My Great American Road Trip – Illinois

Illinois has some crazy iconic foods – a horseshoe sandwich, which is basically an open faced burger, covered with french fries and a cheesy sauce, hotdogs with the works (except ketchup), and the thing I really wanted to make, a jibarito sandwich which uses smashed up plantains instead of bread. But there’s really only one thing. The deep dish pizza.

I like Chicago and I’ve been there a few times, but I’m pretty sure I’ve never had pizza there. My knowledge of deep dish pizza is Uno’s, which immediately sends me back to high school. Appropriate since my tv viewing at the moment is a rewatch of Glee from start to finish. No, I wasn’t in show choir in high school, but besides being tv candy for me (I do love a musical), the showrunner Brad Falchuk is, like me, an alum of Beaver Country Day School. The show is full of Beaver easter eggs (Mr. Klippinger monitoring detention, and the rivalry with Newton South), so good!

I’ve also been cruising the Benetton website and practicing overly charcoaled eyes. I should probably get over the 80s…..

Anyway, as I set out to make my deep dish pizza, I got the right pizza dough, full of gluten (I am still not ready to make my own). Deep dish pizza is pretty easy. I used a cake pan. You roll the dough thin and spread it in the pan and up the sides. Every time I got the dough in place it sort of shrunk. So I had to spread it out again and again. You then just layer away – mozzarella, sausage – then you take canned whole tomatoes, crush them by hand and spread them on top. I added spinach, because, you know, I’m desperately in need of leafy greens.Then put a generous shake of parm over the top.

Into the oven it goes until the crust is golden brown and the the cheese is bubbly delicious.

It was so good! My crust was too think, especially around the seam, but it was really delicious. It is the third pizza I’ve made since the pandemic began, and the best yet. I think from here on in, I’m going to be making my home pizzas deep dish! (I will be eating thin crust New York pizza when I go out!).

And best of all, asThe Great Catsby and I settled in to eat pizza, the Glee cast performed Chicago!