in the restaurant and go from there."

Pupatella Neapolitan Pizzeria and Friggitoria, 5104 Wilson Blvd., Arlington, (571) 312-7230

Half the enjoyment of eating at Seventh Hill Pizza, a Best of D.C. award winner this year, is watching pizzaiolo Anthony Pilla at work. During my most recent visit this weekend, I briefly chatted with Pilla over the counter at the Capitol Hill pizzeria, as he bounced around the prep area, forming dough and putting the finishing touches on pizzas and Nutella dessert calzones.

He's originally from Cleveland, he told me. At one point, he considered a career in advertising, but once he got a taste of true Italian pizza-making, at a pizzeria in his hometown, he turned his back on the world of Mad Men forever. He even traveled to Naples to better understand his subject and, four months later, became a certified pizzaiolo. 

As you can see in this video, Pilla delivers his hard-earned knowledge with considerable flair. He even, on occasion in the workplace, breaks out a few Italian phrases, delivered in an accent that cleverly disguises his Midwestern roots.