Pizza: Another 'New Favorite' Scam, and What You're Really Getting

# The LA Pizza Scene: Another Week, Another 'Must-Try' List?

Alright, let's talk about it. Another week, another breathless announcement from the LA food media machine, right? "7 new favorite pizzas to try in Los Angeles." Seven! Not five, not ten, but a very specific, very clickable seven. You gotta wonder, who’s sitting around deciding what constitutes a "favorite" before anyone’s even had a chance to digest it? It ain't just a list; it’s a whole damn industry built on FOMO and the eternal hunt for the next Instagrammable bite. And honestly, it’s getting pretty exhausting to keep up...

The Never-Ending Pizza Gold Rush

Every other Tuesday, it feels like we're being told there's a new "must-try" spot, a groundbreaking culinary revelation that will change your life, or at least your Friday night. This week, we're apparently all supposed to be tripping over ourselves to get to Highland Park for a "Pork-and-beef bolognese pizza at Bub and Grandma’s Pizza." Bolognese. On a pizza. Look, I get it, fusion, creativity, pushing boundaries and all that jazz, but sometimes you gotta ask: is it actually good, or is it just different enough to get on a list?

I mean, bolognese is great. Pizza is great. But combining them? It feels less like a stroke of genius and more like a desperate attempt to stand out in a city that’s already drowning in pizza options. It’s like when everyone decided kale had to be in everything, even your morning smoothie. Was it better? Nah, just... there. And now we've got a bolognese pizza. Is this really a "favorite" in the making, or just a fleeting novelty designed to drive clicks and traffic to an already congested neighborhood? I bet the parking situation alone makes it a non-starter for half the city. Seriously, I spent forty minutes trying to find a spot near some "artisanal toast" place last month, and I swear to god, I still ain't over it.

And who are these "favorites" for, anyway? The locals who already know the good spots, or the out-of-towners looking for a curated experience? Because let’s be real, a true "favorite" isn't something you discover on a list; it’s the greasy slice you stumble into after a late night, the place where the owner remembers your order, the one that tastes like home, not like a carefully constructed marketing campaign. This isn't just about food; it's about the relentless commodification of taste, turning genuine culinary enjoyment into a competitive sport.

The Hype Cycle and Our Collective Amnesia

Here’s the thing about these "new favorite" lists: they operate on a collective amnesia. We’re constantly told to forget last month’s "new favorite" because, surprise! There’s a newer new favorite. It's a hamster wheel of culinary consumption, and we’re all just running on it, chasing the next big thing, only to find it's often just a slightly different version of the last big thing. What happened to the seven pizzas from six months ago? Did they spontaneously combust? Did they suddenly become un-favorite?

This isn't to say there aren't great pizzas in LA. There are. Plenty of 'em. But the constant need to anoint "new favorites" every other week feels less like genuine discovery and more like a content generator for publications that need to fill space. It’s like they've got an algorithm that spits out "X new things to try in Y city" and then just plugs in whatever restaurant is getting a PR push that week. The words "favorite" and "must-try" have lost all meaning, diluted into generic adjectives for anything that's mildly palatable and recently opened. My cat's "favorite" toy changes daily too, but I don't see anyone writing an article about it. And offcourse, she's not paying twenty bucks for it.

Then again, maybe I’m just a jaded old cynic who can't appreciate the thrill of the chase. Maybe there are people out there who genuinely get excited about a pork-and-beef bolognese pizza and rush out to try all seven of these new anointed "favorites." Maybe the culinary landscape should be a constantly shifting kaleidoscope of fleeting trends. But for me, I’m gonna stick to my old, reliable spots, the ones that don't need a listicle to tell me they’re good. They just are.

Just Stop Already