Pizza

I don’t know about you, but I am pretty sick of Texas barbecue.

That might be blasphemy for a Republican, but it’s true.

There are two things I like about Barack Obama. First, he is a White Sox fan, and he is not likely to jump on a Cubs bandwagon just to please the yuppies on the North Side of Chicago.

Second — and this is just a hope — his arrival in D.C. may inspire some Chicago pizzerias to move here to the nation’s capital.

Washington has the worst pizza in the world. There are no good family pizzerias anywhere near Capitol Hill (where I live). Sure, you can find a chain like Armands or Pizzeria Uno, but they have all the charm of the local Domino’s (which is the worst pizza in the world). I keep hearing about Two Amys, but they don’t deliver to the Hill, so they don’t count.

Chicago has the best pizza in the world. By comparison, New York’s pizza is cardboard.

My favorite Chicago pizza is Aurelio’s. It is a South Side pizza place owned by folks from my hometown. It is pizza with character, great crust, great sauce, fresh ingredients. Outstanding.

Lou Malnotti’s is probably the best thick-crust pizza in the city (although some would make the argument for Gino’s East, which is certainly an outstanding pizza, and better than anything on the East Coast. Others would make the argument for Giordano’s, which I find very tasty, but very filling).

Chicago pizza, like Chicago’s people, is authentic. It is made not by a factory, but by a guy who knows how to make a good pizza, and who probably learned it from his mother.

Chicago pizzerias are also places where you go with a group after a softball game. You drink some beers and eat some pizza. Nothing too fancy. Just good pizza and good beer. Why is that so complicated? But you can’t anything like that in this town.

Sure, there is Matchbox, which just opened on the Hill, but that is far too fancy for the softball crowd, and you can’t find a place to sit to save your life.

Here’s to hoping that the Obama administration brings with it some good pizza places. God knows, this town needs it.

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