{"id":242937,"date":"2026-05-25T09:17:30","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T09:17:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/242937\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T09:17:30","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T09:17:30","slug":"carmelas-pizzeria-reopens-in-franklin-square","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/242937\/","title":{"rendered":"Carmela’s Pizzeria reopens in Franklin Square"},"content":{"rendered":"

Though Carmela\u2019s Pizzeria & Restaurant in Franklin Square has reopened under new ownership, the business is staying in the family.<\/p>\n

Rick Calia, a cousin of the former owners, Bart and Carmela Calia, has taken ownership along with his son Rick Calia Jr., and his brother-in-law Michael D\u2019Alessadro. They reopened in late April with throwback pricing on the purchase of a second pie. Carmela\u2019s is reopening\u00a0the restaurant attached to the pizzeria Saturday, after\u00a0awaiting its liquor license, Calia said.<\/p>\n

“My cousins started this place in 1971. They came from Italy in 1966,” Calia said. “They owned it until 2022 and then they sold it.”<\/p>\n

Calia retained 80% of the staff who worked at the pizzeria when his cousin owned it. The menu stayed the same, Calia said.\u00a0Gourmet pizza options include the Quattro Gusti ($28.95 for a large pie) \u2014 made with black olives, mushrooms, ham and artichoke hearts with tomato and mozzarella \u2014 while\u00a0grandma ($23.95 for large) and Neapolitan ($20.50 for large) are among the traditional pies.<\/p>\n

For dinner, there’s the pasta e fagioli ($9.95) made with ditalini pasta, kidney and\u00a0cannellini beans, and prosciutto in broth,\u00a0eggplant rollatini ($22.95) and\u00a0veal Sorrentino ($28.95), made with medallions of veal topped with sliced eggplant, prosciutto and mozzarella in a brown sauce.<\/p>\n

Calia said they did a “real overhaul,” to prepare for reopening the eatery, which had been closed for approximately\u00a0two years. The process took about a month. The counters and floors were redone; he changed the cabinetry and soda dispensers before opening.<\/p>\n

Carmela\u2019s Pizzeria & Restaurant, 910-912 Hempstead Tpke., Franklin Square, 516-488-7884, Carmelasoffranklinsquare.com.<\/a> Open 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Sunday to Thursday, 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday.<\/p>\n

\"Melissa<\/p>\n

Melissa Azofeifa is a restaurants reporter with Newsday’s FeedMe team. Having grown up on Long Island, she loves talking about food and its impact on culture. A graduate of Stony Brook University, she joined Newsday in the fall of 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Though Carmela\u2019s Pizzeria & Restaurant in Franklin Square has reopened under new ownership, the business is staying in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":242938,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[8695,10203,9,11,10,49,51,50,821],"class_list":["post-242937","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-feedme","tag-fmopen","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-news","tag-restaurants"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=242937"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242937\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/242938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}