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Buddy's Pizza (Photo: Facebook)
Over the decades, nationally, we've heard talk about Chicago-style and New York-style pizza. Detroit was seldom part of that conversation.
That's changed in recent years. In fact in the past several months, we've seen stories in local and national publications about the rising popularity of Detroit-style pizza, including this one in Esquire magazine a few months back, titled: Hip to Be Square: Detroit-Style Pizza Is Conquering America. From coast to coast, the Motor City's signature pie is everywhere right now."
The article by San Francisco freelancer Omar Mamoon says:
Over the last decade, Detroit-style pizza has grown from a local pride point to one of the hottest food trends across America. From coast to coast, pizza pros nationwide are baking up their version of the Motor City’s crispy, cheesy-crusted deep dish, and for good reason: It's ridiculously delicious.
"Detroit is trending because it’s new to people," adds Brian Spangler of Portland's beloved Apizza Scholls. "12 years ago, it was Neapolitan, and then it was Neo-Neapolitan. There was about a 10 year run of that thin crust pizza explosion across the US and I think people are ready for something new." (Spangler has been chronicling his work on a Sicilian/Detroit hybrid via Instagram.)
The crispy square slices are nothing new to those in the Motor City, who simply know it as "pizza."
The signature style originated in 1946 when August “Gus” Guerra started baking his mother-in-law's dough recipe at his tavern, Buddy’s Rendezvous. Legend has it that Guerra—out of sheer genius or pure practicality—repurposed blue steel pans that were used for carrying automotive parts into baking pans. He placed his mother-in-law’s fluffy Sicilian-style dough in the rectangular pan and lined the top edge-to-edge with Wisconsin brick cheese. After it was baked, Guerra added two red “racing stripes” of marinara sauce, the final defining characteristic of a good Detroit-style pizza, and the local legend was born.
