New England State and City Foodways

Specialised

CONNECTICUT: NEW HAVEN APIZZA — coal-fired, charred, thin, oblong, and the white clam pie at Frank Pepe’s from 1925, which is one of the genuinely distinct pizza traditions in the country; also the steamed cheeseburger of Meriden and the hot lobster roll with butter rather than mayonnaise. RHODE ISLAND: COFFEE MILK, the state drink, milk with coffee syrup; clam cakes; stuffies (stuffed quahogs); johnnycakes, a Narragansett-derived cornmeal cake whose thick-or-thin question splits the state; New York System wieners; and Portuguese and Italian Providence. MASSACHUSETTS: Boston baked beans with molasses — a molasses that came through the triangular trade, which is why the city had a molasses flood in 1919 — brown bread, Boston cream pie, Fluff (invented in Somerville) and the Fluffernutter. MAINE: lobster roll cold with mayonnaise, Italian sandwich, whoopie pie (contested with Pennsylvania), blueberry pie, Moxie. VERMONT: cheddar, maple, cider, and a small-producer culture. NEW HAMPSHIRE: apples, maple, and the boiled dinner.

Where in the world

What is recorded

New Haven apizza is recorded as a distinct coal-fired Italian-American tradition, with the white clam pie documented at Frank Pepe’s from 1925. Rhode Island coffee milk is the official state drink. Johnnycakes derive from Narragansett cornmeal preparation and their thickness is a documented intra-state dispute. Whoopie pie origin is contested between Maine and Pennsylvania and no origin is assigned. documented

The white clam pie at Frank Pepe’s in New Haven, within the coal-fired apizza tradition. documented