Pizza Factory - Baldwyn, Mississippi

Pizza Factory, located on old 45 in Baldwyn, Mississippi, has been slinging a mighty fine deep dish pizza pie for 40 years. (There’s a West coast chain with the same name, but it has no connection.) Pizza factory is a local place, locally owned and operated, and they are known for their deep dish pies and calzones, which they call smokestacks. It is a local institution and it is almost always hopping.

Usually, I don’t care for deep dish pizzas, but the Pizza Factory offering is an exception. It is exceptional. See, the problem with deep dish is that the crust dominates. They’re too bready, and I have little to no interest in stuffing myself with empty carbohydrates. The Pizza Factory crust is somehow light and crisp, and yet somehow robust enough to support a heap of toppings, all those glorious toppings; the toppings take center stage and the crust fades into the background as a mere delivery vehicle for sausage and pepperoni and onions and olives and heaps of cheese.

Pictured above is the deluxe pizza, the everything on it specialty pie they make, which is all I’ve ever gotten there because it’s so good. It’s so loaded down with toppings that when you take a slice a certain amount of them just roll off, so you get to scoop all that good stuff up with a spoon after you’ve finished the slice. It’s entirely decadent.

Combine that with a great salad bar, and this is where I’m going to scratch my pizza and salad itch, which starts gnawing at me with some regluarity. This place and Vanelli’s in Tupelo are the only two pizzerias worth checking out in North Mississippi.