Pizza Fried Chicken Ice Cream [Meeting #127]

Pizza Fried Chicken Ice Cream

964 W 31st Street (Map)
Chicago, IL 60608
(773) 565-4192

CPC invaded Pizza Fried Chicken Ice Cream on Saturday, July 16, 2022.

The story behind the pizza part of Pizza Fried Chicken Ice Cream is pretty cool. Two longtime friends and the fiancé of one of them joined forces to create Eat Free Pizza, through which they gave out free pizza and beer one night a week via Instagram. Check out the back story here. The combination of working on their craft and getting a boatload of social media and real media love enabled them to open up a permanent home in Bridgeport that they share with Kimski (next door) for fried chicken and Pretty Cool Ice Cream (Logan Square) for ice cream pops.

They've gotten a ton of praise since then and have expanded to long-term pop-ups (like the one currently at Marz) and just opened a second permanent location in Westmont, Kim's Uncle Pizza. Esquire even named it one of the best new restaurants in America in 2020. Now we've got to pump the brakes a little bit. Given that Pizza Friendly Pizza, Professor Pizza, and Milly's Pizza In The Pan all opened in Chicago 2020 and are all significantly better than PFCIC, the idea that this is one of the best new restaurants in the country is batshit crazy. Either that or the fried chicken is life-changing, in which case I need to get back ASAP.

In a CPC first, we actually began our meeting with something from a different pizzeria than the one we were meeting at. Stelios is currently between homes (pro tip: don't sell your condo months before the house you're building is ready) and is living on the far south side, minutes away from Chicago tavern style legend Vito & Nick's. Since we knew we'd be eating on an outdoor patio at Maria's, we got him to bring us a sausage pie from Vito & Nick's.

Good Lord, even at room temperature, this is just a fantastic pie. And that fennel-packed sausage just oozes Chicago pizza vibes. Magical.

Back in my prolific pizza eating days when I wrote for Serious Eats, I occasionally got into debates with the pizza nerds who were appalled that I firmly believed that a pizza could be great even with a mediocre crust. Exhibit A were the many great tavern crust places throughout Chicago and the Midwest. That being said, the three tavern crust pizzas that were truly special - Vito & Nick's, Pat's, and Villa Nova, all had crusts that were a cut above.

The pizza at Pizza Fried Chicken Ice Cream does not have a special crust. It's fine, but it's effectively just an edible plate. I would have liked it to be crisper (the edges were great) but nobody else seemed to agree with me.

The toppings are a different story. The ones we had were top notch. We were not able to try their sausage because for the first time in visiting literally hundreds of pizzerias in Chicago, I encountered a place that was sold out of sausage. This wasn't a case of them running out late at night - they sent all of their sausage (an ingredient that's incredibly easy to buy or make) to their pop-up at Marz. Truly baffling. And by baffling, I mean stupid.

Bitter old man grumpiness aside, as I said, the toppings we had were great. One pizza was pepperoni and mushroom and the other was spicy sopressata, garlic and Mike's hot honey. Everything was high quality and they didn't hold back in piling them on. And that latter combo, one I haven't had before, was a gamechanger that I will be trying again multiple times at multiple pizzerias.

All in all, this was good stuff. I had really high hopes that weren't met, but that just means this isn't destination pizza. If I lived in the neighborhood (won't happen) or they opened a location in my neighborhood (seems unlikely), I'd be absolutely thrilled to have this as a regular stop.

The obvious plan was to have some of Pretty Cool Ice Cream's excellent ice cream pops at the end of the meal. But we all live a whole lot closer to their north side locations than we do to Mario's so the genius decision was made to go there instead since we were relatively close, or at least a lot closer than any of us normally are. It was a good call.

Tavern style pizza and Italian lemonade. Now that's a fine Chicago summer night.

George's Deep Dish [Meeting #126]

George's Deep Dish
6221 N. Clark Street (Map)
Chicago, IL 60660
(773) 801-1551

CPC brought George's Deep Dish to AJ & Amanda's house on Saturday, February 5, 2022.

Photo: George's Deep Dish

Deep dish pizza is a beautiful thing. That's been true since it came on the scene and it's even more true today when the term can be used to justify any number of variations of thick sauce-on-top pizzas. But over time, some of the legends have started to fade. Uno's was still solid when I last had it several years ago, but I don't know anyone who goes there. Gino's East is a joke these days, though it still packs in tourists and people who are able to convince themselves they're eating what they loved years ago rather than what's actually going into their mouths. Lou Malnati's and Pizano's can both still make some great pizzas, though Lou's has expanded so much that there's consistency issues. Pequod's is still plugging along and can be very good if you order right. None of this is new; it's been true for years.

Photo: George's Deep Dish

What is new is that over the last several years, for the first time in a very long time, some new deep dish places have come along to rejuvenate the scene. And what's been special about that is that people have really put some effort into the crusts, which has never been a focal point of the longtime deep dish favorites (with the important exception of Burt's Place, which is no longer what it was since Burt died (RIP)). 

Labriola was probably the first one to deliver a version of the Chicago classic with a truly delicious crust. And there have been others since. But last year, George Bumbaris, gifted Chicago with what is surely the greatest deep dish crust in the history of professional pizzerias. But wait, there's more. The sauce and toppings just as good. This is some stellar pizza.

Confession: We had to cheat a little bit with our ordering. George's only serves a limited number pizzas each night so they limit orders to two pizzas per person. Because apparently pre-teen children count as people, we had 10 people RSVP yes to this meeting. Two pizzas is not enough for that many people so we cheated a little bit by having one of us order 2 pizzas and one of us order 1. Sorry about that. Not really. Did you know we're the mother fucking Chicago Pizza Club, tasting and chronicling and rating for almost 20 years? We're special.

Anyhow, we picked up our pizzas in Wisconsin Edgewater and brought to AJ and Amanda's home to savor these delicious pizzas. 

There are 8 pre-set toppings combinations on the menu at George's, with each available in 10-inch and 14-inch versions. Each of those pies is named after a famous real or fictional George. Weasley's Spicy Red Top comes with the fantastic sausage, roasted red peppers, spicy cherry peppers and ricotta.

Clooney's ER has more of that top notch sausage along with some high quality pepperoni and beef meatballs and bacon

For our third pizza, we built a simpler one with just pepperoni and cremini mushrooms to accommodate the children, although it was so good, the adults happily ate most of it.

The toppings are so good at George's that it'd be a winner even on a mediocre crust. But this is the best bread base of any thick pizza in Chicago. According to this Instagram post, the dough uses natural fermentation and a little bit of added yeast. That means is kind of sourdoughy, but not really. A kiss of tang if you will. Texturally it's somehow tender and chewy at the same time. Just truly great stuff. 
George's is carry out only but it travels very well.

Robert's Pizza and Dough Co. [Meeting #125]

Robert's Pizza and Dough Co. 

465 N McClurg Ct (Map)

Chicago, IL 60611

(312) 265-1328

CPC's biggest group in ages invaded Robert's Pizza and Dough Co. on Saturday, July 17, 2021.

Robert's first hit Chicago in April 2016 and earned some high praise in town. But because the Chicago Pizza didn't meet for almost 4 years after our March 2016 meeting, Robert's didn't get reviewed by Chicago's most authoritative voice on pizza. Is that why Robert's closed in June 2017? No, probably not.

Anyhow, Robert's reopened in 2019. CPC started meeting again in 2020. Then things happened. Now the CPC is fully back and the city is mostly back and restaurants are open. And with former Chicagoans Andrew and Jen in town to visit, the rejuvenated CPC headed down to the edge of the Chicago River to chow down on some of what former Tribune food critic and Alinea/Next fanboy Phil Vettel said was his favorite pizza crust in town. 

10 CPC members and one baby showed up for the meeting, which is our biggest in-person gathering since who knows when. And we did it without the CPC's first couple, El Presidente and Kate. Apparently they prioritized seeing Kate's family in from out of town. Sad to see their commitment wane like that. I kid. Kind of. I'm in a bad mood. Want to know why? Read on.

We start this review with a report on some unadulterated bullshit. Robert's does not offer free drinking water. That's not a typo. A pizzeria. In Chicago. Does not offer tap water. Want some water? Pay $5 for a bottle. What kind of fucking insanity is that? And get this - the bottles are served without caps. Was this Chicago tap water in glass bottles? Could have been because cold Chicago tap water is fucking  delicious. And it's free. Okay, I think that's out of my system. Let's move along to the very good pizza, starting with the pizza porn:

Caramelized Onion: caramelized onions, fresh mozz, tomato sauce

Roasted Vegetables: roasted cherry tomato, red pepper, calabrian chile, mushroom, caramelized onions, sauteed spinach, garlic, fontina cheese, evoo

The Funghi: wild mushrooms, thyme, driftless ricotta cheese

Fennel: braised fennel, fennel fronds, fennel salami & pollen, fresh mozz, honey

Cup & Char Pepperoni: classic pepperoni, calabrian peppers, fresh mozzarella, tomato sauce

Let's start with the crust, which is really good. I can see why Vettel described it as reminiscent of a French baguette. It's got good flavor and crackles a bit when you bite into it. I wouldn't call it the best in town or even in the top few, but it was very good; definitely the best part of the pizzas. Good flavor, good hole structure, good crunch, good chew.

The toppings were all solid to very good. I did think that a few of them - the caramelized onion, the roasted vegetable, and the funghi all would have been improved tremendously with some extra flavor - a kick of spice for the first two and maybe some balsamic for the funghi. I was also expecting a lot more fennel flavor from the "Fennel." I love fennel and was really excited about this one, but honestly if they had just called this a salami pizza, I wouldn't have thought "hey, this salami pizza has a nice amount of fennel." 

But maybe Robert is so proud of his crust that he doesn't want powerful toppings to get in the way. Who knows. Not a major critique either way. The pizza is good. I just had high expectations and I didn't walk away wowed. 

I did walk away thirsty.

Paulie Gee's and Others - CPC Goes Virtual [Meeting #124]

Paulie Gee's

2451 N Milwaukee Ave (Map)

Chicago, IL 60647

773-360-1072

Carry out only for now

Some of CPC invaded Paulie Gee's on January 9, 2021 and ate at home while others ordered from other places and ate at home.

This will be the laziest recap I've ever written. I apologize to nobody. Blogs are dead. Long live the Chicago Pizza Club blog!

With the pandemic still in full swing, we couldn't meet at a restaurant or even gather in one house. And because it was January, we couldn't meet in a park or a back deck. So we decided to combine an actual meeting with a virtual meeting - everyone who was able would get pizza from the same place and those who weren't would get pizza from further away. It worked out pretty well. Me, Andrew, Jen, Neil, Stelios and Jessica all got Paulie Gee's. Francisco screwed up and didn't order ahead so when Paulie Gee's sold out, he and Kate opted for Lou Malnati's. Adam wins the award for most dedicated member. Dude got off the plane just before the meeting started and wasn't going to make it home before it ended so he picked up a pie at Reggio's Pizza Express at the airport and checked in with us from the road. Stander checked in from the western burbs with pizza from The Original Old World Pizza in Elmwood Park. And finally, Kelly and Ryan joined us from Michigan with some supermarket Edwardo's.

I have no major thoughts on the pizza that you can't fine elsewhere. Paulie Gee's is good and it's been written up everywhere. People love the place. Their version of Detroit style is legit delicious. Their regular pies are also quite good. They've recently added NY slices. Haven't tried them. Maybe others will report in the comments on the quality of the pizza. Probably not. 

That's it for my words. Here are some pictures:

US Pizza Cup Winner Sharp White Cheddar, Mozz, Ezzo Pepperoni Cups, Housemade Bacon Jam, Red Sauce, Ricotta, Basil, Mike’s Hot Honey

Hootenanny Vegan Pepperoni White Cheddar, Mozzarella, Pepperoni Cups, Cold Tomato Sauce, Pecorino Romano

Daniela Spinaci Shaved Parmigiano Reggiano, fresh mozzarella, sliced fresh garlic, fresh baby spinach, and olive oil

Hellboy: Fresh mozzarella, italian tomatoes, Berkshire soppressata piccante, Parmigiano Reggiano, and Mike’s Hot Honey

Adam and his bad ass quarantine beard with a meat covered pizza from Reggio's

That rare occasion when a frozen pizza looks better in real life than on the box

The Original Old World Pizza in Elmwood Park

Chicago Classic from Lou Malnati's