Century-old NYC pizza icon Totonno’s looks for someone to take over with just one condition: No pineapple
NY Post
The family behind a historic pizzeria that has been serving Coney Island for 100 years is looking for a buyer or partner to help to keep their grandfather’s legacy alive.
But whatever the future holds for Totonno’s Pizzeria Napolitana, the family says the goal is to stay true to founder Antonio Pero’s classic recipe.
“My grandfather would turn in his grave to hear pineapples,” Antoinette Balzano, Pero’s granddaughter, told The Post. “Clams? Oh my God.”
Balzano and her sister, Louise “Cookie” Ciminieri, recently put out a public call for an investing partner or buyer to take over the family business that is widely hailed as one of the Big Apple’s best pizza spots – and one of the few left in the city that uses a coal-fired oven.
Balzano, 73, explained that while she and her two siblings are proud owners of Totonno’s, they’re way past the age of retiring and lack the necessary manpower to keep things going.
Pero lived the American dream after he emigrated from Italy and opened the pizzeria in 1924, his granddaughter said.
