Another one of the trips we did this summer was to Chicago, and we had a lot of fun in the area:  we visited Lake Michigan to see the dunes in Indiana and do a tour of a few local wineries, and we also took one of the famous architecture tours on a boat floating down the Chicago River.  But of course while we were there we also tried a bunch of food – namely pizza, as Chicago is famous for having it’s own home-grown version.  Here we’ll show you all the pizzerias we had a chance to visit, and what we got at each spot – and as it happens, all of this delicious food is vegetarian!

The very first place we visited was Pizano’s, which has four locations around Chicago.  All of them are open for carryout and delivery until 1am or later, which was perfect after our flight into the city wgot  delayed.  They serve up a classic deep dish, so we got one with green peppers and garlic.

Also near our hotel was the original Pizzeria Uno, so of course we had to go to the place that claims to have invented deep dish, and which spawned a whole nationwide chain of pizzerias.  There we got their spinoccoli, made with spinach and broccoli.

We also headed out to Burt’s Place in Morton Grove – which is really a subrub of Chicago, but it’s close to the city limits so we’ll still count it.  Burt’s Place is just a few blocks from a Metra station, so it was easy to hop on a train and visit.  Our pizza there was this one, with mixed bell peppers and garlic.

Our favorite deep dish pizza came from Gino’s East, which has three locations in Illinois plus two in other states and one in Singapore.  We went with a plain cheese topped with garlic, and we loved this one best because the crust was just the right amount of crispy and buttery and the tomato sauce was the perfect flavor – slightly sweet and a little chunky.

But deep dish isn’t the only good pizza in town:  there are several places that serve up other excellent styles of pie.  For example, Coalfire (which has two locations in the city), makes a good Neapolitan pizza – this is their margherita, with Calabrian chiles added on top.

We also tried some Neopolitan style at Spacca Napoli – this is their cinque formaggi, made with fior di latte, gorgonzola, fontina, caciocavallo and pecorino.

Later we hit up two spots that serve up thin tavern pies:  first Falco’s, which has one location in the city and two in the Chicago suburbs.  This is their cheese pizza with jalapeño on top.

Then Vito & Nick’s, where the pizzas are super thin, so we got two.  Here’s their plain cheese pie …

… and here is a cheese topped with giardiniera, which is a pretty common topping in Chicago – it’s made from pickled vegetables marinated in olive oil.

And finally, one place that really surprised us was Piece Brewery, which offers not just beer but also New Haven-style pizzas.  We decided to go all in on that theme and got a red pizza with hot cherry peppers on top.

That was definitely a lot of pizza – to be fair, we were in Chicago for four days so we were able to spread it all out.  We were very strategic in planning routes to hit up all these pizza places, so we really got a lot in and had the chance to sample a ton of different pizzas.  Of course we were looking forward to deep dish, and Gino’s really stood out to us there – but we were pleasantly surprised by the tavern pies we got, and enjoyed the Neopolitan pizzas, and we honestly never thought we’d encounter New Haven-style pizza outside of Connecticut.  It was fun traveling all around for these pies, and combined with the other activities that we did this was a fun way to spend a long summer weekend.