Not having any particular allegiance to either team that is playing in Super Bowl XL has its advantages. The primary one being that I don't feel bound to a particular color scheme and can use blue, silver, black and gold with abandon. Not being one for tablescapes, I limited my wild color use to blue and gold sprinkles. White icing outlined hand-drawn football helmets, which I decorated further with blue Seattle Seahawk S's and yellow Pittsburg Steelers P's. Interestingly, the blue-sprinkled cookies disappeared much more quickly than the yellow. Are more people supporting the Steelers or are the blue sprinkles just more enticing?

[Photo by Nicole Weston]

It was eight years ago, and still I remember every bite. I was in Seattle for one night and I was going to live it up. We ate at Wild Ginger, and we feasted on what was then still on the very edge of food fashion: Pan-Asian fusion cuisine.

Today Seattle shares the Pan-Asian food title with its Canadian sister just across the sound, Vancouver, B.C., but Wild Ginger is still heralded as one of the best restaurants on the West Coast.

Sarah Gim may think that she's discovered great things in the Eastern European heritage of Pittsburgh. But nothing's ever been made out of a potato that even approaches Siam lettuce cups with sea bass in a spicy peanut sauce (swoon!). It's sweet and salty and fishy and tangy and the heat rises behind your ears and OH MY GOD I need to eat here every night.

Sarah Gim says Pittsburgh kicks Seattle's butt. OH YEAH? I'll take Pike Place over Polish sausage any day. Here's why:

1. Costco was born right outside of Seattle. You're talking the world's largest* producer of bulk butter, deli counter muffins, five-pound logs of goat cheese, and free samples. Top that, Giant Eagle!
2. Sure, a Polish sausage might beat up an oyster in a fight. But a 10-pound wild salmon would beat up both of y'all. It swims upstream, avoiding bears and dangerous man-made obstacles, just to procreate. Even the most impressive sausage... is just a bunch of ground meat wrapped in pig intestine! Eww!
3. Iron City beer is better than Starbucks coffee... when you're coming home from the swing shift at the steel factory. Those smarty pants at Microsoft and Amazon.com need coffee to wake up in the morning for a hard days' work dominating the universe! Yeah!
4. Seattle's cuisine is influenced by Vietnam. Pittsburgh's cuisine is influenced by Poland. My Communist cuisine is so much better than your post-Communist cuisine!
5. Right, Pike Place Market! They throw seafood there. Do they throw seafood at you in Pittsburgh? I didn't think so.
6. Smoked salmon dip or Heinz ketchup - which would YOU rather dip your chips in? That's what I thought!
7. Let's have a cheese off: I'll take Cougar Gold, you take... umm... American cheese?
8. You think Washington apples are boring? Try a Walla-Walla Sweet onion. Slice one, cook it up reeall slow in butter over medium-low heat, add a 1/2 teaspoon of paprika and 1/4 teaspoon of chipotle pepper, mix with 1/2 cup mayonnaise and 1 cup sour cream in Cuisinart, salt to taste, and wow! Seattle Onion Dip.

* I have no evidence to back up this claim. [Photo Sarah Gilbert]

1. I'd rather eat a pierogi with #7 Ben Roethlisberger (hot!) than salmon with Matt Hasselbeck (not hot!).
2. Steelers are people. Seahawks are...birds. Tweet tweet, little birdies!
3. If they got into a fight, Polish sausage would eat an oyster alive.
4. Black and gold helmet cookies are just so much classier than...what color are the Seahawks? Oh yeah, too many - navy blue, Pacific blue, green and white.
5. I'd rather drink an Iron City Beer than...Starbucks.
6. Pittsburgh was founded in 1758 and the Steelers were born in 1933. Seattle was founded in the 1850s and the Seahawks in 1976. Seattle is such a baby.
7. Pittsburgh has its own language. Wut dem Seahacks got...? Exactly.
8. Sour cream tastes much better with potato pancakes than an apple. 

I've been a Seahawks fan since I was old enough to say "football," and couldn't be happier that my favorite NFL team is finally taking its rightful place in the Superbowl. But what matters more than a city's fortunes on the gridiron? Well, their food, of course.

This week, Sarah Gim and I will be comparing and contrasting the foods of the two super cities, Seattle and Pittsburgh. We'll be butting heads in an all-out food war. I may be a tad bit biased... but I think I know who's going to win.

Seattle is a city characterized by its position on the great Puget Sound, and as such the city's cuisine is based on the seafood available as near as the sound and as far away as Alaska. Thanks to the huge ocean-going vessels that come and go from the downtown ports, the city also is flavored by the rich food cultures of Japan and China.

When I think of Seattle, the first food I can taste, raw and salty in my mouth, is the oyster. I like to think it's what real seahawks would eat.