[Chicago Pizza News] Obama's Favorite Pizza Goes To Washington, Or Does It?

Hyde Park is home to many well-known pizzerias: the original Edwardo's, the oldest still-operational Giordano's, the original Medici, an outpost of Pizza Capri, and Caffe Florian. Hyde Park residents Barack and Michelle Obama bypass all of those places to satisfy their pizza cravings in favor of the pies from Italian Fiesta Pizzeria, which is in the strip mall at the corner of 47th and Lake Park.

And now, the Ritz-Carlton in Washington DC is hosting a Presidential Inauguration expo on November 20, and they have invited the owners of Italian Fiesta Pizzeria to come to DC to make pizza for the occasion.

However, it turns out that Italian Fiesta may be going to DC under false pretenses. While Michelle Obama is on record as saying how much she likes it (and the South Shore native did grow up near the oldest location), there is no evidence that Barack Obama has ever been inside the place. More importantly, Obama is on record as telling the owner of a Chicago-style pizzeria in St. Louis called Pi that that place serves up the best pizza he's ever had. Perhaps next summer the CPC will venture to St. Louis for a Cubs/Cardinals game and do some research on our President-Elect's pizza tastes.

Connie's Pizza [Meeting #69; Meeting #16 Revisited]

Connie's Pizza [Map]
2373 S Archer Avenue
Chicago, IL
(312) CONNIES (266-6437)

CPC invaded Connie's Pizza on 11/10/08.

Most people think that U.S. Cellular Field (Comiskey Park) sits in Bridgeport; but they are mostly wrong. The original Comiskey Park (and the overwhelming majority of the current structure) actually sits in Armour Square, a long, skinny community area tucked between Bridgeport and Douglas. Armour Square gets its name from Armour Square Park, which was named after Chicago meat titan and philanthropist Philip Armour and designed by the Olmsted Brothers and Daniel H. Burnham and Co.

The Chicago Pizza Club was in Armour Square to satisfy a quest to find chorizo pizza, which allegedly exists at Fratellini Pizza & Pasta Inc. A person I spoke with at Fratellini, which has the wrong phone number listed on its website, assured me that they were open on Mondays (as their website indicates), but we arrived to a closed restaurant that has no sign indicating its hours of operation. I tried calling to find out what was going on, but the outgoing voice mail message offers nothing, not even the name of the restaurant. Odd.

Undeterred, the CPC immediately regrouped and headed to Connie's Pizza, which has been operating in the area for 50 years. In the 1950s, Raymond DeGrazia and his wife, Connie, opened a pizzeria in Bridgeport at 638 W. 26th Street. After tinkering with their pizza recipe by replacing provolone with mozzarella, Connie's pizzas quickly grew in popularity. In 1963, Jim Stolfe bought the restaurant and it has remained in the Stolfe family ever since (his son Marc now runs the company).

Forty-five years later, Connie's has established itself as one of Chicago's best-known pizzerias. In addition to the 6 Connie's restaurants and two Pazzini locations, Connie's pizza can be had at both baseball stadiums, Brookfield Zoo, and O'Hare Airport. And thanks to their fleet of ubiquitous pizza delivery trucks and frozen pizza business, Connie's can be had virtually anywhere in the City.

A couple of fun Connie's facts before getting to the pizza: Connie's allegedly paid the mob well over $100,000 in "street taxes." When Chicago passed its since-repealed foie gras ban, Connie's joined with dozens of other protesting restaurants by offering a foie gras pizza on the day the law went into effect.

The Chicago Pizza Club did not partake in foie gras pizza on this visit, but only because it was not on the menu. We did, however, have a couple of very unique pizzas. Connie's is currently running a special featuring three unique toppings that are served on a thin crust made with Old Style Beer. We opted for the chili cheese dog pizza, which includes chili con carne, slices of Vienna Beef hot dogs, mustard, shaved onion, sport peppers and both mozzarella and cheddar cheeses. Perhaps it's because this pizza was served first, but it was inhaled by the CPC. Some of the slices were missing hot dog pieces, but other than that there were no complaints about that pie, and there were a couple of raves. The crust was a little firmer and thicker than traditional Chicago thin crusts, and it held up well to the generous portion of toppings piled on. I didn't taste much flavor from the beer, though though it did add a yellowish tint to the crust.

We were so enamored with the special toppings offered on the Old Style crust, that we opted for a second one - the Italian Beef pizza, but on the regular thin crust. Toppings on that pie included Italian Beef, hot giardinera, sweet peppers, sauce, and mozzarella and provolone cheese. The well-seasoned meat was not wet like most Italian Beef, but that was probably a good think as traditional Italian Beef would turn any crust into a soggy mess.

Up next was Connie's most famous pizza - a middleweight crust with sausage. This is the pizza that is sold at both baseball stadiums, the United Center, O'Hare Airport, Brookfield Zoo and every other non-pizzeria location I've seen Connie's. The crust is about half an inch thick and is more like bread than the kind of crust typically found on deep dish pizza. The pizza comes with a generous supply of sausage, which was had a pretty strong fennel flavor, but a texture that a couple of us noted screamed mass production.

On our deep dish pizza, we went for pepperoni. The deep dish crust is identical in texture to the middleweight, only it is about twice as thick. The pepperoni seemed to me to be a little thicker slices than is common, but other than that was indistinguishable from most pepperonis out there. The sauce on the deep dish and the middleweight was thick, but not chunky. It was neither noticeably tangy nor sweet, but rather a solid basic pizza sauce.

The final pizza we ordered was a very unique stuffed crust. Typically a stuffed pizza consists of a normal bottom crust about 1/4 inch thick and a paper thin top crust that is often indistinguishable from the thick layer of cheese it covers and unnoticeable due to the sauce that sits on top of it. Connie's top crust is just as thick as the bottom crust. They offer the stuffed pizza two different ways - with sauce on top as is done everywhere else, or what they call the "original 26th street style" with the sauce on the side. We opted for the latter, and we got it stuffed with ham, bacon, and cheddar cheese (in addition to, not instead of mozzarella).

The service we received was fantastic. Perhaps it's because Stelios blew our cover by announcing to the host when we got there that we are the Chicago Pizza Club and would be blogging about the meal, but the staff was incredibly attentive. There were twelve of us present and, unprompted, Connie's asked us if we wanted our pizzas cut into more than the normal 8 pieces so everyone could try each of them. I think that's the first time that has happened in the history of the CPC and it was much appreciated.

Petey Pizza gives Connie's a 5.37.


Hope we ordered enough...


The Sausage Pizza, as seen at many a sporting event and music festival...


The Stuffed Pizza with Ham, Bacon and Cheddar...


Italian Beef Pizza on an Old Style crust...


Deep Dish with Pepperoni...


The Chili Cheese Dog Pizza...


Italian Beef up close and personal...


The Chicago Pizza Club hard at work...


Where it went down...


Fred enjoys some leftovers...

[Special Report] Santarpio's Pizza

Santarpio's Pizza (GoogleMap)
111 Chelsea Street
East Boston, MA
617.567.9871

While on a recent trip to Boston for a wedding, my food-loving friends and 2 members of CPC decided to make a trip to Santarpio's Pizza in East Boston near the airport. Prior to my trip to Boston, I had never given thought to their pizza culture. If I had, I likely would have suspected that the overwhelming number of Irish descendants in this city would make for poor fare. This was not the case: East Boston has historically been an enclave of Italian immigrants. In recent years it has become populated by Central American immigrants, but there are still many signs of the prior Italian majority. Santarpio's opened in 1933 and has regularly been listed as one of Boston's best pizzerias by local publications. Today, it still remains a family business and in its original building. Frank Santarpio would be proud.

This is obviously a small restaurant with a local and outsider following alike. We had no wait when we arrived, but when we left an hour later there was a line 15 people deep outside the restaurant. As you can see below, the menu is not comprehensive. They serve two items: pizza and skewered meat. We opted for both. The servers seem way too busy to chit-chat and they expect you to order as soon as you take your seat. We ordered one special pie with hot peppers, garlic, pepperoni and italian cheese and a combination of Italian sausage and lamb skewers served with peppers.

The skewers were variable. The lamb was slightly overcooked and the sausage was just right. There was nothing particularly unique about each one with regards to seasoning, but the peppers were outstanding. They were mildly hot and acidic and were an excellent counterpoint to the skewers. One note about the skewers; I'm not sure how well tended they are while they sit over the fire. As I hinted before, I think this might cause a lot of variability in how "done" your meats are when they arrive at your table.

The pizza was very good, much to my surprise. As I mentioned before, I wasn't expecting much. The crust was probably the best part of the pizza. It was thin and the edges held up very well. The center had lots of loose cheese and toppings and mine actually kind of fell apart. The edges that were not weighed down with ingredients were like very good bakery-fresh bread: light but with good chew and perfectly baked. The pepperoni was outshined by the garlic and hot peppers, but the real star was the sauce and crust anyways. The cheese was, I think, a mixture of two cheeses that I could not distinguish. The sauce was slightly spicy with good acidity to it and in abundant quantities. For the chunky sauce fans, sorry, this place was more of a paste. And lastly, I should mention the oven. It is a brick oven, but sadly I did not venture into the kitchen to photograph it.

I think that when I next go to Boston, I would be interested in checking out other pizza places that are reputed to be excellent. They may or not be as good as advertised. But I would be even more happy to grab a table at Santarpio's where I know the pizza is good, plus I can also get a lamb skewer with those delicious spherical peppers.


The Menu with a nice picture of Frank...


Umm... THAT'S not pizza...but check out those peppers!


Ok, that's more like it...


El Presidente goes in for the kill...


Kate and El Presidente look dazed in the afterglow...

[Chicago Pizza News] Two New Pizzerias and an Additional Location for Another

Last week, Chicago Magazine's on-line "Dish" reported that Trattoria Trullo, formerly of Evanston and now in Lincoln Square (4767 N. Lincoln Ave.; 773-506-0093), is adding a mini pizzeria on December 10 in the front of the restaurant. The owner says they will be offering pizza as it's made in his hometown of Puglia, Italy, which he says is thinner and crisper than Neapolitan pies.

The same article also reveals that My Pie has officially given up on finding a new Lincoln Park location, but will be opening a new location right by the Metra stop in Northbrook.

This week's Dish reports that the wood-burning Neapolitan pizza craze has grown again with the opening of Antica Pizzeria in Andersonville (5663 N. Clark St.; 773-944-1492). Mario Rapisarda, the Sicilian-born chef/owner, is a veteran of Spiaggia.

Piece Brewery & Pizzeria [Meeting #68; Meeting #19 Revisited]

Piece Brewery & Pizzeria [Map]
1927 W. North Ave.
Chicago, IL
773.772.4422

CPC invaded Piece Brewery & Pizzeria on 10/28/08.

Bill Jacobs knows his breads. After the New Haven native and his brother sold their eponymous Jacobs Brothers Bagels, he started up a pizzeria based on the pies of his youth. And since the doors opened to Piece Brewery & Pizzeria, the place has been an unqualified success. Even now, the Wicker Park eatery does so well that they don't take reservations for groups of less than 10 and they take no reservations after 7 on Friday or 6 on Saturday.

Traditionally, New Haven pizza is cooked in a coal oven, has an oblong shape, and features a thick crust. Well, thick for a thin crust pizza; not nearly as thick as deep dish. Piece gets two out of three of those - there is no coal oven there. However, the rotating shelves in the gas oven get hot enough that there is actually some char on the crust, leaving a crisp and very chewy crust that is ready to hold up whatever toppings you choose to put on it. As I said, the man knows bread.

But before getting to the toppings, one must first choose what style of pizza they want. Piece serves up three distinct categories. Red is the most familiar - like most pizzas, it has tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese. A white pizza also has mozzarella, but adds olive oil and garlic and eliminates the sauce. The plain pizza has tomato sauce, Parmesan and garlic and does not have mozzarella. Of course, the Chicago Pizza Club had to try them all.

Up first were a pair of red pies, one with sausage and one with bacon and onions. The sauce, which was plentiful, had a light sweetness and was full of small chunks of tomato. The juicy sausage had a strong garlic flavor; I didn't notice much fennel at all. The only criticism anyone had of the sausage pizza was that there was not enough sausage, a sentiment expressed by a few Pizza Clubbers in attendance. Quantity of toppings was definitely not a problem with the bacon and onion pizza. There were a lot of thinly sliced onions that appeared like they might overwhelm that pie. But the bacon had no problem standing up to the onions, and the thick, flavorful crust and generous helping of tomato sauce balanced it all out to make one very well-received pizza.

On our white pizza (mozzarella, olive oil and garlic), we opted for artichoke hearts. As was the case with the sausage, there was a noticeable lack of toppings on this pizza (at least by Chicago standards - East Coast pizzerias tend to focus more on the crust than the toppings). What wasn't lacking was the garlic - there was a whole lot of it on this pizza. Fortunately, the CPC has a good number of garlic fans, so there were no complaints at all about the garlic levels.

Finally, on our plain pizza (sauce, Parmesan and garlic), we honored Piece's Connecticut roots and ordered a pizza with clams. The white clam pie was invented at Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana in New Haven a little over 80 years ago. We opted to get the clams on a red pizza instead of a white one - not sure if that is a major cultural faux pas or not. I do know that judging by the pace the various pizzas disappeared, the clam pie was the least favorite of the four pizzas. That said, when the CPC went to La Madia a few weeks ago, the clam pizza there was also the consensus least favorite. Perhaps we just not a clam-loving bunch. And that's not to say we did not enjoy it - the CPC left nothing behind for starving children in Africa on this visit.

After polishing off four pizzas, we ordered pizza for dessert. Chocolate pizza! Allegedly inspired by Rachael Ray and Piece co-owner Rick Nielsen, the chocolate pizza consists of Piece's regular pizza crust topped with a homemade chocolate hazelnut sauce (think Nutella, only better) and a small amount of mascarpone cheese. Hot, chewy pizza crust covered in that sauce made for one very popular dessert.

No review of Piece Brewery & Pizzeria would be complete without mention of Piece's beer. Brewer Jonathan Cutler has been with Piece since the beginning and has piled up an impressive number of awards over the last few years, including the 2005 World Beer Cup Champion Small Brewery and Brewmaster Award.

Petey Pizza gives Piece a 7.81.


The Sausage Pizza...


White Pizza with Artichokes...


Bacon!


AJ digs in...


I guess they brew beer or something too...


The Mighty Oven...


The Chocolate Pizza!


Where it went down...

[Chicago Pizza Interview] Leo Spizzirri

Giordano's, probably the best known purveyor of stuffed pizza in the world, has been using largely the same recipe since it was started by the Boglio brothers in the mid-1970s. The man currently responsible for making sure Giordano's stays on top of its game is Leo Spizzirri, Executive Chef. I sat down with him recently at his office, which is Giordano's biggest location, on the corner of Rush and Superior. He filled me in on Giordano's, pizza history, and the World Pizza Champions.

The son of Italian immigrants, Leo grew up in the Chicago area. He learned how to make pizza in teglia (an Italian precursor of stuffed pizza) from his family and he learned how good stuffed pizza is thanks to the Nancy's that was across the street from his house.

Largely self-trained as a chef, Spizzirri has studied pizza-making under some Italian masters, including classes at Scuola Italiana Pizzaioli (Google-translated version is here), where he studied under Grazzaino Bertuzzo.

A little over a year ago, he came to Giordano's as Executive Chef. He filled me in on some of what makes Giordano's pizza so good. The crust features high gluten flower and is allowed to rise for 3-5 days (4 being ideal) before it is made into pizza. The cheese, toppings and sauce are all fresh. Giordano's gets its whole milk mozzarella in large chunks and shreds it themselves, ensuring the cheese has the proper moisture when cooked. The toppings are all fresh, as are the tomatoes that are used to make the sauce.

A number of Giordano's restaurants are franchisees, but none of those are in the City of Chicago. And even the franchises are subject to oversight from Spizzirri, who cites consistency of product as one of the most important functions of his job.

Spizzirri has done so well at Giordano's that Tony Gemignani, one of the founders of the World Pizza Champions, invited him to join the team. That team is the winningest team at the annual World Pizza Championships in Salsomaggiore Terme in Parma, Italy. As Leo put it, they are the Yankees of the World Pizza Championships. This April, thanks to lobbying by Spizzirri and his teammates, stuffed pizza will be allowed in the pizza in teglia category. Many at the competition are unhappy at this development since it's not a traditional pizza style, and Spizzirri has no expectations of winning the category. But once they get a taste of his Chicago pies, who knows what will happen?

I did learn one shocking piece of information about Leo Spizzirri. Despite his upbringing and his job, Leo's favorite place to grab pizza is Chi-Town Pizza, a New York-style pizzeria that I thought was primarily there to serve partiers leaving Division Street bars. Actually, that may its primary purpose, but Spizzirri swears they have great pizza. Of course, the pizza he eats most often is Giordano's, which he says he eats three times a day for "quality control."

Pizza D.O.C. [Meeting #67; Meeting #11 Revisited]

Pizza D.O.C. [GoogleMaps]
2251 W Lawrence
Chicago, IL
773.784.8777

CPC invaded Pizza D.O.C. on 10/15/08.

Pizza D.O.C. is now the grizzled veteran of Chicago's Neapolitan-style pizzerias. There are other Italian restaurants scattered throughout the city that also make pizza, but among those who are best known for their pizza, D.O.C. is the longest running. We originally came here 3 years ago and gave it largely mixed reviews. While we appreciated the quality of ingredients, there were complaints about soggy crusts and low quantity of toppings. Now, after having recently reviewed Coalfire, La Madia, and Spacca Napoli we return to our original Chicago Neapolitan destination.

We ordered 6 pizzas

• Margherita
• Quattro Formaggi (bleu, mozzarella, swiss, parmesan)
  
• Boscaiola (sausage)
• Fiorentina (salami and roasted peppers)
• Gustosa (egg, asparagus, ham, and parmesan cheese)
• Asparagi e Caprino (asparagus and goat cheese)

The pizzas came out as the were ready and they started coming out 20 minutes after we ordered them. The oven is a less stylish version of the beautiful oven at Spacca Napoli, but it does the job and fits multiple pizzas during busy dinner and lunch rushes. A good rule of thumb with this style of pizza is to wait a few minutes when the pizza arrives before eating it. This accomplishes two things: one, it gives the pizza a chance to cool and not burn the hell out of your mouth and two, it allows the ingredients a chance to cool from liquid mess to melted solids and the crust stiffens a bit as well. Unfortunately, I was hungry and burned my mouth.

In general, I think we were fairly pleased with our pizza. The crust was not hard and dried out although they were a little too liberal with the dry flour they put on the plates to keep the pizza from sticking. I kept tasting it throughout the evening. The pizza was sliced for us, which seems like a mundane thing until you go to a restaurant that doesn't do it and you end up operating on your pizza with a dull blade. The sauce, when present, was again barely noticeable. The asparagus was great I think it works better when it's chopped up as opposed to the more aesthetically pleasing but less practical whole spears used at La Madia. And the prior complaints I logged about lack of toppings seems to now be satisfied; the sausage pizza in particular had a great sausage that completely covered the cheese canvas.

Maybe this place has improved somewhat from our last visit or, more likely, our tastes have opened up a bit. In any case, another successful meeting at a very good neighborhood pizzeria. While some consider this a destination pizzeria, with so many other options in town I don't think that's true. Certainly a good pizza, but no longer the only game in town.

Petey gives Pizza D.O.C. a 6.5


The Pizza Oven...


Waiting for some deliciousness...


The Fiorentina Pizza...


The Gustosa Pizza...


The Asparagus and Goat Cheese...


What a spread...


Where it went down...

[Chicago Pizza History] Marc Kelly Smith's "Deep Dish Chicago"

Marc Kelly Smith invented the poetry slam in Chicago in the 1980s.

In 2005, he married his craft to another one of Chicago's gifts to the world when he debuted his poem, "Deep Dish Pizza" at a press conference for Stirring Things Up in Chicago, a citywide culinary and arts festival.

Here it is:

Chicago: the deep dish city of deep dish people
Everybody’s juices bubblin’ & sizzlin’ & spittin’ inside.

And a crust that can be thick, when it needs to be thick
When it gets poked and fingered and belittled
And cast off as just another second-city helping,
a flatlander’s windy cheese.

But we know better, we who live this city and love its people,
know that it’s SECOND TO NONE when it comes to a slice
Of authenticity, genuine no BS … “Skip the pretense, pal.”
“Hey, you ain’t puttin’ that pomposity into my pizza pie, amigo!”

Second to none when it comes
To feeding a vision of “yes” to no small dreams
Of can do. Go for it. Make it happen.

And then, stand back and watch the worlds beyond our crust
Try to lay claim to the juices we cooked up,
That we brought to life, that we passed on as a gift of nutrition,
For those who hungered for a spirit like ours.

So here’s duh scoop: This deep dish of “do it” comes from us,
From our city and our people …
“Hey Lou, tell the poet, ‘Enough talk, let’s eat!’”

When I emailed Smith to ask for a copy of the poem he told me a couple of great stories:

The Speak’Easy Ensemble provided back-up vocals to my front performance as they emerged from the back of the audience accenting and echoing sections of the poem, and causing a little stir amongst the dignitaries, politicians, and reporters not use to slam anarchy and in-audience poetic presentations. On the last lines, however, some of those same stone-faced politicians were teary eyed with civic pride and sentimentality … and when a Lou Malnati’s pizza was delivered at the cue line “Let’s eat!” a little roar of pleasure went up and we devoured the deep dish reality.

Following the ceremony and throughout the summer copies of the poem were delivered to about one hundred thousand people inside Lou Malnati pizza boxes. Not one person ever told me that they noticed the poem included with their pizza delivery, not even my son, Carl, who ordered pizzas from Malnati’s on a regular basis. Positive proof that pizza ranks higher than poems when Chicago’s appetites are considered.

[Chicago Pizza News] New Neapolitan Pizzeria is Coming to Chicago

Fans of the original Spacca Napoli can rejoice. According to Chicago Magazine, Spacca Napoli's first pizzaiola is opening a new, 110-seat Neapolitan menu in Lincoln Park in January.

Nella Grassano and her husband Frank are joining forces with Scott Harris, owner of Mia Francesca, to open Nella Pizzeria Napoletana at 2423 N. Clark in the former home of Fiesta Mexicana.

This place is so serious about their pies that they are bringing in real live Italians to build the oven.

[Chicago Pizza News] Jersey Boys to Give Away Free Pizza

On Tuesday, October 14 from noon to one, as part of the one-year anniversary of Jersey Boys in Chicago, Broadway in Chicago and TheatreDreams will be giving away 4,000 slices of Home Run Inn Pizza at four different downtown locations:

* Bank of America Theatre (18 W. Monroe St.)
* Couch Place – James M. Nederlander Way (State St. between Lake and Randolph)
* Pioneer Court (401 N Michigan Ave)
* Illinois Center Plaza (111 E. Wacker)

Since Home Run Inn slices are usually squares, it's unclear whether people will actually be getting slices, but that's the word the press release is using.

Folks who attend the Tuesday evening performance of Jersey Boys will also be treated to Home Run Inn Pizza, Eli's Cheesecake and Coke. That performance is not currently sold out and can be purchased here.