If you want a Chicago-style pizza and to eat like the true Chicagoans do, head on over to the pizza joint Izzy & Adam’s.
“The novelty Chicago-style pizza is ‘deep dish,’” says owner Ryan Long, 33. “That’s how they did it originally in Chicago. What everyone knows.”
However, according to Long, the real Chicago style is “tavern style. Thin crust that you cut into squares.”
Beginning December 14th, Izzy & Adam’s will also start offering thin-crust pizza.
The restaurant, which opened last September, has been exclusively selling deep-dish pizzas. Its motto is “Windy City Flavor in the Mid-South.”
Both types of pizzas are available in “all the same flavors. Just different portions,” Long says.
The two-inch-or-so deep-dish pizza is “a cheese-lover’s pizza. There’s a lot of cheese on it. It’s kind of a different pizza. There’s more filling. And it’s just unique to Chicago because it was invented there.”
The Chicago thin-crust pizza is different than the New York-style, which most people are familiar with: big slices you can fold over.
But with deep dish, “you put ingredients on the bottom, then the cheese, and the sauce goes on top of it all. And it’s garnished with Romano cheese and parmesan.”
They use “raw Italian sausage” on both pizzas. “We put on quarter-size pieces and it cooks in the oven. The grease from that pork gets released into the sauce. That’s what makes it damn good.”
Long knows a thing or two about Chicago pizza. “I grew up in Chicago in the Northwest suburbs. Rolling Meadows.”
His whole family cooked on weekends. “We would do Greek burgers — half lamb, half beef. Lasagna was a big thing.”
They grilled outdoors all year — even in the snowy winters. “In the wintertime you shovel a pathway to the grill. That’s a Chicago thing.”
Long became fascinated with the restaurant business when he worked at Olive Garden in college. “The majority of people you cook for, you’ll never see them. But you still have that ability to change their day for the better.”
He was more into sports than cooking. “Football was always my primary sport growing up. I started when I was 6 and played until I was 21 in college. University of Texas at El Paso. Linebacker.”
But, he says, “I saw the competition level in college and realized I was probably not going to the NFL.”
Rosati’s Pizza in Chicago is where he learned the restaurant business. “I, essentially, learned everything from there and just took it all over here and opened up.”
Long planned to open a restaurant in Chicago, but his wife, Estefania, got a job with a pharmaceutical company in Memphis. “We brought all the equipment down here. We already had our oven, our assembly units. I had a dough mixer. We had a dough roller. We had quite a bit.”
And, he says, “We got pretty lucky finding a spot on Summer Avenue.”
He named the restaurant after his two sons, Isaac and Adam.
Long will never forget opening day. “We had 60 orders in the course of two hours. We had to close up early during our grand opening. It was nuts. We were only open for about three hours.”
The explanation? “We ran out of dough.”
His pizzas quickly became popular. “There were not a lot of deep-dish pizzas, if any, in Memphis.”
Long also discovered there were “a lot more people down here from Chicago than we expected.”
And those people “do miss the pizza.”
Pizza is his number-one seller, but his Italian beef sandwich, a “Chicago version of a French dip,” is number two.
Other items include wings, salads, and zeppole Italian doughnuts. “Very similar to beignets. Small little squares. And we just drop them down in the fryer for a couple of minutes, toss with powdered sugar, and serve with chocolate sauce.”
And, of course, Izzy & Adam’s sells a “Chicago hot dog,” Long says. “You have to have a Vienna beef hot dog. It’s a Chicago all-beef hot dog. With mustard, pickle relish, tomato, onions, pickle spears, and sport peppers — little yellow peppers.”
Izzy & Adam’s is at 6343 Summer Avenue, Suite 110; (901) 529-7428
