Anthony Bourdain Called Chicago Deep Dish Pizza 'An Abomination'

While deep dish pizza may be one of the Windy City's most famous foods, not everyone's a fan. In one episode of the Netflix series "Emily in Paris," one character compares it to a cement quiche (Emily herself takes a swipe at Lou Malnati's, and the pizza chain was predictably furious), while a Pizza Hut commercial for tavern pizza (Chicago's other regional style) implies that deep dish pizza is something the city saves for tourists. Also on the list of deep dish haters was one of America's premier foodies: globetrotting gourmet Anthony Bourdain.

It wasn't that Bourdain was too much of an epicure to enjoy fast food. He was famously fond of In-N-Out Burger, while he also admitted to a sneaking fondness for Popeye's mac and cheese, a comfort food classic Bourdain couldn't get enough of. He also felt that Chicago-style hot dogs were the best in America, and he found Italian beef sandwiches to be pretty amazing, too.

Deep dish pizza, however, he called "an abomination." As he told DNAinfo Chicago in a 2015 interview: "There are so many awesome things here, I don't know why that should be featured. It's leading with your weakness." He also once told Thrillist, "One of the things I know is that no Chicagoans I know eat that s***."

Anthony Bourdain had no fondness for deep dish, but that doesn't mean he dismissed all Chicago pizzerias. He really liked Neapolitan-style thin crust and praised the pizza served at Wicker Park's Piece Brewery and Pizzeria. Globetrotting gourmet that he was, Bourdain also ate pizza in Italy, and he greatly enjoyed a simple Margherita-style pie from Naples' Pizzeria Pellone. Perhaps his favorite pizza of all, however, came from a lot closer to home.

Bourdain lived in Manhattan, and when he didn't want to venture too far, he ordered the white clam pizza at Lombardi's. That restaurant, which bills itself as America's first pizzeria, only sells whole pies, though. So for the classic New York slice, dripping grease and all, he told The Guardian that DiFara's in Brooklyn offered "the best of the best." DiFara's slices don't come cheap — $6 at the time of writing, plus a buck or two more for each topping — but Bourdain's endorsement is, as they say in MasterCard commercials, priceless.