Why is Deep Dish So Controversial?

Everyone has an opinion on deep dish pizza. Everyone who’s tried it—and plenty of people who haven’t—have something to say. There are naysayers and die-hards, haters, and superfans. Here in Chicago, it amounts to being a patriot or a traitor—but that’s another topic for another day. From the battle of pizza-vs-not-a-pizza to the recipe-stealing, kitchen-spying history, deep-dish pizza fires people up.

The troublemaker in all its glory. (Source: Gino’s East)

The sacredness of pizza 

The main argument of the haters is all about sacrilege. In this rigid mindset, pizza is holy, and its reincarnation on Earth has laws to which it must adhere. Undermining this argument is the fact that the recipe for pizza is NOT actually a piece of knowledge divined by humanity at the dawn of time. In reality, it is a dish that has been transformed and remade time and time again. After all, tomatoes were only brought to Italy in 1548. Don’t you think blasphemy in the pizza world would more likely amount to disrespect of a shared meal with loved ones? This argument is therefore null and void.

It sure looks heavenly. (Source: Gino’s East)

A categorization problem

The obsession with categorizing deep-dish pizza—as a casserole, a cake, a bread bowl full of tomato soup—is another preoccupation of the protestors. It can’t be in the same group as pizza, they say. It must have a different label, they say. While the need to categorize every item in your world is a primitive reflex that normally children grow out of by adulthood, we’ll bite. Let’s take a look at the variations of pizza in the Italian motherland. There’s the popular pizza napoletana, the sliced-up pizza al taglio, the crisp pizza romana, the soft pizza siciliana, the deep pizza al padellino, and even a no-sauce pizza bianca. What would you say groups these species into the same genus? At what level of detail do you exclude criteria? Reality is, we live in a diverse world, and we’re better off because of it. Labeling everything on your table is a pointless exercise in taxonomy.

Authentic Italian pizza comes in all shapes and sizes. (Source: Taste Atlas)

Messy, saucy history

A large portion of the controversy surrounding deep dish comes from within the very population that spawned it. Who made it first? The invention and proliferation of deep-dish pizza is surrounded in a rich history of creativity, hard work, and espionage. Italian immigrants Ike Sewell and Ric Riccardo of Pizzeria Uno are two key characters in the origin story. They are said to have invented deep dish in the 40’s at their restaurant. However, their employee, Adolpho Malnati, Sr., maintained it was his idea, and his family opened Lou Malnati’s Pizzeria. And then there’s us, Gino’s East, with our original pizza recipe developed by former Uno cook Alice May Redmond.

Where they say it all began. (Source: Pizzeria Uno via Bon Appetit)

You’re just hangry

It’s important to remember that deep dish is about love and comfort. It’s not supposed to be about conflict and ego (we’re looking at you, New York). It is a story about the disruption that is essential for the development and full flowering of world cuisine. It’s okay if you like to get fired up, but just know that if you think deep dish is a net negative, you’re very, very wrong. Dough, cheese, sauce—in that order—should never cause suffering.

A deep slice of Gino’s East cheese pizza. (Source: Gino’s East)