When I stay at the Hilton Garden Inn near O'Hare Airport, I like to go down and have a beer or two at the bar served by Jim, the bartender extraordinaire at the hotel. He's turned me on to a number of places to eat over the years and a couple years ago he was telling me about a place not far from the hotel that served great pizza. "The great thing about this place is that they'll deliver up to about 3 a.m.," Jim told me one time. He said that he would sometime order a pizza for delivery just before his shift was over so he could take it home to eat. He said so many good things about Little Angelo's Pizza in Rosemont that I had to go give it a try earlier this summer.
Angelo Pegni was a franchisee of Rosati's Pizza, a chain of Chicago-style pizza places with over 200 locations across the nation. I was told Pegni got into a tiff with the suburban-Chicago based chain and quit his franchise agreement. He opened Little Angelo's Pizza in the same spot where he had the Rosati's a few years back.
Little Angelo's is located in a strip mall at the corner of Touhy and Mannheim in Rosemont. (see map) There was a small patio out in front of the place and the dining area inside was nice, but very small. I would say that it didn't sit much more than 26 to 30 people. They had high-top and low-top wooden tables in the dining area. 60's-era rock music was playing in the background.
It's counter service at Little Angelo's and Angelo Penni, himself, took my order at the counter. A short man with sort of a gruff personality, Angelo asked if I wanted thin crust, double crust, Chicago pan-style, or stuffed pizza. I got a thin crust pizza and a couple of domestic beers. In addition to pizza at Little Angelo's, they also have pasta dishes such as spaghetti, mostaccioli, lasagna, and chicken parm and their menu that hangs on the wall behind the counter.
I got my standard sausage, pepperoni and mushroom pizza. The toppings along with the mozzarella cheese and a sweet tomato sauce were thick across the top of the thin crust pizza. The 12" pizza was expensive - over $20 bucks, but it would have easily fed two, and possibly, three people. The cheese was so thick on top of the pizza that on a couple of bites everything slid off the crust. But it was good - very good. There were large chunks of sausage, the mushrooms appeared to be fresh, and the pepperoni slices were thick, spicy and somewhat salty. It was a very good pizza. I like a pizza with a load of toppings and cheese on it. The pizza at Little Angelo's did not disappoint.
I wasn't able to eat the whole thing, so I went to get a to-go box at the counter to take half of the pizza back to my room. Angelo asked me, "So, what did you think?"
I told him it was a very good pizza. And that was the same thing I said to Jim when I got back to the hotel. "Didn't I tell you," he said to me. "It's excellent pizza." I had half of the pizza in the box and I got to thinking when would I have time to eat it. I told Jim that I had half a sausage, pepperoni and mushroom pizza in the box and asked if he wanted the leftovers. "Are you sure," he asked. He took it from me and said he'd share with the staff.
Little Angelo's was all that I was told it would be. It was a very good thin-crust pizza that was loaded with mozzarella cheese and fresh toppings. The dining room at Little Angelo's is small, but tidy, and there's only counter service and no wait staff at the small pizzeria. About the only thing that gave me pause about the place was that the pizza was very expensive. A small three-topping pizza with a couple of domestic beers came to over $30 bucks. But, other than that I didn't have much of any other problems with my pizza at Little Angelo's.
Lied about being able to take a voucher. Do not order from them.
Posted by: Nicholad Angelo | January 21, 2019 at 12:24 AM