That's not pizza.
this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2026
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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.
So that Chicago pizza is cheese with tomato sauce on top?
Do you think the people of Chicago made a tragic linguistic mistake and fucked their cuisine instead?
what do you mean?
Lasagna
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.
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.
…so a calzona and focaccia?
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.
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.
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.
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.
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!
Chicago!
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There is cheese, but when I want pizza, I don't want a salami casserole
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Under. The. Sauce.
Look, I try to be a forgiving person, but...
Putting too much sauce on the bottom causes the crust to be soft and undercooked. So if you like a bit more sauce you can put it on top instead.
I'm a relatively recent transplant to Chigacoland so I feel a bit of an instinctive need to defend deep dish. But really, its more of a love for all forms of pizza.
New York style? Hell yes Chicago style? Two slices and long nap, but still hell yes Detroit style, tavern style, California style, thin crust, thick crust, stuffed crust? Yes yes yes yes yes and yes!
I'm a native Chicagoan and I just wish people would stop thinking of it is "Chicago style" pizza lol
There's only a handful of restaurants that make it and it's not even their best seller, the way more common "Chicago style" pizza is basically just square cut tavern style.
Deep dish is pretty good but I feel like it's its own category. IMO it's a bad choice for most of the situations you'd order pizza. It's extremely filling so it makes you tired. You have to eat it fast because it's only good hot (and it cools down quick). The slices are heavy so it's harder to eat without making a mess.
Like if I want deep dish, I want deep dish. But if I want pizza, I'm not even considering deep dish, you know? It's like noodle pasta vs lasagna
Exactly. The confusion lies in limiting “Chicago Style Pizza” to specifically a pie. Don’t get me wrong, love a great pie on occasion. Growing up there and visiting other states made it super clear. It means ya got options and they are gonna be quality. Tavern was always the go to. Shout out to OG Aurelio's. The best places had killer pan, tavern and some had their version of pie. Some had insane New York style. To me, Chicagoland pizza was knowing you usually were gonna get some of the best, no matter the style.
Oh and Chicago “fast food” - dogs, Greek and Italian Beef’s…. Sometimes available at the same place as the killer pizzas. Come on.
They’re all just jealous.
Shout out to OG Aurelio’s
yes. and their pies were cheap, we lived on this in the 80s.
Yeah, we just don't have a "signature" pizza in the same way Detroit does.
Italian beef feels like such an accidental secret. It's so good but nobody talks about it outside of Chicago
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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.
Until you said Detroit I was going to accuse you of being Jon Stewart's posting account ;) very entertaining post, I salute you
Jon Stewart has some thoughts about this.
Rahm Emanuel and Jon Stewart hurt the reputation of the humble Chicago Deep Dish pizza due to some crass comment about skyscrapers. It's a fantastic pie slathered in tomato sauce with a dough base mixed with corn meal giving it a slight crunch and subtle boost to its flavor. I get not everyone likes the unconventional approach to this dish but in my humble opinion it's well worth having once in a while, especially with a pint of beer. I only wish it were a little more common because damn not even LA has more than 3 or 4 joints that offer it and they're all a pain to get to. Just give the pizza a chance people, it's tasty and filling especially if you like your pie saucy.
Real deep dish pizza is my favorite type of pizza!
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The nature of deep dish pizza aside, doesn't cheeseless pizza predate the kind with cheese anyway?
Yeah, but New Yorkers believe they invented Pizza. Not joking, some very seriously believe that.
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