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| - I went to grad school at UIUC in the late '70s, left for a job on the east coast in 1980, and haven't been back since. In the intervening 30 years I've eaten close to 1000 pizzas by my reckoning, all over the country but mostly in the metro NYC area -- and NYC has some pretty good pizza. But in that vast landscape of tomato pies, the only one that really stands out -- by which I mean the only one I sometimes crave with particularity; the only one I can vividly recall the appearance, aroma, and flavor of; and the only one that moves me with nostalgia -- is Papa Del's deep-dish sausage pizza.
It's a typical Chicago-style pie, baked in a heavily oiled, round, black steel pan. The crust is thick, bready, and slightly sweet. It doesn't just line the bottom, but extends up the side of the pan to contain the filling like a tart shell. This makes for a very high crust-to-filling ratio. The cheese -- at least a half-pound of a mozzarella blend in a "small" pie -- goes on the bottom, to prevent the crust from becoming soggy I guess. The sausage -- another half-pound, highly seasoned with fennel and garlic -- goes on next. It's raw when they put it in the oven, so all the fat oozes out as it bakes, mixing with the crushed tomatoes that cover the pie on top to form a delicious, meaty tasting sauce. I forget whether additions like mushrooms or onions go on top of or underneath the tomatoes -- underneath I think. But one doesn't really care about the vegetables -- it's all about the cheese, the sausage, and the tomatoes. Best ... pizza ... ever! (as Comic Book Guy would say). Oh, and the lasagna dinner (with meat sauce) isn't bad either, if you're not in the mood for pizza.
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