Best Deep Dish Pizza in San Francisco (and Bay Area)
Don't go to San Francisco expecting to find a bagel anywhere. I've looked for years, high and low, and never found a decent bagel; not like in New York, where the most amazing, mouth watering bagels can be found anywhere. The same is true for a good Chicago-style deep dish pizza. I'm not sure why it has to be like this, is it the fog? Is it the hippies that make it impossible for anyone in the Bay Area to make a pizza or bagel? What?
Fortunately, unlike bagels which will never be up to par in San Francisco, there are two restaurants in the Bay Area where you can go to eat a really good deep dish pizza. Both are different in decor and recipe, so it's a little difficult to say which the best is. It is easy, though to enjoy yourself at either place to the very fullest.
Both Zachary's Pizza and Little Star Pizza offer vegetarian and vegan options as well as more meat than any living human being could ever want to consume in one sitting. Both places also take about 20 minutes to make your pizza from scratch, so if you're not planning on filling up on beer, I suggest you order a light salad while you’re waiting - or call ahead. Zachary's Pizza locations are all in the East Bay, which Little Star's are in SF, so no matter what side of the bridge you're on you'll be able to find a good pizza fairly easily.
I've been going to Zachary's Pizza for the past year at its location in North Oakland partially because my friend works there and partially because the pizza is to die for. The walls of Zachary's are littered with tacky pizza painting and the millions of awards they've won over the past 10 years or so throughout the bay. I've never had anything there except the vegetarian deep dish - which comes with corn and broccoli. Zachary's is a family restaurant, so expect the floor to be caked with little bits of food and a baby at every table. Also expect lots of Raiders and A's fans at every table.
Little Star's deep dish pizza may not have had as many veggies in their pizza, but the crust was by far better. It was a rich, buttery corn meal crust - the most perfectly unhealthy crust in the world. The Little Star location that I went to was in the Mission, and therefore very hip. No sweaty old baseball caps and babies here. Black trousers grey v-necks, and chic black hair - I'm not talking about the waitstaff. The waitstaff, like many pizza joints consisted of daydreamy college freshman who really didn't care good service. Lots of bracelets and stony eyelids.
My all time favorite place to eat pizza in the whole world is Golden Boy Pizza in Northbeach even though the place is tiny, crowded, and filled with stinky death metal heads. They serve thin crust pizza only, and my favorite is the garlic clam. The boys that work at Golden Boy are beautiful Italian gods in their own rite. But if you're looking for a nearby pizza joint with a reputation for excellence and Chi-town style deep dishes, check out Little Star or Zackary's.
