For some reason, I had a ridiculous craving for Chicago style deep dish pizza. Like almost a physical urge to eat that thick, gooey, filling style of pie. So we found ourselves braving the crowds (we went at 5pm and there was an hour wait!) because folks said Oregano's had good deep dish pizza.
First, can I talk about the menu? What is this, a theme restaurant in Vegas? The person who wrote this menu should be stoned (and probably was when he wrote it) for all the terrible, chintzy, schlocky, names and descriptions of food.
Anyway, they do a pretty decent job of managing the crowd and getting folks drinks while they wait in the large, open patio area, and a table opened up soon enough. We started with a large, family style salad which was mostly lettuce. Then the pizza came, and it was everything I hoped it would be. Sure, it's not Giordano's, but it was seriously the next best thing. It was thick and gooey and exactly what I was looking for. We had the numero one-o (sigh...) and the amount of toppings, and the pounds and pounds of cheese hit the right spot. The crust was a little tough to get through with the butter knife provided, but that's my only complaint about the pizza. It was even good as a thick cheese brick the next day.
So I'm going to take a star off for the seriously embarrassing menu, and for the fact that you cannot come here and not wait for a table, and the mediocre salad. But that deep dish pizza is the real deal, far away from Chicago.