Chicago Deep Dish Pizza

Get pizza.

This is the comment just about everyone makes when they hear you are going to Chicago.

Duh.

Of course I’m going to get pizza. I've only heard for my entire life that Chicago style pizza is unlike anything else in this world and I also happen to come from a state that is arrogantly proud of the pizzas it has to offer. Oh yes, I’m going to get pizza when in Chicago.

The stuffed pizza, to me, is a difficult concept to explain with words or pictures. I say that only because it wasn't until I actually had the pizza before me with fork and knife to plate* that I realized the depth and true culinary mastery that is the stuffed pizza.

*Yes, I ate it with a fork and knife.** You would too if you had been walking around the city all day.

**No, I do not always eat my pizza with a fork and knife. Especially not in Jersey.

What I can tell from just a brief amount of searching on the topic of ‘Chicago stuffed pizza’ and 'Chicago deep dish pizza' is that there are a few contenders for number one. They all have some famous name to back their claim at being the “best”, or the “oldest”, or the “famous” Chicago stuffed pizza. Me, I look at this in two ways. Part of me sees the glaring sign of “BEST” like Buddy the Elf saw the “Best cup of coffee" sign in NYC. Or perhaps I should say, the way Jovie saw the best cup of coffee that Buddy had her try.*

*If you don’t get this reference, please watch the movie Elf today. It doesn't matter that it isn't Christmas time. You’ll thank me later.

Anyone can write that they are the best. Anyone can get some type of celebrity to back them. I need you to show me you’re the best.

But the other part of me does want to know the history of your pizza. I want to know that you have been crafting your recipe for 200 years (Giordano’s) and that you just so happened to end up in Chicago, the city of stuffed pizza, to sell it. I want to know that you are just so good that you now have over 40 locations (Lou Malnati’s) spanning to cities outside of Chicago. I also don’t want you to be so big that you leave the state of Illinois. (Hello Uno Pizzeria and Grill, I’m talking to you!)

One day I think I may take a trip to Chicago based completely on pizza. I’ll try a different place every day and make my recommendations at the end of the trip.

However, I have yet to take a Pizza Tour of NYC, so naturally that must happen first.

Pizza from Giordano's is not for the impatient. Even their thin crust pizza takes 30 minutes from ordering to plating.

We ordered the thin crust as our "appetizer" since the well-known double stuffed pizza would take fifteen minutes longer.

I know, I know, you don't go to Chicago and order thin crust pizza, but Hubby couldn't resist. It was not at all like a Jersey thin crust pizza. A Jersey thin crust pizza is crisp and only millimeters thick (translation: not thick at all). Giordano's thin crust pizza was equal in thickness and texture to a typical Jersey pizza, if not even a hair thicker.

The taste, however, was perfect. We ordered a simple cheese so that there would be nothing to distract from the elements of their thin crust. The sauce was subtly sweet and the cheese---oh, the cheese was amazing, the perfect amount covering a perfect lining of sauce. Extra thin pizza options were listed on the menu with the heading "lighter versions with less cheese". Though extra thin sounded like it would be more like a Jersey thin crust pizza, "less cheese" can never, ever be a good thing.*

*Except in the case of Kate and Al's pizza. I don't know how they do it, but they make a scattering of cheese taste the way angels sound.

Heavenly.

When compared to an authentic Jersey pizza with greasy* cheese and sauce and crust that tear flawlessly away with each bite, this thin crust pizza is the underdog. But remember, sometimes underdogs come through to win it all.

*A good thing.

We ate two to three slices each despite knowing that the main attraction was just moments away.

Naturally, we couldn't order just one pie. We ordered: Cheese (because, again, we needed a pure, unadulterated version of Chicago’s famous stuffed pizza) and the Chicago Classic (pepperoni, mushrooms, green peppers, & onions)

Take what you know about an ordinary pizza, blow it up to about ten times its size, in thickness, and turn it inside out. You might not have Chicago's famous stuffed pizza, but you'd be on your way.

I'm not a big fan of mushrooms or veggies with my pizza, so the Classic wasn't my favorite, but I could appreciate the culinary thought behind it.

The cheese though---oh my word!

After eating this pizza, everything I've ever known about pizza suddenly made sense. I now knew why we refer to pizza not as pizza but as 'pie'. I instantly understood what Mama Giordano was thinking when she called this pizza, "Italian Easter Pie". The crust is flaky and thick. Think, Thanksgiving pie, but for pizza. The sauce is everywhere, enveloping itself around crust, cheese, and incredible flavors.

Knowing I wouldn't be back in Chicago anytime soon, I made sure to push the limits. Should I have eaten three of these ginormous pieces of pizza?

Probably not.

But I did, and I regret nothing.