Search for the best deep dish pizza in Chicago and you will start a fight before the first result loads: Lou Malnati's loyalists, Pequod's caramelized-crust partisans, a dozen forum threads insisting the real hometown answer is tavern-style thin anyway. New York watches this argument with a folded slice in hand and a smirk. Here is the twist — you can eat both sides of the debate without leaving NYC, in one walkable evening. This crawl lines up a Chicago-style tavern pie in the West Village, an 850-degree coal-oven classic four minutes down the block, and a wood-fired Brooklyn legend as the tiebreaker.
Before you commit to a side, text Karpo and get tonight's shortest waits, a live walking route between every stop, and a backup pie ready if a line blows up your timing.
The route at a glance
This is an ordered route, not a list. Stop one opens at 5:00 PM on weeknights, so start on Grove Street the minute the doors unlock, walk four minutes over to Bleecker for stop two around 6:30, then ride the F train from West 4th Street to Carroll Street for the Brooklyn finale — about twenty-five minutes door to door. Do it Wednesday or Thursday: the tiebreaker is closed on Tuesdays, and weekend lines distort every wait time in this plan. Budget five hours total, order to share at every stop, and remember the goal. You are not hunting the best deep dish pizza in Chicago tonight; you are testing whether New York can out-argue it.
Stop 1: Emmett's on Grove — Chicago plays away, 5:00 PM
Emmett Burke's West Village supper club at 39 Grove Street is where Chicago's other pizza lives. Not the deep dish of postcard fame — the thin, crisp tavern-style pie Chicagoans actually order on a Friday night. Pies here come party-cut into small squares meant for sharing, and the warm, wood-and-tile room does a convincing midwestern-tavern impression that makes the whole exercise feel imported. The signature Hot Poppy — pepperoni, jalapeño, onion, and a drizzle of paprika ranch — is the order, plus whatever second pie the table can agree on.
Two logistics notes regulars lean on. First, grab the 5:00 PM opening slot on Resy; the small room fills quickly, and walk-ins after 6:00 usually wait. Second, if what you are actually craving is the deep dish itself, Burke's original Emmett's on MacDougal Street in SoHo is the sibling that bakes it — a worthy detour on another night. Doors on Grove open at 5:00 PM Tuesday through Friday and 4:00 PM on weekends. Hold this stop to about seventy-five minutes, then start walking.
Stop 2: John's of Bleecker Street — New York answers, 6:30 PM
The walk is the easiest leg of the night: about 0.2 miles and four minutes, down Grove and onto Bleecker Street to the storefront at number 278 that has been making the New York case since 1929. John's bakes coal-fired pies in an oven running around 850 degrees, blistering thin, tomato-forward crusts in minutes — the tomato-pie style the Village perfected long before a deep pan showed up anywhere. Know the house rules before you sit: no slices, ever. Whole pies only, plus calzones, and the line moves fast partly because of it. The place ran cash-only until 2016; it takes cards now, but the carved-up wooden booths and no-nonsense pace have not changed.
Order the plain pie first — a bare, charred crust is the fairest head-to-head against the squares you just left behind. If the wait stretches past twenty minutes, put your name in and loop the block; Father Demo Square is steps away and the people-watching is free.
Stop 3: Lucali — the Brooklyn tiebreaker, 8:00 PM
From West 4th Street, the F train runs straight to Carroll Street in roughly twenty minutes; Lucali sits a seven-minute walk from the station at 575 Henry Street, a converted storefront with only about thirty seats. Mark Iacono's wood-fired thin crust is the pie that regularly tops New York rankings, and the menu is exactly two items long: pizza and calzones, with a short topping list that changes with the night. This is the stop that demands strategy. There are no reservations — the host starts taking names at the door around 4:00 PM, a full hour before the 5:00 opening, and the evening's list can fill before most people leave work.
The crawl-tested move: send one person to Henry Street at 4:00 to put a name down for a late seating while the rest of the group starts in Manhattan. Two more house rules matter — it is cash only, and it is BYOB, so stop at a wine shop near Court Street before you get in line. Closed Tuesdays, open 5:00 to 11:00 the rest of the week. When the pie finally lands, whole basil leaves melted into fresh mozzarella, the thin-crust argument mostly finishes itself.
The verdict: deep dish or thin crust?
Here is the honest scorecard. The best deep dish pizza in Chicago is a destination meal — an hour in a booth with a fork, a knife, and a casserole-deep pie that does not travel and does not share its evening with anything else. Thin crust is a route. In one night, New York let you eat Chicago's own tavern style, a 1929 coal-oven original, and the wood-fired pie that tops national lists — on foot and one subway ride. Deep dish wins a sit-down; New York wins a crawl. Pick your side accordingly, and accept that the correct answer changes with your appetite.
Practical notes
Transit: start near the Christopher Street 1 stop or West 4th Street A/B/C/D/E/F/M hub; the F runs directly from West 4th to Carroll Street for the Brooklyn leg. Payment: Lucali is cash only, with the nearest ATMs along Court Street; John's of Bleecker takes cards these days, and Emmett's on Grove is fully card-friendly. Reservations: only Emmett's on Grove books ahead, via Resy, and the 5:00 PM slot is the one to grab — John's and Lucali are walk-in only. Timing: go Wednesday or Thursday, since Lucali closes on Tuesdays and weekend waits at John's can stretch toward an hour. Lucali's waitlist opens around 4:00 PM and later arrivals often face two-hour waits. Dress for the weather — two of your three waits happen on the sidewalk — and pace yourself: one shared pie per stop is plenty until Brooklyn.
Tags: #NYCPizza #DeepDishPizza #ThinCrust #PizzaCrawl #WestVillage #CarrollGardens #ChicagoPizza #TavernStylePizza #CoalOvenPizza #BrooklynPizza #NYCFoodie #PizzaNight #GreenwichVillage
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Ask Karpo first
Want to know which line is actually moving tonight, when the waitlist really opens, and whether the F train is running your way? Ask Karpo for live wait updates on all three pizzerias, a timed crawl plan for your group size, and a walking route through the West Village and Carroll Gardens before you head out.
