Pizza Italia is Back in Business, Plus an Ooni Outing Gone Wrong
Liberty Ave now has another pizza shop back in action ensuring you're never more than four blocks away from a pizza treat.
Pizza Italia rises from the ashes, restoring the Liberty Ave Gluten Network.
Pizza Italia has stood at the end of Bloomfield on Liberty Ave as long as I’ve lived here. Early on in my residency my neighbor / friend / Cedar Point junkie, John Carman, dragged me to Pizza Italia interested in my take. It was good! Maybe slightly unremarkable in a world of unique, speciality pies. Hard to pick Pizza Italia when you got Fazio’s down the street.
Anyways, early on in the pandemic Pizza Italia had a fire incident and they were temporarily closed during renovation. They still served pizza out of their side window, but the facade was closed and there was no entry into the shop.
Not that Pittsburgh is a huge walk and slice neighborhood, but having your front door sealed up surely stymies any business you might attract. It doesn’t look good from a PR standpoint.
Pizza Italia didn’t just fix what was broken, they came back with a new look, a modern paint job and is more welcoming than they’ve ever been.
Pizza Italia 2.0 opened during Little Italy Days, welcoming the hoards of Italian enthusiasts who are looking for a new satellite TV provider. What they got instead was a new Pizza Italia with a bar you can sit at, tables to dine on pizza and six televisions showing a myriad of sporting events.
In a unique twist, Pizza Italia is billing its BYOB nature to the public. While they aren’t a full service bar, you can decide what beverage you’re drinking inside Pizza Italia. A more casual pizza dining experience where you can grab a pie, bring some brews is rare these days. I haven’t BYOB to a pizza shop since the days of Pizza Taglio where each member of the party would bring a bottle of red wine “just in case.”
This casual nature of beverage consumption is the yin to Trace Brewings BYOF stance. Between the two you can grab a pack of beers from one place and dine at the other or Vice versa. A welcome addition to the growing amount of choices in Bloomfield.
A Slightly Disappointing Ooni Pizza Outing
When we have friends over for Ooni pizza night anarchy, I stay inside and stretch the dough feeling a little panicky. I prep meticulously, hoping the dough rises exponentially. That the yeast bubbles and blossoms manically.
Sometimes the best dough balls sleep too soundly. They don’t rise and the pizza night gets cloudy. I stretch and fret, while the bellies quake. I pile on the sauce and cheese hoping it covers up my mistakes.
The dough becomes too loose and measly. It tears in the middle so easily. It gets stuck on the peel during Ooni entrance, and I reach for a cold one hoping my nerves get quenched.
The fire rises higher and higher, my brow is beginning to perspire. The crust cooks too fast and is charred. A horrifying pizza massacre taking place in my backyard. I plop the pizzas in front of my guests. They’re happy, they don’t protest. They suck the pizzas down and for a while I’m able to hide my frown.
But later in Christa gets real with me. Those pizzas, weren’t your finest you’ve made for me. What did you do so differently? I don’t know maybe it was the humidity.
Making Ooni pizzas is a high pressure situation, when it goes great it’s nothing but elation. Sometimes you have to reap the the dough that you sow, but perfecting the craft is the point of the show.
Despite a couple subpar pizzas topped with cheese, Charlie wanted to make a pizza with me. She rolled it thin, flat as a bill, topped it with sauce, cheese, what a thrill.
Sometimes the dough doesn’t rise the way you want it to. While it was ugly, it tasted okay. But honing the technique and craft is part of the fun.
If you enjoyed this please consider sharing with a pizza pal!
Pizza ya later!
-Dan Tallarico, Pizza Journalist