Roxie's by the Slice offers Brooklyn-style pizza in Bucktown

CHICAGO (WLS) -- If Chicago is known for deep dish and, more recently, Neapolitan pizza, then New York is probably known more for its limp, greasy-yet-foldable pizza-by-the-slice.

Now a new breed of by-the-slice joint opened in Bucktown, and not only are the slices huge, they're darn good too.

This is not the slice joint you remember from college. At Roxie's By The Slice, on a lonely stretch of Milwaukee Avenue in Bucktown, they're improving on a tired, old model.

"Brooklyn-style, jumbo slices, pick a red or a white slice," said Chad Anderson, who developed the recipes. "It's a 36-hour ferment, we're just trying to take the New York idea and improve it."

That day-and-a-half ferment means dough with more spring, more body and more chew. Before they even open, they're ringing it with crme fraiche, adding ladlefuls of tomato sauce, and sprinkling on Pecorino Romano, 12-year-old parmeggiano and plenty of mozzarella.

Baked ahead, they can then be sliced and topped-to order.

"And then when you order a slice we'll take it off the rack and throw it in there for about three minutes, and it gets a nice crisp to it and you're good to go," said Anderson.

It's $4.50 for a basic slice and $1 more per topping, including high-quality anchovies, pepperoni, sopressata or arugula, among others. But these are gargantuan slices, so unless you're famished, share it with a friend. Anderson says they're hoping to attract both the hungry and the thirsty.

"We're gonna get a late-night push from 11 p.m. to 2 a.m. and we have 14 drafts on, so it's a bar too," he said.

Roxie's is open until 2 a.m., so people are either going to come in the earlier hours for dinner or they're going to come late, have a beer, maybe get a little snack. Get a slice in a to-go container if there are no seats or for pizza on the run.

Roxie's gets steadily busier as the night gets later, so if you want to get a slice without waiting too long, best to go well before midnight.

Roxie's By The Slice

1732 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago