Detroit-style pizza

Detroit-style pizzais a rectangularpan pizzawith a thick, crisp, chewy crust. It is traditionally topped to the edges withmozzarellaorWisconsin brick cheese, which caramelizes against the high-sided heavyweight rectangular pan. Detroit-style pizza was originally baked in rectangular steel trays designed for use as automotive drip pans or to hold small industrial parts in factories.It was developed during the mid-20th century inDetroit, Michigan, beforespreading to other parts of the United Statesin the 2010s. It is one of Detroit's most famous local foods.
Detroit-style pizza is a deep-dish rectangular pizza topped with Wisconsin brick cheese and a cooked tomato-based sauce.The dough typically has ahydration levelof 70 percent or higher, which creates an open, porous, chewy crust with a crisp exterior.The fresh dough isdouble-proofedand stretched by hand to the pan corners.When seasoning new steel pans, they usually need to be dry-baked using 10–18 ounces (280–510 grams) of dough per pan.Randazzo says that the crust should be about1+1⁄2inches (40 millimeters) thick for true Detroit-style pizza.The buttery flavor of the crust results from a small quantity of oil and the melting properties of the mozzarella and Wisconsin brick cheeses.Shield's Pizza describes the importance of the sauce for flavor and how quality is ensured by consistently baking pizza for 13 minutes at 440 °F (225 °C).Loui's Pizza places the pepperoni first, underneath almost one pound of brick cheese and then bakes the pizza at 700 °F (370 °C).The brick cheese can withstand the heat due to the heavybutterfatcontent.
Pepperoni is sometimes placed directly on the crust, and other toppings may go directly on top of the cheese with the cooked sauce optionally as the final layer, applied in dollopsor in "racing stripes", two or three lines of sauce.Some recipes call for the sauce to be added after the pizza comes out of the oven.The style is sometimes referred to as "red top" because the sauce is the final topping.
The cheese is spread to the edges and caramelizes against the high-sided heavyweight rectangular pan, giving the crust a lacy, crispy edge.This edge, known asfrico, is the crispy caramelized cheese that runs along the edges of Detroit-style pizzas.According to the trade journalPizza Today, "The key to this pizza is the delicious caramelized cheese that melts down the interior walls of the pan".
Detroit-style pizza was developed in 1946 atBuddy's Rendezvous, a formerspeakeasyowned by Gus and Anna Guerra located at the corner of Six Mile Road and Conant Street in Detroit.Sources disagree whether the original Sicilian-style recipe was based on Anna Guerra's mother's recipe forsfincioneor a recipe from one of the restaurant's employees, a Sicilian woman named Connie Piccinato.The recipe created a "focaccia-like crust" and the restaurant baked it inblue steelpans available from local automotive suppliers because baking pans available at the time were not appropriate for the dish.The steel pans were made by Dover Parkersburg in the 1930s and 1940s and were originally used asdrip traysor to hold small parts or scrap metal in automobile factories.Some 50- to 75-year-old pans are still in use.
The restaurant was later renamed Buddy's Pizza. In 1953, the Guerras sold it and opened Cloverleaf Bar inEastpointe, Michigan.Former Buddy's employee Louis Tourtois made pizzas at Shield's before founding Loui's Pizza inHazel Park, Michigan.The Detroit Newscalled Tourtois the "king of pizzas" in 1978.National chainJet's, local chain Shield's, and Luigi's the Original ofHarrison Townshipare other locally-notable restaurants serving the style.
Buddy's Pizza chief brand officer Wesley Pikula, who started at Buddy's as abusboyin the 1980s, said that he had never heard the term "Detroit-style" before the 1980s when a trade magazine used it and that even afterward it was seldom used except in national trade articles.As late as 2007, some local media were referring to the style as "Sicilian-style".Some makers of Detroit-style pizza in other areas questioned whether to call their pizza by that name, as "sometimes people have negative thoughts about Detroit."
The Detroit-style pizza was popular throughout theDetroit areabut until the 2010s was not often found at restaurants outside the area.In 2011 two Detroit brothers, Zane and Brandon Hunt, opened a Detroit-style pizza restaurant in Austin, Texas named Via 313, using the "Detroit-style" name as a point of differentiation.In 2012, a New York restaurateur created a pizza he called "Detroit-style", though he had never visited Detroit, using focaccia dough, mozzarella, and ricotta.
In 2012, local restaurant cook Shawn Randazzo won the Las Vegas International Pizza Expo world championship with a Detroit-style pizza, and according to pizza educatorTony Gemignani, the reaction was immediate."After he won, I must have had six phone calls from operators, from guys who are big in the industry, saying, 'Give me a recipe for Detroit. How do I figure this out?'"
According toSerious Eats, "in early 2016 or so, everyone seemed to be talking about it or writing about it or opening up restaurants devoted to it."Trade journalPizza Todaywrote in 2018 that "Perhaps no pizza style has entered the public consciousness in quite the way that Detroit-style pan pizza has."Trade journalRestaurant Hospitalitysaid the style had become popular on Instagram.
In 2019,Esquirecalled the style "one of the hottest food trends across America",and both theDetroit Free PressandEatersaid Detroit-style pizza was "having its moment".Eaterwrote that pizzerias offering the style were spreading across the US, but that the new pizzas were different:
Eatersaid the artisanal trend was slow to catch on in Detroit.Along with theConey Island hot dogand theBoston cooler, the traditional Detroit-style is one of Detroit's iconiclocal foods.
According to a 2021 forecast report, Yelp.com noted that Detroit-style pizza was national and reported that reviews mentioning "Detroit-style pizza" were up 52%.In 2023, Detroit-based author Karen Dybis publishedDetroit-Style Pizza: A Doughtown Historycovering three waves of Detroit-style pizza, ranging from the original innovators up through current pizzerias around the country.
GQfood criticAlan Richmanincluded Buddy's Pizza and Luigi's the Original among his 2009 list of 25 best pizzas in the USA.A Detroit-style pizza made by Randazzo, who was then working at Cloverleaf, won the 2012 Las Vegas International Pizza Expo world championship.TheChicago Tribunereviewed Jet's Pizza in 2013 and rated it very highly.In 2019,The Daily Mealnamed Buddy's the best pizza in Michigan.TheDetroit Free Pressnamed the Cloverleaf its Classic Restaurant of 2020.
In 2020, four Detroit-area restaurants, Buddy's, Supino Pizzeria, Loui's Pizza, and Cloverleaf Pizza, were listed in the 101 Best Pizzas in America by The Daily Meal.Pizza Today named Via 313, one of the leading Detroit-style pizza shops in the country, its "Independent Pizzeria of the Year" in 2020.Platementions that "The chewy crust, crispy cheese corners, and hearty meal of a slice fits precisely with what customers want right now: rich, satisfying comfort to-go."The Palm Beach Postdescribes how within minutes, aDelray Beach, Florida, bakery with a Detroit-style pizza pop-up store sells out its takeout pizza that is ordered online at noon on a Monday for pickup on the following Sunday.A writer forDelishoriginally from Chicago and now based in New York City provided a positive review in an article correspondingly entitled "What Is Detroit-Style Pizza? It's Way Better Than Your Deep Dish Or New York Slice".