Tavern-style pizza is a type of

pizza Pizza is an Italian cuisine, Italian, specifically Neapolitan cuisine, Neapolitan, dish typically consisting of a flat base of Leavening agent, leavened wheat-based dough topped with tomato, cheese, and other ingredients, baked at a high t ...

that has both a thin crust firm enough to have a noticeable crunch and slices cut into squares, as opposed to wedges.

Characteristics

Although regional styles can vary, tavern-style pizza across the

Midwestern United States The Midwestern United States (also referred to as the Midwest, the Heartland or the American Midwest) is one of the four census regions defined by the United States Census Bureau. It occupies the northern central part of the United States. It ...

typically have a crispy and thin crust. In Milwaukee, this is referred to as a "cracker" crust; crusts in Minnesota tend to be a bit softer. Unlike hand-tossed pizzas common on the east coast of the United States or in Italy, the dough is rolled out before baking. Prior to cooking, the crust is topped with a seasoned tomato sauce, cheese, and toppings like sausage. Immediately prior to service, the pizzas are cut into squares instead of the classic triangle.

Regional varieties

History

Purpose

The name "tavern-style" comes from how the pizzas were originally served in taverns. According to at least one origin story, the pizza tempted customers into lingering at the establishment, at which point they would be more likely to order more alcohol. Other bars might serve peanuts or other salty snacks for the same purpose. According to one narrative, the pizza's signature square slices were created so that a customer could hold that in one hand and a beer in the other. Another theory is that they made it possible for taverns without plates to instead set the pizza on napkins.

Creation

Claims to originating the style in the 1930s and 1940s have come from residents of

Milwaukee Milwaukee is the List of cities in Wisconsin, most populous city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. Located on the western shore of Lake Michigan, it is the List of United States cities by population, 31st-most populous city in the United States ...

and of

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

. Milwaukee's claim dates to a Third Ward restaurant named the Caradaro Club, which opened in 1945. Their idea was to combine Sicilian pizza's rectangle slices with

Neapolitan pizza Neapolitan pizza (; ) is the version of the round pizza typically prepared in the Italian city of Naples and characterised by a soft, thin dough with high edges. The tomatoes are traditionally either San Marzano tomatoes or , which grow on t ...

's thin crust. Sources variously date Chicago's claim to the 1930s or between 1946 and 1950, when a number of restaurants started making recognizably tavern-style pizza. If the latter, one contender includes Vito's Tavern, then located at the intersection of 79th and Carpenter Avenue in Chicago. They claim to have served their first tavern pizza in 1946 after one of their owners got the idea while serving in the military. Another is the Home Run Inn in South Lawndale, which opened in 1947. Chicago reporter Monica Eng has identified at least four additional restaurants which could have originated the style.

Sales

Tavern-style pizza is commonly found in restaurants across much of the

. Its popularity widened across the United States in the 2020s. The expansion included tavern-style releases from the US restaurant chains

Pizza Hut Pizza Hut, LLC is an American multinational pizza restaurant chain and international franchise founded in 1958 in Wichita, Kansas, by brothers Dan and Frank Carney. The chain, headquartered in Plano, Texas, operates 19,866 restaurants worldw ...

and

Domino's Domino's Pizza, Inc., commonly referred to as Domino's, is an American multinational pizza restaurant chain founded in 1960 and led by CEO Russell Weiner. The corporation is Delaware-domiciled and headquartered at the Domino's Farms office p ...

, in addition to the

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frozen pizza Pizza is an Italian, specifically Neapolitan, dish typically consisting of a flat base of leavened wheat-based dough topped with tomato, cheese, and other ingredients, baked at a high temperature, traditionally in a wood-fired oven. The ...

brand. A number of sources have said that tavern-style pizza outsells

deep-dish pizza Chicago-style pizza is pizza prepared according to one of several styles developed in Chicago. It can refer to both the well-known deep-dish or stuffed pizzas and the lesser-known thin-crust "tavern-style" pizzas. The pan used to bake deep-dis ...

in Chicago. According to 2013

Grubhub Grubhub Inc. (stylized in all caps) is an American online and mobile prepared food ordering and delivery platform based in Chicago, Illinois. Founded in 2004, it was a subsidiary of the Dutch company Just Eat Takeaway since 2021. In 2024, Wond ...

data and the company Chicago Pizza Tours, thin-crust pizza outsells the more widely known deep-dish style among locals, with GrubHub stating that deep-dish comprises only 9% of its pizza deliveries. In response, Technomics food industry researcher Darren Tristano questioned GrubHub's conclusion on the basis of the delivery service's user demographics, saying that its younger users cannot afford deep-dish pizza, while

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noted that the data would not include information on two particular chains specializing in the style (though with just 20 restaurants in the city of 2.7million) that are not on GrubHub. In 2020

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-affected data, Yelp also found that thin-crust pizza was more popular in Chicago. However, ''

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'' magazine spoke to multiple Chicago pizzerias in 2024 whose sales of the two styles of pizza were evenly split.