KELLER
If one Acquario is a hit, why not two?
Owners Elda and Emil “Nino” Rata have opened Acquario Pizza Pasta & Bar near Keller Town Center, and it’s well on the way to matching the success of his Acquario Italian Restaurant.
After three years running his finer-dining Acquario, the Ratas decided to add a Neapolitan-style pizzeria in the same city for a simple reason.
“There was no high-quality, traditional Neapolitan pizza around here,” Emil Rata said as the first customers streamed into Acquario Pizza Paata & Bar, now in its soft-opening phrase at 967 Keller Parkway near Rufe Snow Drive.
The Ratas went all-out.
For a chef, Acquario Pizza hired national award-winning pizzaiolo Gimmy Piperku, from Rome via Las Vegas and San Diego.
Gimmy Piperku, a world champion pizza chef from San Diego and Las Vegas restaurants, is the ”pizzaiolo” at Acquario Pizza Pasta & Bar in Keller, Texas, seen March 2, 2026. Bud Kennedy bud@star-telegram.com
To bake the pizza, the Ratas brought in a giant Neapolitan oven too big for the door. To get it in, front windows had to come out.
Acquario Pizza took over a nondescript strip shopping center space. So the atmosphere is more casual pizzeria than upscale restaurant like the original Acquario, on the Keller-Southlake border at 8849 Davis Blvd.
But there is nothing nondescript about Piperku’s pastas or pizzas, some of the best in North Texas and comparable in the Fort Worth area only to downtown’s standout Bocca Osteria Romana and its Felina pizzeria.
If you haven’t tried Neapolitan-style pizza at the older local Cane Rosso chain or another restaurant, it’s soft, light, airy and known for its high, charred edges.
A sausage-and-mushroom pizza at Acquario Pizza Pasta + Bar in Keller, Texas, seen March 2, 2026. Bud Kennedy bud@star-telegram.com
Acquario Pizza’s introductory menu offers a choice of 10 pizzas with toppings such as soppressata, prosciutto cotto, Calabrian chili peppers and cuo-and-char pepperoni.
The pasta menu offers a choice of eight entrees such as spaghettis, rigatoni in vodka sauce, or pasta with beef Genovese.
Start any meal with an order of puccia, the round and lighr pull-apart bread from southern Italy.
Puccia, a light semolina bread from Puglia, Italy, is a must-try appetizer at Acquario Pizza Pasta & Bar in Keller, Texas. It’s served with an eggplant spread. Bud Kennedy bud@star-telegram.com
An order of bread ($11) and eggplant Parmesan ($14) made a sensational dinner together or alongside a pizza.
Desserts include tiramisu or Nutella pizza.
(I didn’t get that far.)
Piperku is a former champion in pizza makers’ Caputo Cup competition.
Eggplant Parmesan is an appetizer at Acquario Pizza Pasta + Bar in Keller, Texas, seen March 2, 2026. Bud Kennedy bud@star-telegram.com
“This is pizza Napoletana, authentic,” Piperku said — “tomatoes from Italy, mozzarella from Italy, flour from Italy … Everything is like a street food that brings people together.”
He learned pizza making at 16 — “a little too old” by Italian standards, he said jokingly — when he moved from his small home town to Rome and needed a job.
He found work at a bakery.
Acquario Pizza Pasta & Bar is in a strip shopping center on Keller Parkway near Keller Town Center in Keller, Texas, as seen March 2, 2026. Bud Kennedy bud@star-telegram.com
“I found out what I like,’” he said — “the raising of the dough.”
Acquario Pizza Pasta & Bar is open for lunch and dinner daily; 682-647-6554, acquariopizza.com.
The original, finer-dining Acquario Italian Restaurant is open for dinner only Mondays through Saturdays; 817-431-8323, acquariorestaurant.com.
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
Bud Kennedy is celebrating his 40th year writing about restaurants in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. He has written the “Eats Beat” dining column in print since 1985 and online since 1992 — that’s more than 3,000 columns about Texas cafes, barbecue, burgers and where to eat.
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