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Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

nytimes.com

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Re: Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

#61

Post by chitowneats »

duped wrote: post #11

Ditch the giardiniera and put the sausage under the cheese instead of on top, and add a splash of red wine to the sauce and you'd have something more in common in the local pizza spots. Also can't forget the corn meal to keep the crust from sticking to the pan, which is just a part of the experience when you eat it. Personally the crust looks wrong. It's not a saltine, it's slightly thicker than that. There are pizza…

Giardineria is the world's most underrated condiment. It belongs at the top of list next to kimchi and sauerkraut.

Re: Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

#62

Post by vidanay »

joezydeco wrote: post #42
stametseater wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems to be the way with all online recipes. SEO crap.

Pages about pizza, especially crap like "top 10 pizza joints in Chicago!" are a guaranteed way to generate clicks in the midwest. People will argue about that shit for days. I've had Fox's, I've had a lot of Vito and Nicks (or Nick and Vitos, they listed in the phone book both ways), when really the best pizza is whatever is local and your parents bought you all the time as a kid. Which means Pinocchio's in Niles IL…

In the 80's in Arlington Heights the pizza of choice was either Dondi's or Wayne's. Sadly, Dondi's changed ownership about 15 years ago and went seriously downhill. They finally went out of business last year. I have heard that Wayne's is still in business and is still great.

Re: Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

#64

Post by yumraj »

AlbertCory wrote: post #26

Native Chicagoan here. Not totally a snob, but getting there. I didn't usually encounter really crispy crust growing up, but I'm not saying it's wrong. He does a lot of things here I've never tried, but now I'm going to. I had an Ooni, and after 5 or 6 meh attempts, I sold it. I also exited the r/ooni subreddit. I'm also out of love with the Neapolitan style baked at 700F+. Come at me. I think a pizza steel preheated…

What do you mean by pizza steel?

I’m looking to get a cast iron pizza pan but would love to know there’s a better option.

Re: Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

#65

Post by jrexilius »

AlbertCory wrote: post #26

Native Chicagoan here. Not totally a snob, but getting there. I didn't usually encounter really crispy crust growing up, but I'm not saying it's wrong. He does a lot of things here I've never tried, but now I'm going to. I had an Ooni, and after 5 or 6 meh attempts, I sold it. I also exited the r/ooni subreddit. I'm also out of love with the Neapolitan style baked at 700F+. Come at me. I think a pizza steel preheated…

Native Chicagoan here as well. When I was growing up we called this "party" style pizza, while deep dish was just called pizza. After living in Austin for last 8 years, I still desperately miss good deep dish pizza, but thin crust is easy to find outside of Chicago...

Re: Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

#66

Post by poloniculmov »

yumraj wrote: post #64
AlbertCory wrote: post #26

Native Chicagoan here. Not totally a snob, but getting there. I didn't usually encounter really crispy crust growing up, but I'm not saying it's wrong. He does a lot of things here I've never tried, but now I'm going to. I had an Ooni, and after 5 or 6 meh attempts, I sold it. I also exited the r/ooni subreddit. I'm also out of love with the Neapolitan style baked at 700F+. Come at me. I think a pizza steel preheated…

What do you mean by pizza steel? I’m looking to get a cast iron pizza pan but would love to know there’s a better option.

Something like this[1]. It's easier to use than a pizza stone and yields better results.

1: https://bakingsteel.com/products/baking-steel

Re: Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

#67

Post by pcl »

AlbertCory wrote: post #26

Native Chicagoan here. Not totally a snob, but getting there. I didn't usually encounter really crispy crust growing up, but I'm not saying it's wrong. He does a lot of things here I've never tried, but now I'm going to. I had an Ooni, and after 5 or 6 meh attempts, I sold it. I also exited the r/ooni subreddit. I'm also out of love with the Neapolitan style baked at 700F+. Come at me. I think a pizza steel preheated…

A couple years ago, when I was on a pizza kick, the thing that worked best for me was to start cooking the dough on the stovetop on a very hot cast iron skillet. I would cook it long enough for the dough to start to change color and bubble a bit (45-60 seconds), and then make sure it was releasing from the pan. Then, I would sprinkle on oil, tomato sauce and toppings and move it from the skillet to the preheated stone, and leave it under the broiler for another couple minutes.

The initial cook on the pan got the crust going, and so the oven time was mostly focused on the toppings.

Re: Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

#68

Post by BuckRogers »

codemac wrote: post #13

It upsets me this is called "Chicago" when clearly it came from further east - these "working class pizza taverns" being common across Indiana, Ohio, and PA as well. There are plenty of examples of these types of "no I started thin crust and square cut" pizza tavern places everywhere. And even worse is that I am no historian and I'm probably wrong. But my direct experience contradicts a lot of the Chicago-washing of…

When I first moved Chicago, I found it weird to run into natives that considered tavern style pizza as also Chicago’s style. In Iowa we just generally consider that the Midwest style pizza but that’s definitely the style preferred by locals for many decades.

Chicago is the Big Apple of the Midwest so I guess they think everything originated from there. But I’m pretty sure tavern style either came from back east, or where I’m from along the Mississippi River.

Re: Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

#69

Post by wsatb »

pessimizer wrote: post #53
wsatb wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most Chicagoans I know do not eat deep dish often, nor do they even really like it. But...as someone else said, this isn't really the alternative. The crust is just plain wrong.

To be fair, an awful lot of upper-middle class esp. North Side Chicagoans aren't from Chicago. The inner suburbs are far more Chicago than a lot of neighborhoods in the city that are filled with various Midwestern emigrants (who didn't think they were good enough for NY, and didn't think they were good looking enough for California, so ended up in the second city.) The inner suburbs are filled with the descendants of…

> Midwestern emigrants (who didn't think they were good enough for NY, and didn't think they were good looking enough for California, so ended up in the second city.)

Or because it's close to home and way more affordable? Also, while winter sucks, I'll take a Chicago summer over both those places every single year.

I grew up here as well. No one thinks deep dish immediately when talking about getting pizza. It feels more like a once or twice a year delicacy than anyone's go-to pizza.

Re: Kenji López-Alt spent 5 months studying Chicago thin-crust pizza

#70

Post by gnicholas »

robshrk wrote: post #47
karaterobot wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think a pizza steel preheated in a kitchen oven at 500F gives you a perfectly good pizza, and the fact that you can slide out the oven rack and use gravity to launch the pizza off the peel makes it a total win. For me, the pizza steel is also plenty good compared to the portable gas ovens. Some other tricks I use are adding diastatic malt powder to the dough, and par-baking the crust before adding the toppings, t…

The one minute par-bake also makes it so much easier and stress free to slide a fully loaded pizza onto the stone. I don’t even use cornmeal just lightly dusted whole wheat flour for the raw dough. The par-baked crust needs nothing.

We used to cornmeal lightly but then discovered parchment paper. It's super easy to slide off with a spatula underneath.

When you par-bake, how long does it take you to then add the ingredients? Do you have to rush? Or is it better to take a few minutes, so the oven can re-heat itself?

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