nothin Neapolitan Brothers Take On Wooster Square… | New Haven Independent

Neapolitan Brothers Take On Wooster Square Pizza

Thomas Breen photo

Neapolitan brothers and new pizza restaurant owners Aleko and Jeshar Zeneli on Tuesday night.

Eataly photo

The third brother, Eataly NYC Flatiron Executive Pizza Chef Gazmir Zeneli, winning the Caputo Cup in 2017.

Three Neapolitan brothers plan to open their own pizza restaurant later this spring in the heart of the city’s Little Italy.

How will they compete with Pepe’s and Sally’s, not to mention the many farther flung famed local pizza joints?

With personal pies. Wood-fired stoves. And decades of experience.

On Tuesday night in the basement meeting room of 200 Orange St., the Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA) unanimously approved Zeneli LLC’s special exception application for a restaurant liquor license to open the new Neapolitan spot at 138 Wooster St.

Zeneli LLC is owned by three brothers from Naples, Italy: Aleko, Jeshar, and Gazmir Zeneli.

Later this spring, the siblings plan on opening a new pizza restaurant, tentatively called Casa Zeneli,” at the 1,227-square-foot Wooster Street commercial space that used to house Cavaliere’s Market and Ferrucci Italian Deli.

The restaurant will have 30 seats, eight of which will be located at the restaurant’s bar, and the restaurant will be open from 7 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. every day of the week, according to the plan.

Local attorney Ray Lemley at BZA on Tuesday.

As we all know,” the Zeneli’s attorney Ray Lemley told the zoning commissioners, there are plenty of pizza places on Wooster Street.” The Zeneli’s restaurant plans to offer something quite a bit different from Pepe’s, Sally’s, and others on the block, he said.

This restaurant will open early in the morning to serve cappuccinos, croissants, and other breakfast goodies, then transition to pizza and booze in the evening.

Certainly it’s consistent with everything else in the neighborhood,” BZA Chair Pat King said before the board voted unanimously in support.

After the hearing, Aleko and Jeshar offered a hint of what to expect at the neighborhood’s newest pizzeria.

Jeshar said he has been making buffalo mozzarella for 20 years, including at his current gig at the celebrated artisanal cheesemaker Liuzzi Cheese in North Haven.

Aleko and Gazmir, meanwhile, are both pizzamakers at the Eataly Italian market and food hall in New York City. Gazmir, who was not at Tuesday’s BZA hearing, is the head pizza chef at the New York City location, and travels the country training young pizza chefs.

Pictures of the Zenelis’ new pizza oven.

If we can make it here,” Aleko said about New Haven, home to some of the most celebrated pizza in the country, we can make it anywhere.”

Aleko and Jeshar said they have ordered a special, wood-fired pizza oven from Naples to stock their new New Haven kitchen. Each pizza will only take 90 seconds to cook in such an oven, they said.

Their pies will be Neapolitan-style, they said, longer, more rectangular than round, and served as personal pies” for individual consumption.

We’ve worked all our lives making pizza,” Aleko said. And now they’re looking to share those years of experience with a city that knows pizza well.

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