Underseer
Contributor
Argh.
I get that pan pizza is the style of Chicago pizza that is most unlike pizza served elsewhere in the world, and so naturally, that's the style of pizza that people outside of Chicago focus on the most. The thing is, if you say "Chicago pizza" to me or most people from the Chicagoland area, pan pizza is not what pops into our heads. I eat pan pizza maybe once a year or so. Don't get me wrong: I like it, but if I ate that stuff regularly, I would be as big as a house. Besides, what's the fun in eating pizza that fills you up after one or two slices?
Comparison to NY Pizza
As a baseline, let's compare Chicago pizza to NY pizza, since that's the closest. No, not the Neapolitan brick oven pizza (it's got Naples right in the name there), the other kind of NY pizza. Take a NY pizza and make the sauce a little bit spicier with a little extra white pepper, then add a thicker layer of pizza sauce to the pizza. When I first came to Chicago, this part annoyed me because it causes the cheese to slide right off when you eat it, but the tradeoff is that you get really big tomato flavor in every bite.
Chicago pizza is traditionally with sausage rather than pepperoni. Chicago was once called the "hog butcher of the world" and I noticed the quality of the sausage on pizza right away when I moved here.
Like NY pizza, the pizza is cooked until the cheese is browned, unlike some other parts of America that seem content to merely melt the cheese.
The last main difference is that the pieces are square cut instead of pie cut. This is not unique to Chicago as many cities in the Midwest do this. With the square cut, there's no need to fold the slices in half like you need to do with NY pizza. You get 3 types of slices out of this cut:
Personally, I love square cut as the pieces are smaller, and it feels like you get more variety between the different kinds of pieces that result from the cut. So you eat more pieces, and you get more variety in the pieces.
This. This is what "Chicago pizza" looks like:
Sausage & giardiniera from Rosati's, a pizza chain in the Chicagoland area.
Not this:
This is just for those times when you want to gorge yourself silly on mozzarella, or when entertaining guests from out of town.
What prompted this? Well, someone made a crack about "Chicago pizza" and of course he was talking about pan pizza, which made me think of the above. On a lark, I went to Google, searched for "Chicago pizza," clicked the "images" button, and sure enough, it was nothing but pictures of pan pizza. Worse, the one image of thin crust pizza that I saw was pie cut. Blasphemy!
I get that pan pizza is the style of Chicago pizza that is most unlike pizza served elsewhere in the world, and so naturally, that's the style of pizza that people outside of Chicago focus on the most. The thing is, if you say "Chicago pizza" to me or most people from the Chicagoland area, pan pizza is not what pops into our heads. I eat pan pizza maybe once a year or so. Don't get me wrong: I like it, but if I ate that stuff regularly, I would be as big as a house. Besides, what's the fun in eating pizza that fills you up after one or two slices?
Comparison to NY Pizza
As a baseline, let's compare Chicago pizza to NY pizza, since that's the closest. No, not the Neapolitan brick oven pizza (it's got Naples right in the name there), the other kind of NY pizza. Take a NY pizza and make the sauce a little bit spicier with a little extra white pepper, then add a thicker layer of pizza sauce to the pizza. When I first came to Chicago, this part annoyed me because it causes the cheese to slide right off when you eat it, but the tradeoff is that you get really big tomato flavor in every bite.
Chicago pizza is traditionally with sausage rather than pepperoni. Chicago was once called the "hog butcher of the world" and I noticed the quality of the sausage on pizza right away when I moved here.
Like NY pizza, the pizza is cooked until the cheese is browned, unlike some other parts of America that seem content to merely melt the cheese.
The last main difference is that the pieces are square cut instead of pie cut. This is not unique to Chicago as many cities in the Midwest do this. With the square cut, there's no need to fold the slices in half like you need to do with NY pizza. You get 3 types of slices out of this cut:
- Corner pieces
There are 4 on each pizza. They're small, triangular and mostly crust. Ideal for people who like crust. - Center pieces
These interior pieces have no crust whatsoever, and are ideal for people who don't like crust. Because of the lack of crust and the extra pizza sauce, you need to eat them carefully as that cheese is gonna slide right off. - End pieces
These have a crust/pizza ratio more like what people outside the Midwest would consider "normal"
Personally, I love square cut as the pieces are smaller, and it feels like you get more variety between the different kinds of pieces that result from the cut. So you eat more pieces, and you get more variety in the pieces.
This. This is what "Chicago pizza" looks like:
Sausage & giardiniera from Rosati's, a pizza chain in the Chicagoland area.
Not this:
This is just for those times when you want to gorge yourself silly on mozzarella, or when entertaining guests from out of town.
What prompted this? Well, someone made a crack about "Chicago pizza" and of course he was talking about pan pizza, which made me think of the above. On a lark, I went to Google, searched for "Chicago pizza," clicked the "images" button, and sure enough, it was nothing but pictures of pan pizza. Worse, the one image of thin crust pizza that I saw was pie cut. Blasphemy!
