The Motor City has been cranking out a unique style of pizza for over seventy years. The local, rectangular pies were virtually unknown outside of Detroit until about a decade ago when a master pizzaiolo introduced the world to the unique pizza style, and since then Detroit pizza has spread across the country from gourmet pizzerias to national chains.
What Is Detroit-Style Pizza?
(Photo Credit: Sarah Stierch via flickr)
Detroit-style pizza is derived from a Sicilian flatbread recipe, baked in a pan. In this regard, it's related to New York Sicilian and Grandma-style pies. But it’s also similar to the style of pan pizza created by Burt Katz in Chicago since both Detroit squares and Katz’s deep dish have a caramelized crust.
The original Detroit square was based on a Sicilian recipe and then adapted by the creators. Today, the pies are baked in steel pans, and to create the caramelized crust, the pans are greased and oiled before the dough is added. The exterior essentially fries in the oven, while the rest of the pie remains light and fluffy. Most Detroit pies are made with bread flour giving it a unique consistency among pizzas.
The pans are shallow, but the pies are sometimes called deep dish. However, the inch-or-so-deep pies are thinner than Chicago's deep-dish pizza. The pans themselves resemble shallow trays used in the auto industry to keep track of small parts and tools, and the earliest pans may very well have been intended for auto repair work.
Typically, the pies are topped with both mozzarella and "brick" cheese, a Wisconsin-made cheese processed in a similar style as cheddar. The inclusion of Brick cheese is considered an important hallmark of the style.
The pies are sometimes known as "red tops" because often the sauce is placed over the cheese and other toppings rather than underneath it. The result is that the sauce continues to concentrate and intensify the tomato flavors in the oven. Not all Detroit-style pies bury their sauce.
Pizza Innovation
Buddy’s first opened as a speakeasy in the 1930s. It was just a bar and didn't have any food. However, alcohol sales alone weren’t enough to pay the bills, especially after the end of Prohibition. Then Gus Guerra bought into the bar after the war along with his brothers. Looking to increase his profits, they decided to open a kitchen. Many of the other bars in the area had cornered the market on deep-fried food like fish and chips, so Guerra chose to sell pizza. Pizza was finally entering mainstream American culture at the time. In 1946, Buddy’s Rendezvous, as the bar was renamed, began selling a special new type of pizza.
Guerra is credited with introducing Detroit squares to the world, but like so many other pizza stories, he didn't develop the actual recipe. There are at least two women who helped Guerra launch the new style. Guerra's mother, a Sicilian-born immigrant, is said to have provided the base recipe for Sicilian pizza and then waitress Concetta Picinato is credited with developing the recipe into a crusty, pan pizza.
A few years later, in 1953, Guerra left Buddy’s behind and opened a new restaurant, Cloverleaf Bar. Here Guerra made famous the "Motor City Square," but it was the same recipe Guerra began selling in 1946 at Buddy’s.
Soon after, other competitors followed, like Loui's Pizza, founded by Louis Tourtois, and Luigi's, founded in 1953. Both pizzerias also sold other Italian American staples like spaghetti.
Detroit-Style Pizza Becomes A Chain
Eugene Jetts and his brother John founded Jet's Pizza in 1978 as Jetts Party Shoppe & Pizzeria. The location had originally been a party store the Jetts converted to sell pies. The pizza proved more popular than the party supplies, and by 1986 they had dropped the party in favor of Jet's Pizza, just in time for a second location.
Jet's invented the term and shape known as 8-corner pizza, a pie celebrating the crispy corners by adding more. In the 1990s, the Jetts created a franchise system with their cousins the Galloways. Today, there are more than 400 Jet Pizza pizzerias in twenty states serving up Detroit-style pies.
Another Detroit-area pizzeria is Little Caesars, now the third-largest pizza chain in the United States. Founded in 1959 by husband-and-wife team Mike and Mary Illitch, the first shop opened in Garden City, Michigan as Little Ceasar's Pizza Treat. However, despite starting out in the Detroit area, the chain didn't add pan-style pies until 2013.
The chain did grow rapidly though. By 1962, Little Caesar's had its first franchise location opening in Warren, Michigan, and by 1969 there were more than fifty restaurants. Pizza was a rapidly growing market in the United States, and chains like Pizza Hut and Domino's were also growing rapidly at that time. Pizza Hut introduced a "Detroit-style" pan pizza in 2022.
Detroit-Style Pizza Goes National
(Photo Credit: Dale Cruse via flickr)
Detroit-style pizza had remained a mostly regional dish through the 20th century, but that all changed in 2012. Although Shawn Randazzo didn’t invent Detroit-style squares, he might have perfected them. Randazzo is also credited with coining the term “Detroit-style” pizza, giving the regional food a name with national recognition. It's hard to imagine a pizza known only in Motor City as anything else, but before he came along, it was mostly known simply as a square pizza slice.
2012 Randazzo made a fateful decision that changed the course of pizza history. He entered a Detroit-style pie at the International Pizza Expo held in Las Vegas, a conference of restaurant owners, suppliers, and pizza makers. His squared-off pie with crispy crust earned him the title of World Champion Pizza Maker igniting a craving for the square slices.
Randazzo had started his career delivering pies at the famous Cloverleaf way back in 1995, but after winning World Champion Pizza Maker, he finally launched his own shop, Detroit Style Pizza Company, with his mother. In addition to pizza, the company sells special steel pizza pans and supplies for making the perfect Detroit-style slice.
In 2019, Randazzo also launched Palazzo di Pizza, an "authentic" Detroit-style pizzeria with his cousin. His goal was to displace the many chain pizzerias proliferating in the Detroit metro area and building up an appreciation for “authentic” Detroit-style pies. Unfortunately, in December of 2020, Randazzo died of brain cancer.
Squares Go Mainstream
Randazzo's win in Las Vegas set the pizza world on fire. The square slice suddenly had a national audience. Detroit-style slice joints began popping up in other cities like Chicago and New York, challenging other better-known styles. Some of these pizzerias like Lions and Tigers and Squares and Emmy Squared, both in New York, have gone on to achieve acclaim selling Motor City Squares.
Ian MacAllen
Ian MacAllen is America Domani's Senior Correspondent and the author of Red Sauce: How Italian Food Became American. He is a writer, editor, and graphic designer living in Brooklyn. Connect with him at IanMacAllen.com or on Twitter @IanMacAllen.