Did a sweet, soft-spoken cook develop part of the pizza that has been acclaimed as the best in Chicago – thus making it the best Chicago-style deep dish pizza in the world?

Yes! When Alice Mae started in the Pizzeria Uno kitchen, she didn’t like the crust. “It was too hard to push,” she famously stated, “I had to make that crust better.” And she did!

Alice Mae worked as a pizza chef at Pizzeria Uno for seventeen years before joining the Gino’s East family. It was in our kitchen where she improved her original formula, and brought her “secret dough conditioner” into the Gino’s East crust.

The special touch Alice Mae had was evident in her pizzas; she would pat and coax the sauce rather than slapping and splattering. She would slowly and deliberately arrange the pre-portioned sausage instead of just throwing it in the pan. The care she took with each pizza was remarkable, and it became a tradition that we’ve always tried to live up to.

Ms. Redmond would go on to work in the Gino’s East kitchen for twenty-nine years before retiring in April of 1989. Alice Mae’s nephew, Glenn Hudley, stayed on board after her retirement as a kitchen manager at Gino`s East, where he ensured that her secret recipe was properly passed down – on a need to know basis, of course!

Alice Mae Redmond has since passed away, but her legacy lives on through the perfect pizza that she had a gentle hand in creating. We salute you, Ms. Redmond! Thank you for being such an important part of our history.