Frankie's 5th Floor Pizzeria is a pizza place inside a food court, inside a mall. However, this isn't the kind of place you stop for a meal that you bookend with an Orange Julius and a Cinnabon. From the cloth napkins to the bottled microbrews, Frankie's is a destination a few slices beyond your average Sbarro's.

C. Francis Favero (the titular Frankie) knows pizza. His dad owned three South Side pizzerias, and Frankie advanced through the ranks of Lettuce Entertain You to eventually open the Water Tower's Foodlife and Wow Bao. Inspired by super chef Nancy Silverton (of La Brea bakery in Los Angeles) and his dad, Frankie brought his dreams to life when he opened his own pizzeria.

Taking into account the way Chicagoans like their pies (sweet sauce, slightly salty mozzarella), Frankie's presents an 8-inch thin-crust with a gourmet Sardinian twist. Standouts, like the potato and rosemary ($11), come with a side of truffle oil and topped with arugula. Even more standard fare like the pepperoni pizza ($10) gets the Frankie's treatment, the pepperoni having been cured twice. Naturally, Frankie's sausage is homemade. Add ingredients like fennel, pine nuts and grana padano cheese, and you start to see that Frankie's means business. One might observe that the center of the pizza manages to steer clear of the soggy crust curse. "Yeah, that's one of the things we obsess over," Favero says, and it's easy to believe him.

With a variety of antipasti and salads on the menu ($5-$9), Frankie's can take care of you even if you aren't in a pizza frame of mind, though you'd be cheating yourself by skipping even the basic margherita. Once you're stuffed, give the homemade gelato a try, or, if you're in need of a digestivo, Frankie's can set you up with a limoncello ($3) based on a special family recipe.

Centerstage Reviewer: Bill Burman