Get A Piece Of This:
9 Chicago Pizza Mysteries Solved

Asked by Lou Dicerbo

A: Known as “party cut” or “tavern cut” (or maybe just the right way to cut pizza), this crisp, square-cut style emerged in Midwest taverns after World War II, according to Rose Barraco George. That’s when her father, Nick, added pizza to their family’s 98-year-old tavern, Vito & Nick’s Pizzeria. George says the squares were just easier for tavern patrons to eat with beer.

Steve Dolinsky, author of the upcoming Pizza City, USA: 101 Reasons Why Chicago is America’s Greatest Pizza Town, adds, “These square pieces were intended as snacks, not meals. The boys stopping off at the bar on the way home had to save room for dinner with their families, so they had a couple of squares and a beer and headed home. That’s why it was important to be so cracker thin.”

Asked by Susan Clark

A: Nadine Karavidas owns one of the more famous pizzeria joints on the Northwest Side — Marie’s Pizza & Liquors on Lawrence Avenue. Nadine runs a tavern started by her father and grandfather that added pizza after WWII.

“My dad added it because pizza had become this popular thing after the war,” Karavidas says. And as it says on Marie’s menu, “it’s beer’s best friend.” Nadine says her dad was also a pioneer in the frozen pizza business, which they sold in Chicago grocery stores until a tragedy led them to close their plant in the ’70s.

An earlier version of this story misstated the location of Marie’s Pizza & Liquors. It is located on Lawrence Avenue.

Asked by Eric Holeman

A: “Not everyone in Chicago does pepperoni this way,” says food journalist Steve Dolinsky, whose book, Pizza City, USA: 101 Reasons Why Chicago is America's Greatest Pizza Town, comes out later this fall. But he says when places do hide the pepperoni, it’s “to avoid the pepperoni cups that form as the fat renders and they get burnt and crisp. … The cheese obviously insulates them, but also prevents pepperoni from becoming crispy.”

Chris Hernandez, who manages the 45-year-old Golden Crust Pizza and Tap in Albany Park, says there’s another reason why some joints do this. “If you put it on top, sometimes the pepperoni will slide off,” he says. “If people really want it on top, they can ask for it, otherwise it’s under the cheese.”

Asked by Samantha Abernethy

A: To be honest, we had our doubts about the premise of this question. Really? A pizza-scented underpass? But, in the name of due diligence, we went sniffing around Kinzie Street on a recent morning, all the way from underpass at Wells Street to the underpass at Orleans Street. And just when we were about to give up, we stepped onto the northwest corner of Kinzie and Orleans streets, and POW. Yeasty, cheesy aromas of baking pizza came wafting out of nowhere. Samantha was right! With no restaurants in sight, we followed our sniffer to stairs leading to upper Orleans. Here we found Kiran Patel baking fresh chubby loaves of bread (some of it topped with cheese) at a Subway sandwich shop, whose oven vents lead right down to, yes, the northwest corner of lower Orleans and Kinzie.

Asked by Jenn Adams

A: On this question, we defer to our former WBEZ colleague Derek John, who dug into a similar question five years ago after Jon Stewart dissed deep dish on The Daily Show. Using data from Grubhub (which fields orders for about half of Chicago’s 600 pizzerias), John found that thin crust orders outnumber deep dish and stuffed 10 to 1. Famous deep dish pizzerias, like Giordano’s and Lou Malnati’s, did tell him they get three times more deep dish than thin crust orders but … those are the places you go when you want, um, deep dish.

Asked by Andrea Ficarelli

A: Restaurateur Ike Sewell often gets the credit for this heavy, crusty pizza, but Chicago cultural historian Tim Samuelson says the true creator was Sewell’s business partner Ric Riccardo, the namesake of the legendary Rush Street bar Riccardo’s. Samuelson says the two introduced deep dish in 1943 at their bar, which was located on the ground floor of a mansion on Wabash Avenue and Ohio Street. Riccardo lived on the second floor and, legend has it, he bought the downstairs bar because it was getting too noisy for his new baby. It first opened as The Pizzeria, but was renamed to Pizzeria Uno by 1955. Samuelson says the aim “was to create a pizza that was an entire meal.”

This belly-busting pizza was different from others in the city, but it became so popular with the downtown crowd that Sewell opened Pizzeria Due just down the street in another old Chicago mansion. Uno’s employees, including Lou Malnati, would later open joints with similar pies all over the city.

Asked by Daniel Hogan

A: Not all pizzerias do this, but you do see paper bag covers at a lot of places, like Obbie’s Pizza on the Southwest Side. When we called and talked to Obbie’s manager Jim, who preferred to not to give his last name, he explained it was “more economical and better for the environment.” But doesn’t that make it hard to stack the pizzas in the delivery car?

Jim’s answer: “We put ‘em in boxes to protect them while we’re driving, then take ‘em out when we deliver them to the customer.” Hmmm. Smart.

Asked by Rami Faraj

A: In an effort to overcome its No. 3 spot in the cola wars, RC Cola started a partnership with Chicago pizzerias to distribute their product in the late ’60s. These pizzerias would get a reliable and affordable supply of RC quart bottles (perfect for deliveries), and RC would get more exposure — plus a lasting association with fun pizza dinners. (Hey, it worked for our family.) This plan was detailed in an excellent Encyclopizzeria story and confirmed by Brad Troutman, who is the Chicago-area director of DPS (the company that owns the RC brand). Troutman says “Chicago is still the nation’s No. 1 market for RC today.”

Sam Zaccaro, who opened the erstwhile Pozzillo’s Pizza in Schiller Park in 1985, says he always gave out RC because “it cost me only about 27 cents a bottle, and because RC just goes with pizza. I can’t explain it, but it does.”

Asked by Shelley Krepich

A: Here, an Assyrian immigrant used Mexican and Italian ingredients to create something uniquely Chicago. It started in 1927 when Elisha Shabaz opened the Illinois Tamale Company (or Iltaco), which made frozen Chicago-style tamales for hot dog stands and push cart vendors. By the mid-’70s, Elisha’s grandson Warren came up with another frozen food idea using a tortilla to wrap pizza ingredients.

“We were already in an Italian neighborhood, so we were familiar with the ingredients and calzones,” says Warren’s son Adam Shabaz, who also works at Iltaco. “And that’s how Pizza Puffs were born.”

Iltaco sold tamales to Chicago hot dog stands for decades, so that’s where they first sold their Pizza Puffs, which quickly became a mainstay at hot dog stands. Today, the company says, you can find a variety of Iltaco family stuffed sandwich products (including, if you can believe it, a Reuben Puff and Gyro Puff) in stores and restaurants in 38 states.