Lou Malnati's And Portillos Just Created The Ultimate Chicago-Style Pizza
Just like New York City is famous for pastrami on rye and large foldable pizza slices, Chicago is known for its layered deep-dish pizza and classic Italian beef sandwiches. The down-to-earth Midwest city just claimed spot number 12 in Wallet Hub's list of best food cities and for good reason.
To be a Chi-town resident is to live in a city of wind and foodie charm, including Chicago's deep-dish pizza. While the stacked Italian pie can be found at many places in the city, one of the longest-running contenders for the most popular pie is Lou Malnati's, which laid its roots in Lincolnwood, Illinois in 1971. The rich "buttery crust" even made its television debut on "The Daily Show" after Jon Stewart spoke out against the favorite in one of his previous episodes (via Comedy Central).
Sure, Stewart admitted the pie was "tasty," but deep-dish pizza is not the only Chi-town favorite getting rave reviews from windy city inhabitants. The Italian beef may have garnered new followers thanks to its allotted screen time on "The Bear" (via The New York Times), but Chicagoans have long always stood by the thin crispy layered meat sub sprinkled with giardiniera. Foodies outside the bounds of Chicago have just been given the unique chance to experience two Chicago food staples in one epic creation for a limited time.
The iconic Italian beef meets classic deep-dish pizza
Portillo's is like Lou Malnati's in that it has a strong following of Chicago food lovers. Just one TikTok search of "Chicago Portillo's Italian Beef" reveals a plethora of videos with thousands of watchers of Portillo's customers digging into the Chicago classic. As whispers spread of Portillo's expanding to Arizona, Texas, and Florida (per Advantage), the word may also spread about the classic Italian Beef taking a new surprising form.
Tastes of Chicago was born from Lou Malnati's spreading pizza love across the country and has turned into a website where people can have the Windy City's best-known foods shipped across the U.S. The company just announced the debut of Lou Malnati's X Portillo's Italian beef deep-dish pizza, which combines two of Chicago's iconic flavors into one classic pie ready to be shipped right to customers' front doors. According to Tastes of Chicago, the pie features "Wisconsin mozzarella cheese ... slow-roasted Italian beef, and your choice of sweet peppers or hot giardiniera."
News has already spread like wildfire on Reddit. With this iconic flavor profile, one Redditor made known the only desire left for this collab: "Hope I can get it dipped."