As I continue to explore the topic “My Towns” it seems that I’ve been disparaging My Town, Rochester, NY.
I’ve not tried to be negative, but Rochester has a history of self-deprecation. As far back as the early 1950’s Rochester had the designation of “Smugtown.”
TABLE OF CONTENTS
- Smugtown
- Is it Darktown or Smugtown?
- Nebalatan Word of the Day (Grandpa Tony-ism) – Perfick
- Homemade Pizza Update
Smugtown
From Rochester Wiki (Smugtown – Rochester Wiki (rocwiki.org))
“Smugtown is a cutting nickname for Rochester derived from Smugtown, USA, a book written by G. Curtis Gerling in 1957. It was published by Plaza Publishers in Webster, NY…The book provides a casual history of business and social life in Rochester through the 1930’s – 1950’s. Gerling coined the term “Smugtown” for Rochester as a scathing indictment of the amount of rump-kissing he observed at the time. He is especially thorough when discussing the history of Rochester’s millionaires, newspapers, and advertising.
Rochesterians have been aware of this nickname for some time, although few seem to know of its origins. The term has been used by locals for a variety of purposes:
- The Smugtown Beacon – Web-based op-ed publication
- Smugtown Mushrooms – Community gardening group
- The Smugtown Stompers – Rochester jazz band
- The Struggle in Smugtown – An in-depth documentary about labor issues in Rochester.”
Notice the link above to the Smugtown Stompers. If you search Smugtown Stompers YouTube, you will find several links to the song “Darktown Stutters Ball”. If you ever get a chance to see the Smugtown Stompers live, you might notice that “Darktown” gets replaced by “Smugtown” in their rendition.
Is it Smugtown or Darktown?
My favorite version of “Darktown/Smugtown Strutter’s Ball” is from Lou Monte. My favorite part of Lou’s version starts at the 40 second mark. Lou goes into a skat style, Calabrian dialect, that is very reminiscent of my father’s (Grandpa Tony’s) speech pattern
Darktown Strutters Ball (Italian Style)
In researching Darktown Strutter’s Ball, I looked for any reference to Smugtown, but found none. I did find this:
The Darktown Strutters’ Ball is one of the earliest traditional jazz songs to become a standard1. The words and music, by Shelton Brooks, were inspired by a ball at the 1915 Pacific-Panama Exposition in San Francisco1. The ball was originated by the ladies of the evening in the Darktown area of Chicago, who created it as their way of showing that, for at least one night per year, they were just as good as everyone else2. It was by invitation only and, over time, became the most sought after ticket2
Even the Beatles used this song in their early sets (see here).
Nebalatan Word of the Day (Grandpa Tony-ism) – Perfick
According to my father (Grandpa Tony), Lou Monte’s version of Darktown Strutter’s Ball was PERFICK!
Grandpa Tony’s 96th birthday would have been yesterday. He didn’t have much throughout his life, but he always had music playing, just like me. If I can’t hear music playing, I might be dead!
Anyways, one of the few things that he left to us was a CD, Eh Paisano! (see here), because, as above, it was PERFICK! Lou Monte’s version is on that CD! I can still see dad sitting at the kitchen table tapping his ring finger on that hard surface to the song’s beat while mumbling the words. I tap hard surfaces with my ring also to songs.
PERFICK was another of Grandpa Tony-isms for the word PERFECT. I’ve mentioned in the past that he seemed to have trouble with the letter T. Which is hysterical since his name was Tony.
Grandpa Tony was always positive and up-beat. And PERFICK was a word he used often to describe a dive restaurant or even casually poor food. Growing up during the Depression without a father present seemed color his work in a way that made him most appreciative of simple things.
I still have a lot to learn from you Dad!
It’s been awhile since I’ve done a homemade pizza update.
Homemade Pizza Update
At the time of this writing on August 29, 2023, 35 weeks into the year, I’ve made:
- Dough 26 times – nearly weekly
- Pizza (Neapolitan, Sheet (Tomato Pie, Grandma, or Sicilian), and pizza bread)
- 30 times, nearly weekly
- 166 total pizzas!
The full pizza table is here – click link
Homemade Tomato Pie
I recently posted about Perreca’s and Leo’s bakeries and their tomato pie. I consider Perreca’s to be GREAT! But true GREATNESS was my Aunt Theresa’s pie! I use her sauce recipe (albeit I switch out sugar for Stevia). I try to be PERFICK, but I’ve yet to reach that level PERFICKION!
Thinking about Aunt Theresa’s pie gave me the “whoolee” (see blog post of April 25, 2022, click here) for making my own tomato pie. It’s been a chilly August in Rochester, so it’s ok for me to heat up the kitchen stove to do some baking.
So, in the last couple of weeks I’ve made 5 tomato pies over three baking sessions. The first and third bakes were with my dough, the second bake was with Wegmans dough since it was a last minute decision to bake.
| Date | 8/18/23 | 8/20/23 | 8/18/23 |
| Flour/ Dough | Homemade 8/24/23 | Wegmans | Homemade 8/15/23 |
| Sauce | Valleriano (Stevia) | Valleriano (Stevia) | Valleriano (Stevia) |
| Rating | Good | Good | Good |
| Would I Go Back? | Yes | Maybe (Wegmans dough held it back) | Yes |
| Oven | Home Gas Oven | Home Gas Oven | Home Gas Oven |
| Style | Tomato Pie | Tomato Pie | Tomato Pie |
| Notes | a little under cooked, my dough has a much higher hydration than purchased. I cooked for 27 minutes at 400F, should have cooked for 30-35 minutes. The SAUCE WAS INCREDIBLE! | OH MY! Very good, almost great. I’m starting to dial in Tomato Pie. Wegmans dough works well for this, although, it’s much heavier than my dough (that’s a check mark keeping it from Greatness), The mixture of parmagian and pecorino Romano was not as sharp as wanted, (another check mark against). Probably need more cheese | took 1/2 the dough, too cold outside to cook there wonderful tasting pizza, went heavy on the sauce (4 scoops) which really made it like a Tomato Pie vs a Grandma style, put a little too much pepper flakes and fennel which kept it from being great. The tomato taste of the extra sauce and the combo of LOTS of paramagian and pecorino Romano made it wonderful – OH SO CLOSE! |
These are from my August 18th bake – great sauce coverage, very nice crunch crust, dough taste right-on from long, long ferment, a little too much hot pepper flakes in the sauce kept it from being great.
These are from my August 20th bake with Wegman’s dough – dough is much heavier than my own with little bubbles, but in general, not as airy; likely a shorter ferment and possibly all-purpose flour which is cheaper and has less gluten content than 00 Nebalatan flour. But the sauce and bake time were right-on. OH SO CLOSE TO GREAT!
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