Chicago “Hometown” Pizza

Much like their support of the two local Baseball Teams, the vast majority of Chicagoans who admit to loving this pizza (and there are some who don’t care for it) will be polarised into two camps. You’re either a Lou Malnati fan or you’re a Giordano’s fan. Two chains hailing from the Windy City who have, like all good exports, franchised themselves out into the suburbs and the wider MidWest region. We’re Giordano’s fans in our house (there’s no logic to that conclusion – it’s probably the cheese !) and we’re fortunate to have pretty much constant access to this ultimate comfort food. That doesn’t stop me from trying my own, of course, and it’s one I need to perfect before going back home to the UK – no Giordano’s in England !

Fortunately, there’s a potential answer which I will have to experiment with and document in a future post. This guy seems to have done the hard work…and his conclusion doesn’t seem that difficult to implement. I am looking forward to trying this just to see how close we can make it to the “real thing” and now I have the hang of this Blog thing then I’ll post that in more detail as I do it.

In the meantime I’ve had a crack using other recipes a couple of times, and I have to say, the result is not too bad at all. I have a recipe from a very nice Real Book that I’ve used, and then I have one which I found online.

Broadly speaking they all point to the same method.

The dish I used here is a lid from a large Cast Iron Dutch Oven which I bought in the UK a few years ago. Generally this beast is used for huge outdoor chilli and other casserole type cooks, but the lid also makes a great skillet. I felt that the dimensions of the thing would be ideal for what I was trying to do, and also to facilitate the high heat transfer to bake that crust underneath all of that density above. Turned out OK, so as I evolve this to the Giordano’s recipe I think the pan strategy is a keeper. I have a smaller Dutch Oven lid too but to be honest this pizza is so popular, the big one seems to be the way to go.

Just as with the Detroit pizza this has so far been cooked in a normal kitchen oven – no Kamado Joes in sight, and no pizza stone/baking steel. More scope for further experimentation…