New Glarus (2022)

I think the vast majority of Chicago tavern style pizza isn’t cracker thin (at least in my experience). Maybe the tavern roots of it were like that

 

I’m from Racine and agree - Wells Brothers is out of control good!!!

 

Zaffiro's on Farwell. But Well's Brothers is right on the money too.

Edit: anyone trying to tell you Pizza Man shouldn't be trusted for any advice. Okay I'm done now!

 

Did they finally reopen after the fire? The original place was pretty good. Not great, but not awful. Lotta my home-brew friends loved it.

 

Thanks all. Most of my trips up north are to Madison, so I appreciate the advice for some new strips. If I can find some pizza focus trips, I can convince my wife to go more often. Then, I can load up on "gas station watery beverage" and everyone's happy.

 

They did - have a spot on Downer. I think it’s awful. Had never been the same. We live in MN but I was there a couple of weeks ago over Christmas and we won’t go back again.

 

Agreed, some Chicago versions aren't quite cracker. There's definitely a lot of sad hefty square cut stuff in the city. But, I think of the style like Vito and Nicks on the South Side or Pat's on the Northside.

 

Fox's in Orland Park is definitely cracker.

 

Yes but lots of issues. The new Downer location the other guy mentioned had some plumbing issues and was flooding through the wall into a bar next door at one point. Don't remember if that was before or after all the staff quit due to sanitation issues plus the usual labor abuse stuff you see in restaurants. Their second location opened in Oak Creek a few years back and already went tits up. I know the old place was much beloved but I was not impressed by the food and the service was atrocious. Never got the appeal and I think nostalgia is the only thing keeping the Pizza Man name in play at this point.

 

So, I google'd Pizza Man (hadn't heard of it) and the arson story is pretty entertaining!

https://www.milwaukeemag.com/getting-away-arson-true-crime-pizza-man-fire/

(This is 100% the new Dark Lord thread)

 

A well done Meat Monster is my go to.

 

I doubt it. I've never set foot in a Mod Pizza, but from what I've heard and seen others get, it's a completely different animal.

 

This is some straight up bull crap: https://www.visitmilwaukee.org/plan-a-visit/food-drink/milwaukee-style-pizza/

Milwaukee trying to claim tavern style pizza as its own? WTF. Sorry, non unique to MKE. It's basically what pizza is if it isn't on the east coast or deep dish.

https://chicago.eater.com/maps/best-chicago-thin-crust-pizza-restaurants-tavern-style

There are hundreds of styles of pizza in Chicago so anyone claiming unique styles better come with some good provenance whether thick, thin, deep, square, tavern cut, pot pied, sausage crust or other.

 

Cutting corners on Spotted Cow?

 

Maybe that's part of your joke, but I'm not getting it so I'll further explain.

Spotted Cow was originally made with corn. They changed the recipe a few years ago (I think it's been a couple of years now) to be all-malt. I never saw an announcement from New Glarus that they had changed it, but wondered if something was up when I'd had a bottle and it didn't taste the same--I liked the old recipe better.

After the change, the marketing and story behind the beer changed as well.

 

Yes! It used to be sold/described as a cream ale. Then a few years ago it suddenly changed to a farmhouse ale. I looked but never could find an explanation for this.

 

From what I read they changed the style description to reflect the style guidlines because farmhouse was unfiltered whereas cream ales are filtered.

 

This article talks about it a little (both the style change and move away from corn). Funny, in 2008 it was given as an example of the cream ale style.

 

Great article, thanks for the link.