We challenged chefs of three different skill levels–amateur Joe, home cook Beth, and professional chef Ann Ziata from the Institute of Culinary Education–to make us their take on Chicago-style deep dish pizza. We then asked expert food scientist Rose to explain each chef's choices along the way. Which deep dish pizza do you think makes Chicago proud?
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00I'm Joe, and I am a level one chef.
00:07I'm Beth, and I'm a level two chef.
00:09Hi, I'm Ann Ziada.
00:10I'm a chef at the Institute of Culinary Education.
00:13I've been a professional chef for 14 years.
00:15Today, I'm making a deep dish pizza.
00:19I don't like it too thick.
00:20I'm a shallow dish pizza kind of person.
00:22I've been to Chicago.
00:24I've eaten a lot of deep dish pizzas.
00:26They're really good, but they're not pizza.
00:29Today, I'm going to be making my white and green deep dish
00:32pizza.
00:32My inspiration was a vegetarian lasagna
00:35made with bechamel and green.
00:36So the most important part of any pizza is the dough.
00:45I've never made pizza dough.
00:47You know why I don't?
00:48It's because they make it in a bag.
00:50I'm going to do two layers of dough.
00:52I'm going to put one base layer.
00:53I'm going to put some sauce, cheese, some toppings,
00:55and then a second layer of dough.
00:57Same thing, sauce, cheese, couple different toppings.
01:00It's like a pizza on a pizza.
01:01There's cornmeal in this, and there's butter.
01:04And that's what kind of makes it pie-y.
01:08First thing I'm going to do is proof my yeast, the leavener
01:10in this recipe.
01:11And in order to wake it up, I'm going to add a little warm water
01:14because it's thirsty, and a little sugar for it to snack on.
01:18If we skip this step and go and make our dough
01:20and the yeast is alive, everything's going to be great.
01:22But if the yeast is dead, pizza's going to be awful.
01:24So the yeast here is alive.
01:25You can see it's foaming.
01:26That's a sign of a nice, healthy yeast.
01:28So I'll start by adding all-purpose flour, the cornmeal,
01:32lots of sugar, and a good amount of salt, and the yeast.
01:36Three teaspoons.
01:38I'm also going to add a little semolina flour.
01:40That's higher in protein.
01:41It's also going to add a little bit of this nutty flavor
01:43and some corn oil.
01:44I want to mix this up first.
01:47Let's start kneading.
01:48Cold butter, just like a pie crust.
01:51You want the butter to be incorporated into the flour
01:53where it looks a little bit pebbly.
01:56So I'm going to let this rest for about six hours.
01:58My pie crust, I mean, pizza dough,
02:01is covered and ready for its rest for 90 minutes
02:06over in a nice, warm place in the kitchen.
02:09I'm going to make some sauce now.
02:10So what do I got?
02:11I got some tomatoes in a can.
02:14I got some tomato paste.
02:15I could use sauce out of the jar,
02:17but then I'm not doing anything.
02:19So this makes me feel like I cooked a pizza.
02:21Now we're going to add a little bit of oregano in there.
02:23A pinch of salt in there, a pinch of sugar.
02:26There's no method to this.
02:27I'm just pinching
02:28because that's what I feel like you're supposed to do.
02:30If you have measuring spoons,
02:32you're not really making Italian food.
02:33Somebody comes to your house and they say,
02:34oh, you did it wrong.
02:35It's like, well, get out then.
02:36Go get your own pizza.
02:37Traditionally, deep dish pizza has tomato sauce
02:40on top of mozzarella cheese.
02:41This is Chicago deep dish pizza sauce.
02:44So you're going to see butter, red onions.
02:49I use red packed tomatoes.
02:51It's the only tomatoes I ever use.
02:54And I always pass the tomatoes through a food mill
02:58because I don't want any seeds and any skin.
03:02We'll get the onions and the garlic in there.
03:05I want to put in some tomato paste
03:07and get the tomatoes in there.
03:09Always salt, pepper, oregano.
03:12I guess about a half a teaspoon.
03:13I always use fresh basil.
03:15Now we're going to cook this sauce low and slow.
03:19I want it really thick, really, really thick.
03:22If you need a thick sauce,
03:24all you have to do is keep cooking.
03:26And this is perfect.
03:28I'm going to make a white sauce pizza.
03:30I love white sauce.
03:31I also really love greens and cheese.
03:33To me, that is a match made in heaven.
03:35So to make the bechamel, I have milk here.
03:37So we're going to add some aroma to the milk here.
03:39Fennel seeds are going to add a little sweetness,
03:42a little green character, a little mintiness.
03:44And it's going to really compliment the cheese.
03:45Peppercorns is going to add a hint of spice.
03:47One single clove,
03:48it's strong enough to fix the whole pizza.
03:50And then one bay leaf.
03:51So I'm just going to strain it so it's a nice, even texture.
03:54So I'm going to make a blonde roux.
03:56A roux is a mixture of fat and flour
03:58used to thicken a sauce.
04:00Now I'm ready to add my fennel seed milk.
04:02I'm looking for it to become much thicker.
04:04Nutmeg is a rare spice that loses its flavor
04:07with longer cooking.
04:08So we always want to add it at the end.
04:09This is my favorite part of pizza.
04:11It's the cheese.
04:12I care about this more than anything.
04:14I would eat a pizza with no sauce or dough or toppings
04:18because I love cheese that much.
04:19Don't skimp on the cheese.
04:21No matter what kind of sauce you use,
04:23you absolutely need cheese on a pizza.
04:24I have chosen provolone and mozzarella.
04:27Why did I choose two kinds of cheese?
04:30Why not?
04:30The cheeses I'm going to use are whole milk,
04:34mootz, and Parmesan.
04:35Chicago, they use Parmesan.
04:37Today, we're using Parmesan.
04:39I have two cheeses I'm going to use here.
04:41The first is a caciocavallo.
04:42This is kind of my mozzarella substitute.
04:44It is made from cow's milk.
04:46It's nutty.
04:47It's rich.
04:48It's toasty.
04:49It's double wrapped for security.
04:50Hold on one second.
04:58Dude, this is tight.
05:00Nobody's getting into this cheese.
05:04Okay, thank you for your patience.
05:06Here's the mozzarella.
05:07I'm just going to cut them up real thin.
05:08So the middle section will be provolone,
05:11and then these slices of mozzarella
05:14will be just kind of scattered about,
05:16giving it a little extra gooeyness, extra cheesiness.
05:20The fresh mootz is delicious,
05:22but it has a lot of moisture.
05:24The black cheese is a low moisture cheese.
05:27So it's going to be drier
05:29without really compensating anything
05:31as far as taste is concerned.
05:33So the caciocavallo is going to go
05:34on the bottom of the pizza,
05:36but we need some cheese on the top too.
05:37So I have a grana padana here.
05:39It's like Parmesan.
05:40It's a little kind of nuttier and crumblier.
05:41I'm just going to grate a bit.
05:43And now my cheese is ready.
05:44That's probably enough.
05:45Mootz, palm, ready to make a pizza.
05:48All right, here are my toppings.
05:50I'm doing the spinach and the onions in the middle,
05:52pepperoni and olives on top.
05:55The idea is that my girlfriend
05:56can pull off the olives and pepperoni
05:58because she doesn't like them.
05:58And then in the middle,
05:59you got all this stuff that we both can eat.
06:01Deep dish Chicago pizza has sausage on top.
06:05So I'm using sweet Italian sausage.
06:07I'm just going to take the sausage out of the casings.
06:12I'm just going to dollop this sausage raw
06:15right on top of the cheese.
06:16Not going to cook it beforehand.
06:18The pizza cooks long enough that the sausage will cook.
06:22Deep dish pizza is unique
06:24because we're really giving it a filling
06:25rather than just a topping.
06:27The first thing I'm going to need for all of this to happen
06:29is to make my garlic oil.
06:31I'm going to add some olive oil.
06:33I have a head of garlic cut in half.
06:34I'm going to add some marjoram, some rosemary,
06:37and I'm going to take some Meyer lemon, just the peel.
06:39This oil I'm going to use for the entire dish.
06:42I'm going to use it to saute the greens and the mushrooms.
06:44And I'm also going to use it
06:45to coat the bottom of the pan.
06:46It's going to be this kind of secret layer of flavor.
06:50For my mushrooms, I have a hen-of-the-woods mushroom.
06:52Nice and rustic, nothing fancy.
06:56So for the creminis, same idea.
06:57I'm just going to slice through it.
06:59So I want to make sure there is some space
07:01for the mushrooms to breathe.
07:02They're going to release a lot of moisture.
07:04And if they're all on top of each other,
07:05they're going to steam and get soggy.
07:07We want them to kind of dry out.
07:09And you can see all the steam,
07:10all that water leaving, which is great.
07:12So I'm going to use a little white wine to deglaze.
07:14It's going to add just a little acidity and brightness.
07:17It's going to help me clean off all of that
07:19on the bottom of the pan
07:20and infuse those flavors back into the mushrooms.
07:24So I turned the heat off
07:25and I'm going to add just a little splash of shiokoji.
07:27It smells like miso.
07:29I'm going to add a little natural umami,
07:31little natural glutamates, which is a flavor enhancer.
07:34Mushrooms look great.
07:35Now I'm going to do my greens.
07:36I already blanched and shocked Swiss chard and kale here
07:40for them to look more cooked and less raw,
07:42and then shocked them in an ice bath.
07:43I'm cutting these up into smaller pieces.
07:45They'll be a little bit smaller than bite size.
07:47So when I cut the slices,
07:49it's not going to be kind of pulling
07:50and destroying the shape.
07:52I'm going to add the kale and chard.
07:55So cooking it is going to get rid of even more moisture
07:58and it's going to also give it a little toasty,
08:01deeper flavor.
08:02So I know you're thinking,
08:03oh, I can do this at home with spinach,
08:04but I promise you can't
08:06because spinach is going to shrink down to this much.
08:09And this is a deep dish pizza.
08:10So I need a lot of filling.
08:12Let's add a little pinch of red pepper flakes
08:15because it is a pizza
08:16and a little Meyer lemon zest.
08:20Okay. I got provolone.
08:22I got mozzarella.
08:23I got pepperoni.
08:24I got my sauce that I made
08:26and it's all going together into a pie dish.
08:29We're going to assemble this deep dish casserole pizza.
08:34Did I say casserole pizza?
08:35Pizza, not casserole.
08:37I got my flour right here.
08:38I want to flour the board.
08:39Spread a little bit down.
08:40Make sure that this is very sticky.
08:43I want to roll this dough out
08:45until it's bigger than the pan.
08:48This dough is, as you see,
08:51wants to go back to its original form.
08:52It's not being very cooperative.
08:54This is why they spin it around like that, I assume.
08:56I don't know how they do that physically.
08:58It doesn't make any sense to me.
09:00I'm going to oil up my pan
09:02so that the dough doesn't stick to it.
09:04Going to add another layer of aroma
09:06and it's going to make the crust a little crispy,
09:08a little crispier.
09:08I have about three tablespoons of olive oil in this pan.
09:13This pizza is going to fry in here.
09:16Get this dough out.
09:20There we go.
09:20I don't want to stretch it.
09:21Just want to ease it in.
09:23Easy, easy.
09:24I'm not going to roll it out.
09:26I think it's just an extra step
09:28that kind of flattens it out.
09:29All right.
09:30Looks like a pie.
09:31We're going to hit it with a layer of sauce.
09:32Now, I don't like a lot of sauce.
09:34I like a lot of cheese.
09:35I'm putting the cheese down first
09:36because it's going to create a barrier,
09:39not letting the moisture of the greens
09:41and the mushrooms seep into the dough.
09:43The mousse on the bottom is going to protect the crust
09:47so that it doesn't get mushy from the sauce.
09:50Provolone.
09:51Sometimes you might see shredded cheese on a pizza.
09:54I got slices here, slapping them on there.
09:57That's satisfying.
09:58And now, some onion.
10:00And we got spinach.
10:01That's a good looking pizza right there.
10:03You could be done in some worlds,
10:04but this is not that.
10:06I'm going to put another pizza right on top.
10:08Next comes the sausage.
10:10You want to make a thin sheet of sausage
10:14across the top of the cheese.
10:16You don't want big clumps because that may not cook.
10:19Now, I'm going to add the mushrooms.
10:20Spreading it all the way around
10:22and getting it right up to the crust.
10:24I don't know who came up with deep dish,
10:25but I know they were hungry
10:27and they had a lot of time on their hands.
10:28We got a little bit of a structural issue
10:32with my top piece.
10:34I'm going to kind of just mush it, you know?
10:36You just give it a mush.
10:37If you're having problems, give it a mush.
10:39The sauce got really, really thick,
10:42which is exactly what I want.
10:44If you cut it without it being this thick,
10:48it might make the crust soggy
10:51and it definitely wouldn't hold together at the end.
10:54This is everything I want in a meal.
10:56I want greens.
10:57I want mushrooms.
10:58I want bread and cheese.
10:59Slap them good, you know what I mean?
11:01Don't be afraid.
11:02You can go up over the edge.
11:02This is your pizza.
11:03This is your world.
11:04I feel like I'm making a pie.
11:06Not a pizza pie, but a pie.
11:09I'm in love.
11:09I'm obsessed.
11:11What could make it better?
11:12I don't know.
11:13Maybe a fennel seed bechamel.
11:14Just like frosting a cake.
11:16I've always loved black olives on pizza.
11:18I feel like they just go.
11:19It's really the only place I like black olives.
11:20I can't think of anything that has black olives on it
11:22besides pizza.
11:23And then I have my pepperoni.
11:25I'm going to rip it up to give it kind of a rustic feel
11:28like you went to some kind of fancy pizzeria.
11:31Does that look rustic or does it look messy?
11:32I don't know.
11:34I mean, nobody complains about how a pizza looks.
11:36They just eat it.
11:37And now, nice layer of parm.
11:40I don't think you can have too much cheese.
11:42And to top it off, our granogello.
11:44Just a little bit.
11:45Nice, salty, cheesy crust.
11:47I'm just going to trim off the excess crust.
11:51Just for good luck, I'm going to brush the crust
11:53with a little more of the garlic oil
11:55before I send it off into oven land.
11:57All right, my pizza is assembled.
11:59It looks, dare I say, perfect.
12:00I'm going to put it in the oven for a half hour
12:02at 425 and then we'll see how I did.
12:05And here you have it.
12:06I'm going to put it in a 425 degree oven for 40 minutes
12:12and then we'll eat.
12:13I have my oven set for 425
12:15and I'm going to cook it for 40 minutes.
12:17Let's go.
12:19Oh, mama mia, look at this.
12:22Look at that beautiful pie I just made.
12:24Look at that.
12:26Not a pizza, but it looks great.
12:29Nice layers.
12:31Stringy moots.
12:34Look at that.
12:34All right, there you go.
12:35This is my deep dish pizza.
12:39This is my Chicago deep dish pizza.
12:44And this is my white and green deep dish pizza.
12:54I'm happy with this.
12:55It looks good.
12:56We got, I see all my layers.
12:57I got a lot of toppings, a lot of filling in there.
13:00Crust, moots, sausage, sauce, and Parmesan.
13:04You can smell the fennel.
13:06You could smell the citrus and the olive oil
13:07and smell the garlic.
13:09The cheese looks so good.
13:11I want to stop talking because I need to eat this.
13:14Oh my gosh.
13:16There's a fork and knife here,
13:17but that's exactly how I like it.
13:18There's just the right amount of sauce.
13:20Not too much.
13:21There's a ton of cheese.
13:22Probably too much.
13:23This is wonderful on a cold day.
13:25Fills you up, warms your belly.
13:27It's got that umami from the mushrooms.
13:30It has that fresh from the green.
13:32Like, I don't know why I feel surprised.
13:33I knew it was going to be good the whole time.
13:35This is so delicious.
13:36I really am going to eat this whole thing.
13:40Let's see how each of our three chefs
13:42made their deep dish pizza.
13:47Jo used commercial pre-made dough.
13:49It's made from high gluten flour
13:51that's combined with special enzymes
13:53and emulsifiers like monoglycerides.
13:55So it stretches without ripping or tearing.
13:58Beth added yeast directly to her dry ingredients
14:00without a proofing step.
14:02You can do this with fast acting instant yeast.
14:05It's made from cultured, dried,
14:06and ground Saccharomyces cerevisiae,
14:09a common strain used for baking and beer making.
14:12Anne combined her flour and other dry ingredients
14:15and proofed her active dry yeast,
14:17a required step that tells you your yeast is alive
14:20and producing carbon dioxide.
14:22That's a sign of a nice healthy yeast.
14:25Beth used a food mill,
14:26which both grinds and strains the whole tomato.
14:29Anne made bechamel, a classic European white sauce
14:33made by cooking a white roux and adding milk that's hot.
14:36The roux, which is equal parts fat and flour,
14:39increases viscosity of the milk by gelatinization.
14:46Jo used a classic combination of pepperoni, spinach,
14:49black olives, and onions.
14:50Black olives tend to have a lot of fat,
14:53Black olives turn dark through oxidation.
14:56An iron compound, ferrous gluconate,
14:58is added to help stabilize the dark color.
15:01I can't think of anything that has black olives on it,
15:03besides pizza.
15:03Anne blanched and boiled kale and Swiss chard,
15:06these leafy greens with vibrant pink-red stems
15:09that become less bitter and rounder in flavor once cooked,
15:12as some of the bitter alkaloid compounds
15:14are leached into the cooking water.
15:19Jo made a layered stuffed crust.
15:21This may require longer cooking time,
15:23since there's quite a lot of moisture in the stuffed crust.
15:26It's like a pizza on a pizza.
15:27Beth added cheese directly to the bottom crust
15:30and then layered her sausage and sauce on top.
15:32Since fat and water don't mix,
15:34the fatty cheese acts as a barrier
15:36for any potential moisture migration
15:38from other ingredients in her crust.
15:40Anne added caciocavallo,
15:42an expensive, semi-hard Italian cheese
15:45that's aged in the characteristic shape of a teardrop.
15:48It adds a rich and salty quality to her deep dish pizza.
15:51She layered her mushrooms and cooked greens
15:54and then topped it with a thick and creamy bechamel.
15:57The bechamel will brown and become slightly crispy on top
16:00during baking due to the Maillard browning reaction
16:03between proteins and broken down lactose in the milk.
16:06Who doesn't love pizza?
16:07Next time you're going deep with yours,
16:10we hope you'll take some of these tips
16:11from our three extraordinary chefs.