Posted by Daniel Zemans, October 15, 2008 at 4:15 PM
Daniel Zemans, our man in Chicago, checks in with another piece of intel on the Windy City pizza scene. Daniel also blogs about Chicagoland pizza with his friends on the Chicago Pizza Club blog. —The Mgmt.
A strip mall is generally not a place to go to find high-quality pizza. But there are exceptions to most rules, and one exists to that one at the Ashland Wellington Plaza. There, nestled between a Supercuts and an H & R Block, sits La Gondola Italian Restaurant, a 25-year-old restaurant that features a full Italian menu and some very good pizza that would make even the most biased New Yorker happy.
As soon as I entered La Gondola, I quickly forgot about the strip mall surroundings. The small restaurant has just six or eight tables close together. It is so dark that small flashlights are passed out so people can read the menu. The size, lack of light and décor gives La Gondola the feel of an out-of-the-way hole-in-the-wall.
La Gondola opened in 1984 about a mile south of its current location. The original owners stayed on until early 2006, when the restaurant was sold to Andy and Christi McGuire. While the new owners have added a couple of entrees, the menu remains virtually unchanged, and everything is still overseen by the original Executive Chef. That includes three kinds of pizza: stuffed, thin crust and extra thin. On this visit, I opted for the regular thin crust.
The thin crust pizza at La Gondola is like a Chicago version of a good New York pizza. The pizza is cooked at 500 degrees, creating a crisp, chewy crust. My pizza could have been cooked for a extra 45 seconds or so to increase the crispness, but it was excellent as served. Unlike most Chicago thin pizzas, this one was cut into slices rather than squares (though La Gondola offers an extra thin pie that gets the benefit of a tavern cut). While the crust is New York, the quantity and quality of the toppings are pure Chicago. This is not a good cheese pizza with ingredients tossed on as an afterthought at the end of the cooking process - each pie is cooked with all of the toppings on from the beginning. The crust can be folded, but the amount of cheese and toppings on top and the crisp outer edge makes that a bad and messy idea (not that folding a slice is ever a good idea).
On my next trip to La Gondola, I will try one of their specialty pizzas, but on this visit, I went with sausage and tomato slices. The sausage comes from a local butcher and it was quite good—a little chewy with some nice fennel flavor. The fresh tomato slices were good, but combined with the homemade sauce, added a little more sweetness than I find ideal. But that is a minor complaint—this was a very good pie.
For those looking to try out La Gondola, I recommend you not make the same mistake I did by overlooking the gift certificates available at restaurant.com. There are $10 certificates for $3 and $25 ones for $10 available.
In the past I turned to slice for inspiration. I have achieved levels of pizza making that would not have been possible without your help. I do not understand why you show pizza like this without explaining that this is not what real pizza should look like.
Daniel, i'm sorry but you betray that almost inevitable feeling of inferiority ,by which i mean the understandable result of living with the label,Second City, with your comment about pizza folding. Anyone who could praise as excellent the pie you photographed, needs a touch of sophistication added to your palette. With all those tomatoes I can barely see a pizza. Anyway, I do look forward to gettin to Chicago in the near future and will definitely check your recommendations....it's only pizza, right?
@LA Pizza Maven: It would be unfair to judge this pizza based on the pictures. As I noted in my report, the restaurant is incredibly dark, which allowed my flash to have far too much of an impact on the pictures. I tried to do what I could with photoshop, but I couldn't make the brown spots on the bottom of the crust reappear and I couldn't get the shade of red to look as it did in real life. As far as the number of tomatoes, all I can do is reiterate that we like our toppings in Chicago.
My friend recommended this site, and now I know I can't take you guys seriously. I've had La Gondola pizza and like most Chicago thin-crusts it takes like concern for sauce on-up; the crust is given second consideration.
This couldn't epitomize Chicago-style thin-crust more and be further from NYC style pizza than trying to say Italian beef is like a NYC bagel with cream cheese.
Seriously? 500 degrees? Did you look at your own crust? Most NYC old-style pizzerias like Grimaldi's, De Fara's, Tottano's, or even Lombardi's start at 700-800 degrees. Longer than 5 minutes in one of those ovens, and we're burnt.
I've had La Gondola's, and while they're decent, it's just baffling that you would use NYC as a benchmark when it's obviously apples and oranges. It's Chicago thin-crust at it's best... why bring NYC into the picture?
@RealNYer: I'm no shrink, but I'm going to go ahead and diagnose you with some anger management issues. In any event, I think you and I have different ideas of what constitutes a New York pizza. Grimaldi's, Totonno's, and Lombardi's are all coal-oven pizzerias, and unfortunately, coal-oven is not the standard oven anywhere. Di Fara uses a much hotter oven than La Gondola, though you are dead wrong about a Di Fara pizza cooking in just five minutes.
What La Gondola has in common with most New York pizzas is the thickness and texture of it's crust. Traditional Chicago thin-crust has crisp crust that is about as thick as a cracker. Thin crust at most stuffed and deep dish pizzerias tends to be neither crisp nor chewy. La Gondola serves up a crisp, chewy crust that is very much like a standard New York crust and nothing like either version of Chicago style thin crust. It's not nearly as good as Di Fara, but neither is any crust cooked in a gas oven that I've had in New York.
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The thin crust pizza at La Gondola is like a Chicago version of a good New York pizza. The pizza is cooked at 500 degrees, creating a crisp, chewy crust. My pizza could have been cooked for a extra 45 seconds or so to increase the crispness, but it was excellent as served. Unlike most Chicago thin pizzas, this one was cut into slices rather than squares (though La Gondola offers an extra thin pie that gets the benefit of a tavern cut). While the crust is New York, the quantity and quality of the toppings are pure Chicago. This is not a good cheese pizza with ingredients tossed on as an afterthought at the end of the cooking process - each pie is cooked with all of the toppings on from the beginning. The crust can be folded, but the amount of cheese and toppings on top and the crisp outer edge makes that a bad and messy idea (not that folding a slice is ever a good idea).
8 Comments:
In the past I turned to slice for inspiration. I have achieved levels of pizza making that would not have been possible without your help. I do not understand why you show pizza like this without explaining that this is not what real pizza should look like.
two pizzas at 8:54PM on 10/15/08
Daniel, i'm sorry but you betray that almost inevitable feeling of inferiority ,by which i mean the understandable result of living with the label,Second City, with your comment about pizza folding. Anyone who could praise as excellent the pie you photographed, needs a touch of sophistication added to your palette. With all those tomatoes I can barely see a pizza. Anyway, I do look forward to gettin to Chicago in the near future and will definitely check your recommendations....it's only pizza, right?
L.A. Pizza Maven at 11:36PM on 10/15/08
@LA Pizza Maven: It would be unfair to judge this pizza based on the pictures. As I noted in my report, the restaurant is incredibly dark, which allowed my flash to have far too much of an impact on the pictures. I tried to do what I could with photoshop, but I couldn't make the brown spots on the bottom of the crust reappear and I couldn't get the shade of red to look as it did in real life. As far as the number of tomatoes, all I can do is reiterate that we like our toppings in Chicago.
Daniel Zemans at 12:59AM on 10/16/08
Kool enough...Im still dyin for a great pie,New York style
L.A. Pizza Maven at 1:21AM on 10/16/08
This doesnt look very appetizing :(
HenryGoldman at 5:48PM on 10/16/08
La Gondola is one of my favourites!!!
ennytko at 10:29PM on 10/20/08
My friend recommended this site, and now I know I can't take you guys seriously. I've had La Gondola pizza and like most Chicago thin-crusts it takes like concern for sauce on-up; the crust is given second consideration.
This couldn't epitomize Chicago-style thin-crust more and be further from NYC style pizza than trying to say Italian beef is like a NYC bagel with cream cheese.
Seriously? 500 degrees? Did you look at your own crust? Most NYC old-style pizzerias like Grimaldi's, De Fara's, Tottano's, or even Lombardi's start at 700-800 degrees. Longer than 5 minutes in one of those ovens, and we're burnt.
Compare Tottano's to your photos. Your crust looks practically raw comparatively.
http://www.yelp.com/biz_photos/ZLPYcgEeRllSoeWyr7y4Ig?select=unLz4zaN0lwuOAPgr31YgQ
I've had La Gondola's, and while they're decent, it's just baffling that you would use NYC as a benchmark when it's obviously apples and oranges. It's Chicago thin-crust at it's best... why bring NYC into the picture?
RealNYer at 3:19PM on 11/09/08
@RealNYer: I'm no shrink, but I'm going to go ahead and diagnose you with some anger management issues. In any event, I think you and I have different ideas of what constitutes a New York pizza. Grimaldi's, Totonno's, and Lombardi's are all coal-oven pizzerias, and unfortunately, coal-oven is not the standard oven anywhere. Di Fara uses a much hotter oven than La Gondola, though you are dead wrong about a Di Fara pizza cooking in just five minutes.
What La Gondola has in common with most New York pizzas is the thickness and texture of it's crust. Traditional Chicago thin-crust has crisp crust that is about as thick as a cracker. Thin crust at most stuffed and deep dish pizzerias tends to be neither crisp nor chewy. La Gondola serves up a crisp, chewy crust that is very much like a standard New York crust and nothing like either version of Chicago style thin crust. It's not nearly as good as Di Fara, but neither is any crust cooked in a gas oven that I've had in New York.
Daniel Zemans at 6:58PM on 11/09/08