Blog Ovens are hot and other facts gleaned from The A.V. Club's ridealong on Chicago Pizza Tours

Asking Chicagoans what their favorite pizza place is is akin to giving a verbal Rorschach test: Santullo’s (1943 W. North Ave., 773-227-7960) means they’d much rather be living in New York; California Pizza Kitchen means you should stay far, far away from that person. But no matter how red in the face we might get about how much better our preferred pizzeria is to theirs, none of us are experts. The emerging trend of pizza tours that have cropped up over the last few months can help get us all a bit closer, though. The latest of these is the new Chicago Pizza Tours, which costs $55 per ticket and nets patrons the chance to sample different pizzas from four of six pizzerias CPT has deals with, like Coalfire (1321 W. Grand Ave., 312-226-2625). Yesterday afternoon, three weeks into CPT’s run as a business, The A.V. Club endured meat sweats and the first summer-like day of the season to ingest more cheese and crust than is probably wise to file this minute-by-minute report.

11:10am: I was told earlier in the week via e-mail by CPT creator Jonathan Porter to arrive at 10:55 a.m., to wear loose-fitting jeans, and to be ready to eat some pizza. But who could have foreseen the 85-degree forecast for the day? Most of the group is in shorts, waiting outside the first stop, Pizano’s in the Loop (61 E. Madison St., 312-236-1777). Even though we’re all about to eat pizza together—one of the most intimate things you can do as a group, Porter says—everyone just flips around on their iPhones instead of getting to know one another.

11:17am: “Pace yourself, we’re going to eat a lot of pizza today,” Porter says after serving up a thin-crust and deep-dish slice to everyone. There isn’t a hint of sarcasm in his voice, which is kind of refreshing. A glasses-wearing guy in his 40s on the other end of the table brags for what turns out to be the first of many times this afternoon about having only eaten Apple Jacks that morning.

11:19am: After the first bite into Pizano’s thin-crust pizza, it’s easy to see why the restaurant sells three times as much of it than the deep-dish stuff. The crust is crispy and very buttery, and the sauce has actual chunks of tomato. I'm feeling kinda cocky at this point, like I could easily down another six slices.

Total slices: 1.

11:29am: Feeling kinda full. Uh oh.

Total slices: 2.

11:31am: Eh, one more half-slice won’t kill me. The thin crust is so good, and eating it is like washing away years of settling for soggy thin-crust that might as well have been made out of wet cardboard.

Total slices: 2.5.

11:36am: There’s nothing like the first burp of the day.

11:39am: On to the bus we go. Our driver’s name is Mike, and everyone gets into the spirit of teasing him after he proudly announces he has blurry vision when he’s behind the wheel.

11:41am: As we leave the Loop for Hyde Park, Porter points out that we just passed where the semi-flipping scene from The Dark Knight was shot. When I ask Porter what kind of pizza Batman might eat, after some consideration, he decides, “Probably something light. Probably Coalfire—our third stop.” How convenient.

11:44am: Even the bus smells like pizza.

11:47am: Even though the tour’s focus is primarily on pizza, Porter does his best to inject a hodgepodge of non-pizza information tourists and locals alike might find interesting. While only one person (me) on the bus that knew “The Bean” is actually titled “Cloud Gate,” nobody knew that the Art Institute is second only to the Louvre in the number of French impressionist works owned by a single museum. I still don’t believe a high-school student would go there on a day of hooky, though.

11:57am: We arrive at Italian Fiesta Pizzeria in Hyde Park (1400 E. 47th St., 773-684-2222), a.k.a. the Obamas' favorite pizza place. It isn’t a restaurant, but just a small store with a counter. It isn’t as good as Pizano’s, a little too runny for my taste. Porter says it wasn’t really the president's favorite at first, either: “It was Michelle’s favorite, so it became Barack’s favorite.”

Total slices: 3.5.

Porter offers up some pizza good enough for the White House.Kelly Reilly

12:05pm: Eight slices remain on the pizza the group attacked, and Porter cheers us on to finish it. A sassy pregnant employee of Fiesta wanders through and warns, “If you eat too much of it, you’re gonna look like me.” Porter winds up giving the rest of it to a homeless woman.

12:09pm: Off to the West Loop for some of Batman’s favorite pizza. Will we see Commissioner Gordon?

12:17pm: The Apple Jacks guy isn’t quite a foodie, but more of a food enthusiast. He confides in the group about his dream invention: the nacho fountain. It’s a fine idea, but I'm going to mail my idea of the sushi hose to myself before speaking in public about it—lest it be stolen by some would-be inventor without any of his own ideas.

12:24pm: We zip along Printer’s Row, near the old office of Prohibition enforcer Eliot Ness who, Porter says, turned down bribes from crooks like Al Capone on a weekly basis. I ask Porter what kind of pizza Capone liked to eat, and feel kinda stupid for not knowing the answer: Sicilian-style.

12:48pm: It was supposed to be 85 degrees out today, but a bank-temperature sign across from Coalfire says it’s 92. Halfway through the tour, I'm surprisingly devoid of any food coma.

12:52pm: In groups of four, we’re all taken back to Coalfire’s smallish kitchen. The restaurant gets its name from its coal-fire-based cooking methods, and Porter takes out a digital thermometer to see how hot that oven gets exactly: 700 degrees around it, and the coals are at a whopping 1389 degrees. 

1:01pm: Historically, I haven't been a big fan of Neapolitan-style or other super-flat and thin pizzas, but these are pretty good. The margherita is extremely crisp on the bottom, but soft and chewy on top. Also, that hot oven cooks surprisingly fast—it took less than three minutes to cook.

Total slices: 4.5.

1:05pm: The pepper-and-salami slice is so-so, but Mike the driver announces he’s going to take next Sunday off to eat four entire pies just like it.

Total slices: 6.5.

Driver Mike, left, can't get enough of the pepper-and-salami slices.Kelly Reilly

1:15pm: Time for the white pizza. It almost oozes butter just sitting on the plate, which can almost excuse the piles of ricotta cheese lumped a top in defiance of good taste. It’s still pretty good despite that egregious sin.

Total slices: 7.5.

1:28pm: Getting back on the bus, I notice it’s now 94 degrees out. Maybe because of Coalfire’s sweltering ovens?

1:40pm: When we arrive at Gino’s East (633 N. Wells St., 312-943-1124), I spot an abandoned box of Giordano’s deep-dish just sitting on the sidewalk. The spirit of the day would dictate I just eat every kind of pizza that crosses my path, but somehow I summon the resolve not to scarf it down.

1:43pm: Porter speculates aloud about what’s in the crust at Gino’s East. Its staff won’t disclose what makes it so yellow and crunchy to anyone. He thinks it’s cornmeal, and there’s also a hint of buttermilk. It’s one for the ages.

Total slices: 8.5.

1:58pm: Two slices remain, and no one has room for more. When everyone, including Porter, stops stuffing their faces, he shares an interesting tidbit about Gino’s East: Apparently back in the mid-'80s, Kenny Rogers shot a Christmas special here. Not sure what kind of pizza Rogers would favor, but it probably had chicken on it.

The unwanted Gino's East slices.Kelly Reilly

2:10pm: We’re all dropped off at Pizano’s, which is now easily my favorite new pizza place. Unlike at 11 a.m., though, it’s now swamped—and deservedly so. Porter goes back for round two at Pizano’s to watch the rest of the game, while I head home to stay away from pizza for at least a month or two.