| Joe Obenberger |
08-26-2013 02:53 PM |
If you get to Chicago, you're in a pizza wonderland. There are so many good choices that it can become bewildering. I wouldn't begin to rate them because they are all good, really good, in their own distinctive ways. New York Style, Chicago Deep Dish, Bakery Pizza, whatever, if you try them, you'll come away liking them all. I'm leaving out all of the artisan, Fine Arts Pizzas, I'll leave them for the hipsters unless I'm in a peculiar mood. At random, in no order, some of the places I like best:
*Pat's Pizza in the South Loop, phenomenal, crispy, thin-crust.
*Bacci, an enormous, gigantic New York style slice with a small drink for $5. All over the place.
*Lou Malinatti - Chicago Deep Dish, many locations all over, including Gold Coast.
*Grand Stand - actually Near West suburbs, Franklin Park, nearly perfect New York style.
*Barnaby's - Several local locations. It used to be a big, national chain and shrunk. Not really like any other thin-crust, but excellent in every way.
*Angelo's - A neighborhood place on the North Side, on Montrose. Awesome slices till midnight.
*Aurelio's - Local chain, lots of locations, uses sharp cheese for a tangy taste and offers a great lunch buffet with five kinds of pizza, pasta, chicken, salad, etc. Really good stuff.
*Burt's Pizza - One of a kind, in Skokie. You gotta make reservations to get in. Everything about this place is ideosyncratic and strange, including the operator, but it's a great Deep Dish Pizza from one of the guys who invented it at Gino's East. It's been on Anthony Bourdain No Reservations.
*Giordano's - Locations all over the place. Phenomenal. And if you like cheese, you'll get your money's worth. I think each pizza uses half a cow's daily output :-)
*D'Agostino's - Their pizza sauce is just unrivaled. Tangy, authentic. The location up North on Sedgewick made them famous, but they've branched out with a few other locations, all of them near live music.
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