A pizzeria with a dedicated following has debuted in Melissa: Yonx Pizza Bar & Co., an indie spot that does New York-style pizzas as well as pizza by the slice, has opened a location at 1521 McKinney St. #700 — an address that had pizza history as it was home for nearly a decade to a Palio’s Pizza, which closed in 2025.
Yonx is from Robert Hede, a restaurant veteran who was previously involved with the Village Burger Bar chain, where he was a partner. He switched from burgers to pizza in 2022 when he connected with NY Pizza and Pints, a small local pizzeria chain, opening a location in Wylie at 1125 FM 544 #800. After two years, he broke off from the chain to found Yonx at the same address.
Yonx does the kind of New York-style thin-crust pizza that Dallas-Fort Worth loves, in a standard 14-inch, as well as a massive 24-inch “Kong” size. They also do slices, which can be ordered as a lunch with a Caesar salad for $9.99.
Varieties include familiar favorites like pepperoni, as well as slightly gourmet options with New York-inspired names such as:
Balsamic on Bleeker St., with garlic sauce, mushrooms, shaved ribeye, mozzarella cheese, arugula, and balsamic drizzleBronx Bomb, with Sicilian marinara, mozzarella, meatballs, mushrooms, and ricotta cheeseBrooklyn, basically a meat-lovers with Sicilian marinara, mozzarella, sliced ham, chopped meatball, beef, & pepperoniGreenwich Garden, a vegetarian with Sicilian marinara, mozzarella, red & green bell peppers, white onions, mushrooms, spinach, & black olives
Prices range from $16 for a 14-inch cheese pizza to $46 for a NY Giant Supreme Soho with Sicilian marinara, mozzarella, pepperoni, sausage, beef, red & green bell peppers, white onions, sliced mushrooms, & black olives.
Yonx Pizza soup in a bread bowl.Photo courtesy of Yonx
There are also sandwiches on house-made toasted focaccia such as the Italian tower with melted provolone cheese, sliced ham, salami, lettuce, red onion, pepperoncinis, & sundried tomato aioli.
Appetizers include comforting soups served in a bread bowl including tomato basil and jalapeno cream soup with charred jalapenos. Plus wings, garlic knots, and “Brooklyn Ballers” — their signature meatballs in marinara, made in-house. topped with whipped ricotta and Parmesan, served with pesto and focaccia ends.
A full bar features frozen margaritas and frozen mojitos made with agave gold tequila. The best day to order those is “Frozen Fridays” from 11 am-10:30 pm when the blueberry mojitos are $6 and the margaritas are $5.
The Melissa location opened in January, with the same menu as the Wylie original, and has been met with an unprecedented wave of positive reviews on Facebook: one comment after another raving over how great the pizza is, and what a godsend it is — positive reviews that began to stack up even before the place had officially opened, the likes of which have been rarely seen.
Hede, who has been hands-on at the Melissa location since it opened, says he’s all-in on these northernmost suburbs of Dallas.
“I like this area — I feel like all the growth is heading out in this direction, there’s just a lot of activity up here,” he says.