I think food is my love language.

Now that I have that on the table, here are my thoughts on food lately.

I have decided that food really defines home. Of course, there will always be those special places when you visit an old vacation place or even new places you find in new cities or towns. But…none of it will ever be the food from the place you grew up or spent a significant part of your life in. Nowhere will ever be able to top your favorite local mexican joint or Pizza place. There must be something in the water that helps you relate to that food. More and more I am realizing that the food you are exposed to in the place you grew up influences your tastes for all foods after that.

With that in mind when we moved here and still we receive opinions from people on places to eat. They often recommend somewhere and state that it was the best ______ food they ever ate. An example, before we moved I came upon someone who lived in Juneau for 20 years before moving around the world and ending up in Flagstaff. He swore to me up and down that place XXX and XXX were the best in town and he even went as far to say the best he’s ever had. With that recommendation I urged D to try them with me. Granted he hadn’t been back to Juneau in who knows how long but it had to have some merit right. Both of those places were good but not nearly as good given he compared them to Fratellies pizza in Flagstaff. Additionally, we have received other recommendations that have fallen through for us. Obviously, everything is subject to personal tastes and opinions but for us to receive multiple recommendations and have a place fall through made me wonder.

In a conversation with a Juneau native she said something along the lines of “If your from Juneau Bullwinkles (local pizza shop) is the best pizza you will ever eat, if you’re not it is easily the worst”. I felt like this made total sense having tried Bullwinkles and honestly being worried that was the only pizza we were going to eat after moving. Additionally, I was talking to another Juneau native who has done a lot of traveling in “the lower 48” and he confirmed this with me. He said that Bullwinkles just has that weird funk or something that you can’t get anywhere else. Is anyone else worried about this “funk” this pizza place has? Good thing we don’t like it. He even went as far as saying he’s tried fancy pizza and pizza places he’s visited and they just didn’t have that funk. Now, not being from Juneau, D and I are finding that we just can’t find a place that is as good as Fratellis. Granted, Fratellis doesn’t have a funk and is well-known even for tourists, it got me thinking…

Similar to Mexican food here Pizza is hit and miss. Fortunately, we found a place that is really good but it is a bit of a drive and its a little fancier than just a Saturday quick dinner, however, it is really good. But…. it’s still not Fratellis. Similarly we have found okay places but nothing to write home about.

The other night we ordered a Dominos pizza to just give it a try, and when we got it and I took that first bite it strangely tasted sort of like home. Don’t get me wrong it was still just Dominos pizza and yes we can find better places. I think why it was so good was it was familiar. In a city that has 4 national chain restaurants its amazing how much eating somewhere where the food is familiar makes you feel at home.

If you are wondering about our mexican food adventures visit this post.

Also make sure to follow all of our Around our table posts so that you can get a taste of what we are enjoying as we are trying to find our taste of home here.