LINCOLN SQUARE — We had to ask.
"What's a Chicago guy doing serving up New York-style pizza with the Mets in town?"
"I don't want to be a traitor ... but I think New York style is better," Jimmy Kang answered sheepishly.
Kang, who grew up in suburban Hoffman Estates, opened his eponymous Jimmy's Pizza Cafe in 2011 at the "cursed corner" of Lincoln and Foster well before a Cubs-Mets playoff series was a glimmer in anyone's mind.
But with the North Siders down three games to none against the guys from the Big Apple, is Kang taking any flak from Cubs Nation about playing for the other team?
"There's been no blowback," he said. "Everyone who comes in is pretty peaceful."
He admitted that business was slow in the early days, when customers were still figuring Jimmy's out.
"When we first opened, people would come in and say, 'Oh you don't have deep dish,'" Kang recalled.
Thanks to positive word of mouth and some good press, response picked up.
"We're slammed," Kang said.
Besides, Kang's allegiance to New York pies has nothing to do with one city versus another.
For as long as he can remember, Kang has been into bread baking and crust is far more crucial to New York pizza than Chicago deep dish (a style Kang dismissed as "tourist pizza").
"For me, it was always about the crust. You start with flour, salt and yeast. It's almost like a pet, the way you nurture it," he said. "These simple ingredients make something so awesome."
As a kid, Kang was a fan of the type of hand-tossed pizza served up at Garibaldi's Italian Eatery, and a family vacation to New York when he was 10 or 12 sealed the deal.
His reaction to a classic New York slice: love at first bite.
Kang's take on the style is very much his own and was developed through old-fashioned trial and error, even though he earned his culinary chops in the most new-fangled of ways — by watching copious hours of Food Network programming.
"I wanted to go to cooking school but my parents said, 'No. You're going to be a doctor,'" he said.
After a five-year detour as a model and actor in Korea — take that, mom and dad — Kang returned to Chicago in 2009 and with time on his hands he began perfecting his dough.
Get Kang talking about his pizzas and his passion is evident, from his pride in using "top-tier" cheese to the "cup" pepperoni he buys.
"There's no filler in our pepperoni. They cup up and carmelize and hold the grease," he said. "It's salty goodness."
His beignets — a touch of New Orleans that seems at odds with the pizza theme — are actually a nod to New York joints' zeppole, fried puffs made from leftover dough.
"Our beignets blow them out of the water," said Kang, adding that he sells them by the hundreds during Mardi Gras.
He would also put his white pie up against anything made in New York.
"Theirs is just crust, olive oil, garlic and cheese. We actually made a white sauce," he said. "It's so much better."
Long Island native Brian Morse, now a long-time Chicago resident, confirmed that Jimmy's is the real deal, and then some.
"It's my pizza place when I'm in the mood for one delicious slice," he said.
On a recent afternoon, Morse could be found tucking into a slice of spinach-artichoke, a style he said old school New Yorker's "wouldn't recognize."
"I think what's different is it's artsy," he said. "[Kang] has great toppings."
A frequent customer since 2011, Morse said he's been rooting for Jimmy's from Day One.
"I'm so happy a small and self-run business is making it," he said.
Speaking of rooting, who's Kang backing: Cubs or Mets?
"Cubs," he said. "I'm not a traitor in that."
Jimmy's, 5159 N. Lincoln Ave., has perfected New York-style pizza. [All photos DNAinfo/Patty Wetli]
Jimmy's pepperoni looks smaller because it "cups," forming what Serious Eats called a "grease chalice."
Jimmy Kang declared his version of the white pizza "much better" than New York's.
Bacon-wrapped garlic knots are another specialty at Jimmy's.
Don't want to jinx the Cubs by ordering New York pizza? Get the beignets.
The decor at Jimmy's pays a nod to New York.
