My Chicago Style Deep Dish is More “Chicago” Than Yours

My move to Chicago wasn't easy. It took me three months to find a job and about six before I had my own apartment. I wouldn't have been able to get by here without having some wonderful friends. Recently, a couple of them decided to leave the city to seek their fortunes in Minneapolis, so as a going away present I tried to make the most “Chicago” dinner I could.

To truly make this the most “Chicago” experience, I really needed to dig into the terroir of Chicago. What do we have here that a person in Minneapolis couldn't get their hands on? As I thought about it, I remembered my first night in the city and my friend introducing me to a local ritual involving an infamous Swedish liquor. The answer was obvious: I needed to cook a meal with Malört. 

Using that as my starting point, I looked for the most symbolic foods of Chicago: Vienna Beef, Giardiniera Peppers, Malört, and Old Style, to form the components of the perfect Chicago-Style Deep Dish. 

Genius kitchen had a recipe for beer pizza dough and I know from previous experience that Malört can work in a tomato sauce (don't ask). The rest fell together like a standard pizza, and it was a great way to send a good friend off into the land of poorly stocked liquor stores. 

Chicago-Style Deep Dish Pizza

3 cups flour

1 Tablespoon baking powder

A pinch of salt

1 can of crushed tomatoes

16 oz can of Old Style

A shot of Malört

Vienna Beef Polish Sausages

Giardiniera Peppers

Mozzarella

Parmesan

Old Style Dough (altered from Genius Kitchen) 

3 Cups of Flour (I used bleached AP flour, because that's what I had)

1 Tablespoon baking powder

12 oz of Old Style

Butter 

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
2. Combine flour, baking powder, salt, and 12 oz of Old Style in a bowl.
3. Mix.
4. Once the dough is mixed, move it to a floured surface. It should still be shaggy at this point. Sprinkle some flour on top and begin kneading until it's smooth, and form it into a ball. Since you're not using yeast, there's no need to wait for the dough to rise, you can use it as soon as you are ready.
5. Grease your cast iron skillet and form the dough inside.
6. The original recipe calls to brush the surface with olive oil, I used butter since olive oil isn't good for high heat cooking.
7. Toss it in the oven and allow it to cook for 5-10 minutes.
8. You don't want it to be completely cooked since it's going back in the oven, when it looks firm pull it out and set aside.
9. Turn the oven down to 375 degrees.

Malört Tomato Sauce

A shot of Malört

1 can crushed tomatoes 

1. Open the can of crushed tomatoes and pour it into a sauce pan.
2. Pour in one shot of Malört
3. Stir and allow to simmer on low heat. 

Assembling the Pizza 

1. While your sauce is simmering and your dough is baking, pour the remaining Old Style in a shallow pan (or just enough to cover the bottom) and heat at a low temp.
2. Add Vienna Beef polish sausages, I used two, but use as many as you want for the pizza.
3. Allow the sausages to steam in the beer.
4. When the beer has evaporated from the pan, add about a tablespoon of butter and coat the sausages with it.
5. Continue cooking the sausages until they reached the desired doneness, I turn the heat off when I see bubbles forming on the surface of the sausage.
6. Remove sausages from heat and allow them to rest for 5 minutes
7. Cut the sausages on a bias
8. Line the crust with mozzarella, next add the sausages, and Giardiniera peppers. Last add the Malört tomato sauce.
9. (Optional) You can shred some Parmesan over the top if you want it to bake with the pizza, or you can add it after you pull it from the oven. I did both.
10. Put the pizza in the oven and allow to bake for about 10 minutes, just enough time for the cheese to melt.
11. Remove pizza from oven and take pictures of it for 5-10 minutes while it's cooling.
12. Post pictures on Instagram, tag The Chopping Block.
13. Serve pizza. 

A couple of notes, I made the pizza in a 10-inch pan and had way too much dough. If you're using a 10-inch pan like me, don't use all the dough. If you have a 12-inch pan, I think you'll be okay. 

If you don't like Malört, don't panic! The Chopping Block has several classes for people who like their pizza without wormwood liquors (such as Pizza on the Grill), so check the calendar for more details.