You can’t get Buffalo-style pizza everywhere. It’s not like the very popular New York-style of pizza that you can find just about anywhere. You can find Buffalo-style pizza in Las Vegas, though.
Buffalo-style pizza is a blend of its location. Buffalo, New York, is located just about halfway between New York City and Chicago, and it’s the two styles of pizzas from these two areas that Buffalo-style pizza draws from. In NYC, you have the thinner NY-style pies. In Chicago, it’s all about deep-dish pizza. Buffalo-style pizza isn’t as thick as deep-dish Chicago style, but it’s not nearly as thin as a New York-style pizza. It’s somewhere in the middle.
Buffalo-style pizza is often compared to Detroit-style pizza, which is sort of a thinner version of a typical Sicilian pizza.
Sticking with the dough for a moment, its thickness doesn’t mean that Buffalo-style pizza is overly dense. Most of the time, it’s quite airy and the density doesn’t come from the dough as much as it can come from the larger amount of cheese that a Buffalo-style pizza can have. If you’re worried that a Buffalo-style pizza looks too thick and dense, you’ll be pleasantly surprised how light it is when you bite in.
The crust can be considered buttery, although this can vary from place to place. The outer crust of a Buffalo-style pizza may not be that visible, due to the cheese and other toppings spilling over to the edge. While the outer crust is more bread-like in texture, it isn’t always visible.
The fluffiness of the crust can lead to less structure than one might find in a NY-style pizza, and some of the best Buffalo-style pizza makers prefer to slightly overcook their pies.
Cup-and-Char Pepperoni Is Buffalo-Style Pizza
An absolute status symbol of a Buffalo-style pizza is the cup-and-char pepperoni that’s used. Of course, not everyone will go for a pizza with pepperoni on it, but if you’re trying to go with a true Buffalo-style pizza, then you’ll want to go with pepperoni. It better be cup-and-char pepperoni, too.
Cup-and-char pepperoni is pepperoni that is a little smaller in diameter and thicker than lay-flat pepperoni slices. When cup-and-char pepperoni cooks, the pieces of pepperoni form a rounded-up shape in a cupping fashion. The outer edge of cup-and-char pepperoni will also develop a nice char, providing a great look and added taste. They may look a little burnt, but they won’t be when done right. Cup-and-char pepperoni provides an awesome crispiness on top of a Buffalo-style pizza, packed with flavor.
Buffalo-style pizza can have sauce that is considered to be on the sweeter side of things, but this can vary from pizza shop to pizza shop depending on the ingredients used to make the sauce. A sweeter sauce shouldn’t scare you away from Buffalo-style pizza, though, especially when it works with the richness of the large amount of cheese and savoriness of the cup-and-char pepperoni.
Whether cooked in a circular or rectangular shape, Buffalo-style pizza is often cut into squares. This is fine, but some pies, due to their size, can end up with middle pieces that have no crust on any of the sides. If you’re a crust lover like those of us at Top Vegas Pizza are, make sure you’re first to the pizza in order to grab a piece with crust.
With a larger amount of cheese and cup-and-char pepperoni, Buffalo-style pizza can produce a greasier pizza. Buffalo-style pizza is often best eaten almost immediately after it’s taken out of the oven, as the combination of ingredients and structure of the pizza’s build may not allow for it to hold up as well as other pizzas do. Who wants to wait to eat pizza anyway?
If you’re in Las Vegas and looking for Buffalo-style pizza, we’d recommend hitting up Naked City Pizza. We’re fans and would recommend anyone give it a try, just make sure you get the cup-and-char pepperoni so you can do Buffalo-style pizza the right way.