Native Chicagoan here. Something that always gets glossed over is understanding that there’s two types of deep dish pizza: stuffed (what you see here) and pan.
Stuffed pizza (from bottom to top) is dough, cheese (plus vegetables or meat or whatever else you wanna “stuff” it with), another layer of dough, then the sauce on top.
Giordano’s or Gino’s East is most closely associated with stuffed, even though it’s often only referred to as “deep dish.”
Pan pizza is almost the same in shape/dimensions, but instead of it being stuffed with cheese/vegetables/meat, that part is just bread.
Lou Malnati’s is most closely associated with pan pizza, even though it’s often only referred to as “deep dish.”
The differences are incredibly important, and anyone who’s tried both can concur.
Anyways, they both have cheese so idk what this dude talking about lol
Thanks for comin to my TED Talk.
Thank you! I like Chicago-style stuffed, but no one on the West Coast knows what it is. Hell, most people anywhere don’t know what it is.
For those who have never had it: imagine a two-layer lasagna but the noodles are replaced with a flaky, buttery, yeast-leavened bread. It can be great, but it can also be a big pile of garbage if it’s not done right, worse than regular bad pizza.
…so a calzona and focaccia?
No, it’s a pizza, and if it weren’t it would be either of those things either.
It’s a sandwich.
Pan pizza is almost the same in shape/dimensions, but instead of it being stuffed with cheese/vegetables/meat, that part is just bread.
This makes it sound like pan pizza is dough stuffed with bread, but I’m guessing that’s not what you meant to imply? Regardless, I’ve only had Pequod’s and I don’t know which kind it was, but I know it was fucking delicious.
Nah it’s not stuffed with bread, it’s just bread up until you get to the cheese and sauce up top.
And yeah, Pequods is always poppin. Lotta Chicago transplants go for their deep dish, but their thin is better imo. It depends on how you feel about crust, too. Some people really like their crust.
One is basically meat pie without a crust top. The other is just a thick ass piece of bread, often something tasty all its own like sourdough, with pizza toppings on top (think more like putting cheese on bread sticks and calling it pizza). For some reason they are both called deep dish but one is all filling with a thin crust and the other is all bread topped with a pizza.
Yes, Lou’s over Giordano’s for that reason. I don’t care for marinara sauce, but the extra dough and cheese is great.
I don’t care if it’s under the sauce I still think deep dish pizza is stupid
I don’t have a problem with deep dish pizza; just Chicago style deep dish pizza. Not only is the sauce on top, it’s marinara sauce and is added cold.
it’s marinara sauce and is added cold.
It does get heated up when they put the whole thing in the oven you know. Not disputing your dislike of Chicago style deep dish pizza, love what you love and hate what you hate it’s all good. But I don’t want anybody to be confused about how hot or cold these pizzas are when you receive them.
The sauce goes on after it comes out of the oven, every time I’ve seen a recipe for it.
those recipes are by people who don’t know fuck all about chicago pizza, ignore them
Wouldn’t putting sauce on before putting in the oven prevent the cheese from doing a maillard? That’s half the draw of pizza to me, is browned cheese.
most chicago deep dish i’ve had is in layers for this very reason:
- crust basin
- cheese
- sauce
- cheese again
Yeah the sauce is put on top to prevent the maillard reaction. In every sense of the word a deep dish is not a typical pizza. But it is still a pizza.
The same can be said for Detroit style pizza. If one wanted to make the same kind of disparagement that people do of deep dish, I could say that Detroit style isn’t pizza it’s actually cake.
My one and only encounter with chicago pizza was enough to convince me I hated it. Doesn’t mean it’s bad though, just definitely not for me. I think it would be better called a casserole than a pizza.
It’s a no pasta lasagna.
I’d love to know wtf they thought that was
I mean, to be honest they probably knew it was cheese and were just being silly.
That makes me want to ask why the crust is so stretchy!
PVA glue
Chicago!
Glue?
Yep. That’s how you get the sauce to stick to the pizza base.
Was this an ad? Then yes. Is it a crappy phone picture ad? Then maybe. Is this a crappy phone picture of someone’s measly deep dish? Then no.
That’s what I use to keep my socks from falling down to my ankles.
That’s not pizza.
It’s a pie
Yes, a pizza pie.
A torta salata, a pie
Chicago “pizza” is more of a casserole in a sort of bread bowl really.
I mean that’s fine I’m not saying it’s bad but I am saying it isn’t “pizza.”
Does it have bread, cheese, and sauce? Then I’m going to love eating it, don’t really care what you call it
Alright. One layer matzah, one thick layer casu marzu, one layer vegemite. Would you eat the bread, cheese, and sauce?
you mean italian food?
It’s cold sauce on top.
It’s amazing how pizza was perfected somewhere between 100 and 200 years ago and then every city in America has decided they need to make it worse in innovative and unique ways.
By the gods it’s the fucking train of food. Here’s perfection now make it more expensive, harder to build, and somehow worse. Quick get Adam Something to make a video on this.
Italian immigrants came up with most of those different styles of pizza. You can hate them, but the people who invented them were Italian.
If they are born in America they are American.
Even if they were born in Italy they are still American, but they are Italian immigrants. Ric Riccardo was a first generation Italian immigrant. Modern Chicago deep dish is likely a modified version of what he served in his pizzeria, but he did still invent it.
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I mean I agree with you, but it’s funnier if talk as if other forms of pizza are an afront to god.
Pizza is actually at least 1000 years old. The thing that identifies it as pizza is the bread not the toppings. And it has actually gotten way better with time.
In the sense that people have been putting stuff on top of flat bread, sure. But that’s why I say it was perfected a hundred years or so ago. Because sure you could argue a flatbread with a a herb and cheese spread and some dates is pizza, but it doesn’t hold a candle to a modern pizza.
I feel like it’s important to me to learn whether the sauce is actually good. I’m terrified that it’s bland. It looks bland. I cannot see any spices or herbs. This is stressing me out more than it should.
They are under the plate.
depends on where you go, good places will have a well seasoned marinara. you can also usually see the herbs and spices they’ve used
This finally made me look for the original, deleted, frustratingly unarchived post. But there are higher resolution pics, and they show herbs n’ ground beef. At least a passable amount of both.
It’s a fairly spicy marinara.
I like my pizza like I like my coffee, with no cheese.
Chicago Style is utter garbage “pizza”. If I wanted a mess drenched in pasta and sauce, I’d get a lasagna. I once ordered a deep dish pizza at a bar, and like a civillized sensible human, I assumed it would be that crispy-crusted glory that is Detroit Style deep dish pizza. Not so, it was the vomit-inducing deep Chicago, which looks and tastes the exact same going in as it does coming out.
Detroit >> Chicago, it’s not even close. I will fight and die on that hill, as you can actually make a hill out of Detroit style slices! You can only make shitty Agincourt mud out of Chicago-style slop.
Wow, then you are going to absolutely hate Mexican food with a passion.
Ar the end of the day, we’re all blood, meat, and bones, but giraffes and humans are different nonetheless. Order matters!
Until you said Detroit I was going to accuse you of being Jon Stewart’s posting account ;) very entertaining post, I salute you
Did you forget?
Lasagna
Can you pleas stop calling it a pizza‽ I’m sure it’s tasty and all but it’s not a pizza. Words have a meaning, or what’s next? We gonna call this a cheeseburger?
words also change meaning, and we changed the shit out of that particular word. Come at us, chitown is always down for a food battle
Words do change meaning but in this instance they shouldn’t. Pizza is actively being used for it’s original meaning. Chicago deep dish pizza and the fact locust haven’t ravaged the city to destruction is proof that there is no god. There is no reason to expand the definition to include that cold disappointing pastaless casserole.
It’s tough being at the top, but you get used to it, take that boston
Nah thanks. I’ll just stay here and enjoy my cheese burger.
wtf are those gummy worm looking things on the roast beef?
It’s jelly, made of stock and the juices arising while roasting the meat. Kind of like a savoury jello.
You must not know about Altoona pizza.
No, I don’t know some random pizza from a random hotel in a random town on the other end of the world. But looking at the pictures, I’d say that, albeit not looking very appetizing, it definitely looks much more pizza-like than that Chicago style cheesecake.
But if you ever come to visit, I can recommend a lovely little Italian osteria in the original Altona where you can get great authentic Italian pizza.
what is not pizza about it
Counter question: What’s pizza about it?
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