The Pizza Kitchen LLC — Restaurant in Addison Township

Y'all!!!!!

So I'm from Louisiana, in Chicago for business. I decided I wanted pizza for dinner. As stated previously, I'm in Chicago, the land of some damn fine pizza, and there is no way I'm ordering from some large national chain. Googled "good pizza near me" and this joint popped up about 4 miles away from my hotel. 10 minutes drive....to pizza heaven.

Was a Tuesday night and kind of quiet in the restaurant. Looked over the menu and the sweet waitress, who I later found out is the owner's daughter, made some recommendations for me. I settled on a 12" Chicago style deep dish with pepperoni, Italian sausage, Canadian bacon, and onions. She told me it would be about a 45 minute wait. I admit, I was disappointed by that....but good things come to those who wait, and I really had nowhere to go other than my hotel room. She asked if I wanted an appetizer. They had a great selection of your standard fare, and something told me that anything I ordered in this little hole in the wall was going to be good, so I settled on wings with a traditional Buffalo hot sauce. I asked they be served with bleu cheese, my preference, but was told they only had ranch, but that it was homemade and really good. OK...another "letdown", but what else did I have to do.

10 minutes later, I got a plate of the best chicken wings I have ever had in my life. And my word, that ranch was the B-O-M-B!!!! So glad they didn't have a jar of Ken's bleu cheese dressing that every other restaurant uses. It was so light, crisp, and full of flavor. The wings were battered and fried to perfection!!! Then tossed in a perfectly seasoned sauce. Not too hot, great flavor. Enhanced the flavor of the chicken, didn't cover it up. Crispy crunch outside, moist inside. Then dipped in that heavenly Ranch...oh my Lord. I died and went to Buffalo wing heaven.

At this point, the server tells me my pizza will be out "in just a few more minutes." I didn't care if it took another hour at this point after what I just experienced with the wings. I KNEW this pizza was gonna make me see Jesus. Little bit of time, a refill of my drink, and BAM, a 5 pound steaming hot mass of crust, tomato sauce, cheese, and all my toppings in laid down in front of me. I grabbed my knife and fork and dug in.

This pizza was substantial. Listed on the menu to feed 2-3 people, it can easily feed 4. I'm not exaggerating, I really think it weighs in excess of 5 pounds. The melding of all the ingredients was just perfect. Cheese was just how I like it, slightly golden brown. That deep dish crust had a little crunch on the edges, and a fluffy interior. Done to perfection.

So, after two drinks and 6 wings, I'm only able to eat 2 slices of pie. Discarding this pizza masterpiece would be sacrilegious. Once again, I'm on a business trip. Sure, I can have a late night snack, maybe a piece for breakfast. But what about the rest?

I then had the opportunity to meet the sweet server's mother, Lori, who with her husband owns the restaurant. Lori helped me think of ways for me to fly this back home the following day so I can bring the leftovers to my family. I don't know if what we came up with will work, but this is such a great pizza that I'm willing to try anything. This is hands down the best pizza I have ever eaten in my 54 years of walking the Earth, and I want to do everything I can to bring it home tomorrow to share with my family so they too can experience the best pizza ever.

Sometimes, you get lucky in life, and tonight was one of those experiences. I got to enjoy not one, but two of my favorite foods in their absolute best form. On top of that, the family that owns the restaurant are truly wonderful people. I hope their business flourishes and rewards them for all of their hard work and dedication to making a truly great product. Small businesses like these are what makes America great, and I am proud that I was able to support them, if for only one night.

The next time I come to Chicago, The Pizza Kitchen will absolutely be in my...

Five of my high school buddies and I met there for our monthly Pizza Club meeting. I walked in and a couple of them were playing pinball and having a beer. There were several arcade games, video slots in a separate room and a party room in addition to the ample sized dining room. We put some music on the juke box and started looking over the menu.

They have a full bar with a variety of beer, wine and spirits. We ordered drinks and selected our first pizza, The Wild, Wild West! It came out piping hot! It has a delicious barbecue sauce that is just the right combination of sweet and tangy. Toppings include sausage, bacon and onion. It was delicious. The stars of this pizza were the top notch sausage and the perfect thin crust. The crust was tasty, crispy and didn't say even a little bit with all of the plentiful toppings.

While eating the first pizza, we ordered two more pizzas. We like to try a variety, so the second choice was Cheeseburger Cheeseburger Cheeseburger. When they brought it out, this one was also piping hot and smelled like they just put down a bunch of...CHEESEBURGERS! This pizza comes on the same delicious crust and is topped with ground beef, ketchup, mustard, pickle, tomato, onion and American cheese. It tasted exactly like we were eating cheeseburgers! Bravo. While this isn't the type I'd order for just myself, it's what we love about our club. We get to try so many pizzas we might not otherwise get to experience. We were all glad we tried it and agreed it was delicious.

Our third pizza was highly recommended by several people - Tommy's Favorite. This was my favorite hands down. It's a sausage pizza served on their da Vinci crust. OMG it is sooo good!! You get that outstanding sausage on their awesome pizza sauce smothered with delicious gooey cheese. But, the crust elevates it even higher! It's that incredible thin crust with a thin layer of cheese topped with another layer of that thin crust. It's still so thin that it's hard to even tell other than that taste! You bite into it and get that flavor of a great pizza, but now there's a hint of melted cheese on the bottom of each bite, too. It was the perfect amount of cheese - not too overpowering.

We liked it so much, we decided to hold next month's meeting there, too! There's unfinished business trying more of the specialty pizzas...and probably another Tommy's Favorite! We are eyeing The Popeye Pizza and Taco Heaven Pizza to start things off next month. Maybe The Ty Ty...

In my ongoing search for excellent thin, crispy, tavern-style pizza we stopped by The Pizza Kitchen in Georgetown Square and this new pizza restaurant did not disappoint.

The Pizza Kitchen is a casual, family style restaurant with a limited menu of appetizers, pizza and a couple of pasta dishes. They have a full service bar with a handful of bottled or canned beer, but no beers on tap.

We started with garlic bread because we were starving and knew it would come out quick and give us a "hold-me-over" until the pizza was done. Usually, garlic bread in many pizza joints is disappointing since they tend to skimp on the oil and garlic and you end up eating warm bread. That's not the case here. If you really like "garlicky" bread, I think you will like the one they bake here.

Next up was the headliner, a delicious pizza that was baked to perfection! We ordered a 14" sausage, mushroom, garlic and black olives pizza. The key phrase that made this such an exceptional pizza was ordering it "thin and crispy". They absolutely nailed the crust! It was thin and had that great "karunch" when you bit into it. Even the inside pieces were crispy. The thinness and crunch of the crust reminded me of all of those south side joints that serve great tavern-style pizza. The ratio of cheese and toppings was just right. They are very generous with the amount of sausage and toppings and if I were to change anything it would be to scale back my order to 2 or 3 toppings. They offer 6 crust variations including "DaVinci" which is described as 2 layers of dough with a layer of cheese in between. I can't comment on any of the other pizza crust styles but give an enthusiastic "thumbs up" for their thin and crispy style.

If you are a fan of thin, tavern-style pizza, The Pizza Kitchen in Wood Dale is...