Big Daddy’s Pizzeria is one of Gatlinburg’s finest pizza joints, located in the same building as Bennett’s Pit Bar-B-Que on River Road. When you walk through the door, turn left if you want barbecue or right if you want pizza. On this particular day…we turned right. So is Big Daddy’s as good as they say? Let’s find out.

Big Daddy’s is easy to find. From the Historic Gatlinburg Inn, head down Parkway toward the entrance to the Smoky Mountains, then take a right onto River Road. You will find it in the brown building shown above that, again, is split between Bennett’s and Big Daddy’s. The interior of the restaurant is attractive and well laid out. But we ain’t here for interior decoration. We’re here for the pizza! So let’s take a look at the menu.

Big Daddy’s cooks its pizza on a 550 degree, wood-fired flame inside a one-of-a-kind brick oven. The restaurant has an interesting selection of oddly-named pizzas. You can get whatever kind of pizza you want and build your own if you like something more traditional. Their specialty pizzas offer combinations that include toppings such as shaved prime rib, meatballs and spinach-artichoke dip.

In addition to pizza, Big Daddy’s offers a nice selection of sandwiches, salads, appetizers and desserts. You can get a submarine sandwich or a caesar salad. So even if you have people in your party not in the mood for pizza, there should definitely be something on the menu for them.

We thought we would step outside the box and ordered one titled “Wing It,” which contains ranch dressing, wing sauce-marinated chicken, red onions, garlic and jalapeños. This thing was good! If you’re not a chicken wing eater, then this is probably not the pizza for you. The ingredients do sound a little strange (ranch dressing as a base?), but it works! It was well-cooked with a nice crust crunch.

To sweeten things up, we ordered flavor dippers with pineapple jalepeño dipping sauce. It complimented the pizza perfectly. The dippers have a cake icing kind of taste.

If you’re in town in the mood for some pizza, you can’t go wrong with Big Daddy’s Pizzeria. Recommended!

It is located at:

714 River Road
Gatlinburg, TN 37738