Kennyz wrote:Far from it, I imagine. Hungry stated his opinion and provided plenty of detail to explain how he arrived at it. It's the kind of post that I imagine even the most ardent Burt's supporter would respect.

Kenny,

Agree completely, studied reasoned opinions, pro, con and beyond are welcomed and encouraged.

Here is my favorite example of going against the current, TonyC's my last abominable meal @ LTH

Enjoy,
Gary

Hi,

The one time I brought my family, the pizza was disappointing. Every pizza before and since, I have been very happy. Why there was an off night when I brought my family is just plain bad luck. They have never returned with me, though they cheerfully eat the leftovers.

Regards,

Helpful hint: if you try to call to order a pizza and there is no answer, don't bother going. We went Sunday night after trying to call but only getting a busy signal. Burt was pissed to see us and told us it would be 2.5-3 hours before we got anything.

Hai Woon Dai was a spectacular second choice.

Cathy2 wrote:Hi,

The one time I brought my family, the pizza was disappointing. Every pizza before and since, I have been very happy. Why there was an off night when I brought my family is just plain bad luck. They have never returned with me, though they cheerfully eat the leftovers.

Regards,

I will visit Burt's again, but this time call ahead and dine in.

hungry i agree with you on the more dough and less sausage than other styles, which is why i usually go for the sausage overload malnati's pie and a pair of bigger pants to accomodate a growing waistline that said, there is an unique, homemade taste to burt's that is really enjoyable

My first post on Burt's commented too that I thought the amount of sausage was a little on the skimpy side. But I found out two things. One, the sausage pieces are on the thick side. Two, the sausage is fairly strong flavored. So what I do is pick the sausage off and cut it into small pieces. Then I take a small piece with every piece I eat. I hadn't thought of ordering double sausage. That's an interesting idea.

Amazingly though, the post by HungryZ actually harks back to this thread title. Yes, size does matter. I prefer the medium, even though I usually order the large to go. The crust really does get a little too thick on the large. The medium is perfect. Unfortunately, for my portion sizes, I get the large to go and then freeze it two slices at a time. The medium is just too small for two pieces to make me a meal. But try the medium next time and I think you'll be surprised with the difference.

Lastly, for me, I don't like too much sauce. I think the sauce ratio is perfect. But you'll find Burt, if you play by his rules, to be very accommodating. My wife actually prefers even less sauce. When I order pizza for her I ask for it with easy sauce.

Moderators, any chance we could get all the Burt's threads merged, so all the useful information is together in one place?

Katie wrote:Moderators, any chance we could get all the Burt's threads merged, so all the useful information is together in one place?

Katie-

I might be mistaken, but I believe a new thread on Burt's was started because the other one was becoming a bit cluttered. That said, this one has echoes of the other long one that's out there.

Last Burt's pizza that Mr. X and I had was quite good. A large sausage, onion & pepper. Plenty of delicious leftovers, plus a bottle of Buddy Roadhouse's excellent Carolina barbecue sauce, makes me very happy.

-Mary

I had a house full of last minute guests last night. Faced with having to feed them and not feeling like cooking, I ordered a bunch of XL pizzas from Burt's. None of my guests had ever had a Burt's pizza before and they all loved them. I found the XL pizzas much too mushy in the middle and the slices out of balance because of the diameter of the pizza. I love Burt's dearly, but I'll never order anything larger than a medium again. In hindsight, I would have been much happier with twice as many medium pizzas rather than the XLs. The fact that they sat in the car while I had to drive them home before eating didn't help much, either.

I've stated before, although perhaps not in this thread, that, in my opinion, based on years of careful observation, the 14", large size pizza is the optimum size to order.

That being said, Burt recently purchased some additional 18" pans (XXL) and for whatever reason they seem to be producing some exemplary pies. Light, fluffy, beautiful crusts with excellent texture. I have no explanation for this. The new pans are of the exact same construction and character as the existing ones. Nothing else has changed; no new dough recipes or any other factors that could contribute to this difference. So, there ya go.

Buddy

I finally had my first Burt's, with mushrooms, mixed bell peppers and onions. The crust style reminded me of Pequod's, with the burntness and the overall crunchy-spongy texture, but this was better -- largely because it had more sauce, which was really nice. Overall, the flavors tasted understated, in that we were able to add salt and bring out the veggies' taste even more. But I really liked the pizza a lot.

I lol'd when my gf's first comment, as soon as she walked in the door from picking up the pizza, was "that place is not a business!" When she went in to pick it up, Mrs. Burt was tending to all the tables and never made eye contact; my gf had to interrupt her to get and pay for our pizza (which was sitting right in front of her anyway). Then Mrs. Burt disappeared again and never came back. This worked in Mrs. Burt's favor, as my gf did not have a small enough bill or another 20 minutes to wait to get change, so she just set down her unbroken bills and left.

i finally made it over to Burt's last night to try the much-discussed pizza. a buddy of mine (not at all a foodie) met me there. i made all the arrangements and just told him to be on time...i didn't give him much indication about all the protocols of Burt's.

he was on time and the pizza was very good. i sense my expectations were probably too high after reading so much about this place. i loved the toppings and sauce and was somewhat disappointed by the crust, which i thought was too thick and doughy.

but i will go back and try a smaller pizza. my buddy and i ate a whole large (sausage, muchrooms, fresh garlic) by ourselves and a pitcher of beer, and he was fairly thrilled with the whole "pizza nazi" thing, which he was completely surprised by. he kept seeing people coming in and being turned away or told of very long waits, and simply could not wrap his head around it. rather than being turned off by it, as some here seem to be, he appeared to like the place much more because of the perceived exclusivity.

we also had the pleasure of meeting buddy roadhouse, who was very charming and welcoming. (hi buddy!)

all in all, it's quite the interesting experience. all i can say is; listen to the advice that's been given in these threads. order ahead of time (well ahead, if you can), and be on time for your pizza. that's not really all that much to ask, imo.

elakin wrote:oh, and i just wanted to say that a lot of time and thought went into that blog entry, given how passionate many here are about Burt's.

it was my first visit there, so if i got anything wrong in my blog post, please feel free to let me know. i'm open to gentle correction and constructive criticism.

I don't mean to step on any toes but considering you learned about Burt's here and based your expectations on what you read here, it seems a bit "off" to save the meat of your content for your blog. And asking for folks here to report any errors at your blog seems especially out of place.

Just sayin'

=R=

i didn't "save" the content for my blog. i wrote the blog post first and then came in here and hit the high points and linked to it. it didn't occur to me to cut and paste the whole thing, as that i would think that would be pretty long-winded for this medium. i guess i can re-post the whole thing here if that's what's somehow expected. (if it is, i had no idea)

and i wasn't asking for help, i was trying to acknowledge that lots of LTH'ers who might be reading my blog entry are far more knowledgeable about Burt's than i, and that i'm open to hearing their opinions, including negative feedback or even flaming. i'm not an emoticon-user, but it did occur to me that i might place one after the bit you quoted.

perhaps i shouldn't have phrased it as "got anything wrong", which does look like i'm looking for proofreading. that wasn't my intention. i was just saying that i've read the long Burt's thread and am aware of the varied perspectives, and, well...let the bashing of my blog entry begin, i guess.

Made it to Burt's tonight and as always, the pizza was perfect. Jeff was working the room but didn't have a chance to actually talk to Burt. He seems to be in good form though and glad to see the surgery doesn't appear to be slowing him down. We got there early and left before 6, but the place was really filling up by the time we left. Unfortunately, I'm really afraid that after the No Reservations piece hits it will just be impossible to get in there.

elakin wrote:let the bashing of my blog entry begin, i guess.

No one's bashing your blog, which I'm sure is wonderful. What I've brought up here is your use of these forums to promote the blog. Many folks who post here have their own on-line endeavors and have links to those endeavors in their signature lines. What you'll notice, however, is that very few of them (ok, almost none) include specific mentions of their blogs within their actual posts. Following convention, using the content of one's posts here in an attempt to draw traffic to an outside site is generally frowned upon and honestly -- in my personal opinion -- comes off as a somewhat bush-league.

Edit to add: Further discussion here of this essentially unrelated tangent would be disrespectful to Burt & crew. So please, let's either drop it, move it to Site Chat or make it private.

=R=

fair enough, ronnie. i had no idea that mentioning one's recent blog posts apropos to a discussion happening here was frowned upon or bush league. my bad.

it's hard to know the etiquette from one site/board to the next. i apologize if i've offended anyone. i'll go back and edit the offending post in question.

I went to Burt's this past Saturday, figured I would give it a try before the sh!t hits the fan there after Bourdain's show and honestly I didn't read anything about it before I went, I didn't want my judgement to be clouded.

So, we got there about 5:30 on Saturday and didn't know you had to call your pizza in ahead of time. Luckily, they had a space for us, but we were told the pizza would take an hour to bake. So we sat down and ordered some onion rings and a Great Lakes beer, my favorite, and took in the scenery. It really reminded me of sitting in a living room of an older relative, very interesting. We ordered a large pizza with peppers, tomato and sausage and to be 100% honest with everyone, it was the best pizza I've ever had. The pizza was not overpowered with cheese, the sauce was very good, the carmelization of the crust was perfect (Pequod's is my second favorite thick crust) and the peppers were awesome, fresh, not water logged and greased up then put on the pizza. I would definitely recommend going if you haven't been, but go this week.

The Anthony Bourdain TV show has a new (i.e., first run) episode airing next Monday, at least on the East Coast at 9 p.m., featuring a visit to Chicago. I'm not certain if this one will include the visit to Burt's or not.

BTB wrote:The Anthony Bourdain TV show has a new (i.e., first run) episode airing next Monday, at least on the East Coast at 9 p.m., featuring a visit to Chicago. I'm not certain if this one will include the visit to Burt's or not.

You can bet the farm that Burt's will be on that episode!

Regards,

BTB wrote:The Anthony Bourdain TV show has a new (i.e., first run) episode airing next Monday, at least on the East Coast at 9 p.m., featuring a visit to Chicago. I'm not certain if this one will include the visit to Burt's or not.

Here's everything Bourdain consumed for the Chicago episode:
What Tony ate where

i talked so much about my first visit to Burt's last week that my wife decided she wanted to try it and we paid them a visit last night for dinner.

we pre-ordered two 12" pizzas to see if the crust would be crustier on the smaller size pie (it was) and they were fantastic.

but, even more fantastic was the kind, personalized, family-friendly service Sharon and Burt gave to my wife and I and our two young kids. Sharon thoughtfully pulled some pepperoni off of my son's slice before she served it because she heard him say he just wanted plain cheese pizza. we were explaining to him that we didn't order a plain cheese and all of a sudden she was there with a piece of just what he wanted.

they both oohed and aahed over our five-month old daughter, and Henry, our three-year old, had a great time waving and making funny faces at Burt before proclaiming that he "loves this place".

the pizza's really good, but now i think i'm getting what all the fuss is about. it's really nice to go to places that have this personal, homey feel to them. they're a rare breed.

elakin wrote:the pizza's really good, but now i think i'm getting what all the fuss is about. it's really nice to go to places that have this personal, homey feel to them. they're a rare breed.

I have to laugh at the irony. This is the same thing that many people say they hate about Burt's.

BTB wrote:The Anthony Bourdain TV show has a new (i.e., first run) episode airing next Monday, at least on the East Coast at 9 p.m., featuring a visit to Chicago. I'm not certain if this one will include the visit to Burt's or not.

Just checked and it will be on at 9 in Chicago as well.

Are you sure about the time? I saw a travel channel commercial for it tonight and I thought it said 10 pm.

Katie wrote:Are you sure about the time? I saw a travel channel commercial for it tonight and I thought it said 10 pm.

Pretty sure that's 10 ET, 9 CT.

=R=

Does Burt's accept credit cards?

Tammy76 wrote:Does Burt's accept credit cards?

Nope. Cash only.

Burt's newbies may want to check out the "website" created by GWiv and reminded gently but loudly to CALL AHEAD and BE ON TIME.

Think of it like going to somebody's grandpa's house for pizza - his house, his rules, everybody eats good pizza and goes home happy.

ronnie_suburban wrote:

Katie wrote:Are you sure about the time? I saw a travel channel commercial for it tonight and I thought it said 10 pm.

Pretty sure that's 10 ET, 9 CT.

=R=

The show is on at 9:00 pm CST, with a repeat showing at 10:00 p.m.