Lou Malnati’s: The Golden Mean of Chicago Deep Dish
Finding your favorite deep-dish pizza chain in Chicago is a little like playing Goldilocks. You try one and it’s a little too dense; another is plagued by cardboard crust.
It took me the better part of the year that I lived in the city to fully research the options, but I’ve pledged my troth to one kind above all others in the end.
When anyone asks me which Chicago deep-dish pie is my favorite, I’m making the case for Lou Malnati’s.
Let’s get one thing straight before we discuss. No one is eating deep dish for health reasons; it all comes down to taste.
And personal preferences are just that–personal, like the largest size of layered, saucy, crispy pie I could possibly attempt to eat on my own without assistance from friends or family.
The anatomy of a Chicago deep-dish slice is such that you’ll cover all the major food groups in each bite. A high-sided moat of crust baked in a blackened high-sided pan is filled with gooey cheese, then layered with your choice of toppings, and finally slathered in tomato sauce (with extra Parmesan on top of that, if you’re so inclined).
But within that template, there’s room for infinite variation. And that’s where I think Lou Malnati’s excels beyond its brethren.
The sauce is fresh and clean, not overly spiced or too sweet. The mozzarella has a mild, salty tang, but doesn’t congeal too quickly.
And its famous Buttercrust(TM, really) isn’t thick and puffy, nor is it thin and tasteless. The edges stay crunchy, the insides stay pliant, and it still supports the perfect ratio–the golden mean, if you will–of crust to cheese to toppings to sauce.
This, too, is key–whereas many deep-dish pizzas are just too deep for my taste, the layers of a Lou’s pie are calibrated.
Nothing gets piled too high; each bite is satisfying and you can get through two slices without feeling like you’ll need to roll yourself out of the room.
It’s still most definitely a knife-and-fork operation, at least for the first half of each slice, but you won’t need to unhinge your jaw to get through it.
(Though, as my friend Andrea Lynn said after her first Lou Malnati’s experience last month, “You’ll want to eat more than your stomach will let you and then try to stuff the rest into the mini fridge in hopes of breakfast leftovers.”)
The original location of Lou Malnati’s is up in Lincolnwood, but there are branches scattered throughout the city.
Every time Dan and I return to Chicago, we always end up in the outpost on N. Wells, where the walls are lined with jerseys from sports world greats both real and fictional–yeah, that’s a New York Knights jersey from The Natural in the photo–and the Goose Island Green Line flows freely.
The Malnati Chicago Classic is our standing order: sausage, cheese, sauce, and Buttercrust, with a little extra garlic for oomph.
I suppose you could round that order out with salad, but I come hungry and wait patiently for that searingly hot round of pie to arrive at the table.
I would never discourage you from eating as much pizza as your heart desires or from sampling every kind of deep dish in the city in pursuit of your own golden ratio, but as far as I’m concerned, there’s only one name worth remembering in Chicago pizza. See you soon, Lou.
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Casey Barber
Casey Barber is the owner and founder of Good Food Stories LLC and a visual storyteller whose work often focuses on the intersection of food and culture. She is also the author of the cookbooks Pierogi Love: New Takes on an Old-World Comfort Food and Classic Snacks Made from Scratch: 70 Homemade Versions of Your Favorite Brand-Name Treats, and she couldn’t get anything done without the help of her executive assistant cats, Bixby and Lenny. Her favorite color is obviously orange.
I am in Chicago next week. I must try this place.
Can you believe there’s one right in downtown Evanston, and I’ve lived in this city for 8-going-on-9 years and still have yet to try this pizza? Blasphemous, I know!
And I know you’re a Giordano’s girl (I was too, because when I lived in Evanston it was right there and oh so convenient), but I think you should give Lou’s a try. In the name of science, of course.
Live north of Chicago. LOVE Malnati’s, but I would love to hear your opinion of this particular pie: Edwardo’s deep dish with stuffed spinach and pepperoni. After eating both for 25+ years, my family goes to Lou’s for most but we must get this particular craving in.
Matt, Edwardo’s is on my to-eat list the next time we’re in town – I always want to try the newer spots but it’s so hard to skip the old favorites! I’ll let you know.
I fell in love with Chicago-style deep dish a few years ago when I had it in San Francisco, of all places. I have since given myself over to the the dark and cheesy side, and I’ve got Chicago on my vacation list for the sole purpose of a pizza tour.