721 South Broad Street, The Burg
Once upon a time this was LaRoma Tomato Pies
Restaurant. Owner: Salvatore DeLia:)
UPDATE: SJ Bill adds:
Oh, would you look at that! Not very fancy is it?
Sam would often sit on the steps of his home on the
right, Parodi in hand, contemplating.
Ingredients: Italian crushed and pomodoro pelati.
Was it Maggio mozzarella cheese? He used a good quality
Felippo Berio olive oil. The dough was never rolled out.
He pressed out teh dough with the finger tips, then
stretched it round and round over his knuckles. A light
toss, onto the peel dusted with coarse corn meal and
into the oven. His pies were done in a few minutes as
they sat next to the full blue flame of open burning
industrial coke. If not tended to, the pie could burn
easily. His oven had to be 700 - 800 degrees. Maybe
hotter.
4 comments:
SJBill: One of the best tomato pies around, the Beatty St. Boys had one every Friday night for dinner.
Absolutely! THree generations in my family got their pies from Sam. He was a classic, back in the days before boxes. Trentonians were used for small pies, Trenton Times for large ones.
No airconditioning in the place, ever. Just a fan over the door as you walked in. That's how we knew it was Summer.
The place smelled of burning Parodi's, coke and baking tomato pie.
The oven was like an open hearth furnace and it produced great pies.
Sam kept water buckets on the floor by the oven to soak peels and hearth brooms before use and to extinguish them after use. The burnt corn meal from the hearth was simply swept onto the floor.
Sam kept large baskets of mushrooms on top of the furnace to dry them out before slicing them up.
Garlic. Anchovies.
My Dad liked lots of black pepper on his pies. Sam punched out the small holes of one pepper shaker with an ice pick, just for him.
Do I ever miss that place.
Hi Joe & SJ:)
Do you remember, if you knew,
where Mr. Delia's family came
from in Italy? Did Mr. Delia
himself immigrate from Italy?
His wifes name? Did he have kids?
Did you know them? Did you know
of other folks who worked in his place? Thank you for any help here
as I can find nothing on the net
about him:)
Since the business name was La Roma, I assume he was from Rome and not from Naples. We visited the family all the time, just up the steps from the Pizza making station into his living room, but I cannot remember the family member's names.
The real tomato pie joints were like bowling alleys in the 40s and 50s. They weren't pretty places. Sam's place was like going to the old Curtis Bowling Lanes or Heil's. Women didn't like it. It was HOT. These were factory worker places.
I remember his license to operqate on the wall. The name was Salvatore De Lia, and he used the word "Pizsaria" his neon sign as well as "Tomato Pies".
Maybe Tal Brody can recall as he lived across the street and went to Sam's all the time, too. I'll write him tonight.
Post a Comment