After having lived in Chicago for 10½ years, pizza that’s 3″ thick and full of cheese kinda gets into your blood. I’ve been making Chicago-style deep dish pizza for a number of years, mostly because it’s impossible to get outside of the city. (No, Uno’s doesn’t count. Especially not if you ever had the privilege of going to the original Uno’s. Or the original Gino’s East, with that delicious corn bread crust. Or Giordano’s. Or tasted Edwardo’s stuffed spinach pizza. Or Lou Malnati’s – still my favourite place to head when I have a few hours layover @ ORD.)

Speaking of Edwardo’s, this weekend’s experiment was a stuffed spinach and onion pizza, topped with peameal bacon. That’s what you Americans like to call Canadian bacon, though it’s virtual impossible to find real peameal bacon south of the border.

I’ll post the recipe later – I’m still tweaking it, it’s a combination of my friend Fred’s recipe and one I’ve been working on independently – but this week’s experiment included the following ingredient variations:

• Whole wheat flour (because I’ve run out of all-purpose)
• 1 lb. fresh spinach, wilted in hot pepper olive oil with fresh garlic, stems left on
• A large handful of fresh oregano and basil from the backyard garden
• Pecorino romano instead of parmesan cheese
• Layering, from bottom to top:
  • whole wheat crust
  • brushed with hot pepper olive oil
  • 80/20 mix of shredded mozzarella / shredded romano
  • homemade pizza sauce, from scratch, including fresh herbs
  • Wilted spinach, prepared as above
  • 1 medium yellow onion, chopped, raw
  • More 80/20 cheese mix
  • 3-5mm slices of peameal bacon, quartered
  • 20/80 mix of shredded mozzarella / shredded romano
  • edge of crust brushed with melted butter, then re-brushed halfway through baking

The result was outstanding:

The photo was taken after the pizza had cooled off a bit, so imagine it just oozing with juices and smelling outrageously delicious.

Fixes for next time: cook the sauce a bit longer, it was too watery; replace some of the average-grade mozzarella with buffalo mozzarella, especially in the top 2 layers; try a 50/50 mix of white/whole wheat flour in the crust, or possibly corn meal for a corn bread crust.

P.S. This is my 500th post!
P.P.S. Yes, that’s my Kohjinsha SH6 on the left there. I’ll post about it next.