We’ve got to admit, we’ve been really missing traveling during this pandemic. We typically center our travel around great places to eat, so we have definitely been missing all of the great variety that comes with that. Since we can’t go to Chicago right now, we found a way to bring Chicago to us. We ordered a Lou Malnati’s deep dish pizza (two of them actually) from the Tastes of Chicago website and had them shipped to our house! They were both 9″ pizzas and cost us $66.99 including shipping. Comparing this to getting the same two pizzas locally, which would have cost $28.84, it certainly cost a bit to have them shipped to us, but the pizzas were packed with dry ice and still frozen solid when they arrived. We baked up our Sausage one the night we got them, and saved the Cheese one for a later date in the freezer. I have personally never had deep dish pizza, let alone Lou Malnati’s, until this frozen version, but Erik had and he said it was shockingly close to the fresh version.
The crust was both crispy and flavorful, the toppings were piled high just as you would expect of a deep dish pizza, and the sauce was probably the most delicious red sauce I have ever had on a pizza. No one topping out-shone the others and together, they created a very complex flavor out of what appears to be a very simple dish. I preferred the Cheese pizza, but Erik preferred the Sausage one, so it’s pretty easy to say that they were both delicious.
If you’re also feeling like the pandemic is making you missing out on regional specialties like this, be sure to check out Tastes of Chicago, as they have WAY MORE than just Lou Malnati’s pizza. They also carry Italian beef, Gyros, hot dogs, gourmet popcorn… the list goes on. If you grab something for yourself, be sure take a picture and share it with us on Instagram using hashtag #economicaleats!