Uno’s Pizza Cooking Classes

Uniting Families One Deep Dish Pizza at a Time?

Early October I visited my sister in Daytona Beach Florida for our 7^th Family Sibling Reunion. My sister Debbi enjoys surprising us by scheduling secretive family oriented events. This year she drove the siblings from Daytona Beach to Orlando, Florida for a cooking class. Prior to her disclosure, I expected to arrive at an anal retentive cooking school. We instead were taken to Uno’s Pizza. My initial thought was — pizza? She could have saved money with an anti-climactic box of Chef Boyardee.

However, this was beyond a simple experience. This experience became the epitome of family unity. I discovered we were about to create, design, and bake our own personal deep dish pizza. It’s one thing to be taught a creme brulee you’ll make every several years at best. But this is pizza…the staple of most American dinners.

According to Pizza.com: “Pizza accounts for more than 10 percent of all food service sales! Each person in America eats about 46 pizza slices a year!”

And not just pizza, but deep dish pizza. We personalized each pizza by hand picking the ingredients, formed the dough, and experienced the unique baking process.

We each created two personal pan deep dish pizzas, one for lunch accompanied by a salad and beverage on location, and one to go. We learned of Uno’s history, and the history of the deep dish pizza.

What made this such a cool experience was the instructor and store general manager Rob Bradley, family bonding, and that we each now possess the ability to extend the fun lesson to our family members for years to come.

My Daughter’s Homemade Pizza

Last month my daughter and I spent the afternoon making deep dish pizzas from the instructions Uno’s Pizza provided to each of my siblings. I plan to include my son and wife over the Christmas vacation this year, since it actually turned out as good as I hoped it would.

Uno’s Pizza has a home run with this unique format. I was told each store manager experienced approximately two months of training before classes were offered.

I contacted Uno Pizzeria & Grill’s National Director of Group Sales Kimberly Lathe, the woman behind the idea.

Kim, how many locations offer the pizza classes?

Five: Orlando, Washington DC, New York City, Boston, and Chicago. The class in Chicago is at our landmark location where it all begin in 1943. It has been so successful we are considering opening up the in-store classes throughout our whole company.

Exclusive Coupon

Exclusive Coupon – Chicago Only!

Why deep dish pizza?

UNO’s is the birthplace of deep dish pizza. Ike Sewell invented the deep dish pizza back in Chicago in 1943.  It is our signature product.

Why did you start these classes?

Uno’s has a very unique story to tell. We wanted people to learn how to make and share our pizza with their friends and family, and learn about our history.

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As a father and a Christian, I enjoy sharing an out of the box idea that strengthens families and relationships in a fun way. The cost is minimal and will last your family a lifetime of memories (and pizza calories)!