Mid-Michigan Dining

• 23703 Greenfield Road
• Southfield, MI 48705
• (248) 552-7272
• Website
• Menu

The Pizza Papalis in Southfield on Greenfield Road

If you’re from the Detroit area, you already know all you need to know about the Metro Detroit chain.  Being from Chicago, I hold all pizzas that claim to be “Chicago Style” to a very high standard. 

There are a number of locations in the Detroit area.  The closest one to our job site was the Southfield location on Greenfield Road.  It’s located in a small strip mall with a Kroger and a CVS.  I didn’t go inside, but from the parking lot, it looked to be a pretty large store with plenty of seating. 

We had three pizzas delivered.  One was plain cheese for the vegetarians on the crew.  One was chicken and one was pepperoni.  We also had some garlic bread and bread sticks.

I grabbed a slice of the cheese and a slice of the pepperoni as well as a couple pieces of garlic bread.  I must have looked like a hog.  Everyone else was cutting a slice in half.  Chicago style pizza is too much for Detroit stomach’s I guess.  I was hungry and two slices of the deep dish pizza is just about right for me.

Pizza Papalis passed the visual test.  It looked like Chicago pizza.  I went with the knife and fork method for the first few bites which is an absolute must for Chicago style pizza.  The dough is so full of fat and so flaky, you really can’t pick it up and not have it fall apart.  I could have got away with it with this slice, but not for long.  I was pleasantly surprised that the crust was crumbling in my hands.  It was no Lou Malnati’s, but one of the best crusts I’ve seen outside of the Windy City.

Pizza Papalis on Greenfield between 9 Mile and 10 Mile Roads in Southfield.

I ate the pepperoni first and man was it delicious.  There was a lot of pepperoni and you could taste a piece of the spicy meat in every bite.  Again, another great sign of a true Chicago style pizza.  I could have eaten (or at least tried to eat) a whole one of these pizzas.  It was soooooo good.  The pepperoni flavor was so strong, I couldn’t even get a good taste of the sauce.  I didn’t need to.    I don’t care if they cheated on the sauce, this pizza was so good on it’s own.

The second piece I had was the cheese.  I grabbed this slice so I could really get a good taste of the flavor of the pizza. The sauce wasn’t as fresh and possibly not a cold sauce, but it was still really good.  Not everyone has to do everything exactly like Lou’s, Geno’s, or Giordano’s.

The garlic bread was garlic bread.  It was pretty standard  and didn’t look to be something made fresh in the store.

Pizza Papalis really lived up to all the hype I had been hearing.  My co-workers were going on and on about how much of a treat it is to get a pizza from Pizza Papalis.  Everyone really likes the pizza….they just can’t eat too much in one sitting.  Easily, Pizza Papalis is the best Chicago style pizza I’ve had outside of Chicago.  I’m really looking forward to finally getting to the Tavern in Greektown!