Ciao Bello Shuttered

Tony Vallone's casual Italian restaurant has served its last pizza in Tanglewood

Ciao Bello has closed.

Photo by Julie Soefer/Greater Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau

One of Houston's most prominent Italian restaurants won't be participating in Houston Restaurants Weeks this year. Ciao Bello, Tony Vallone's casual Italian restaurant, announced on Facebook that it would close after service on August 1.

Closing Ciao Bello is the second setback in the last two weeks for Vallone, who shuttered his Memorial-area steakhouse Vallone's on July 20. The sudden closure meant diners only had a few hours to contemplate a final meal at what had been a neighborhood favorite for close to 10 years.

When it opened in 2009, Ciao Bello became the spiritual successor to Grotto, Vallone's legendary pizza and pasta spot that had been sold to Landry's, Inc. The restaurant allowed Vallone to serve authentic, Italian-inspired fare in a more casual atmosphere (and a lower price point) than Tony's. It also served as the home of some serious culinary talent, including Michael Dei Maggi (Max's Wine Dive, The Rockwood Room) and Bobby Matos (State of Grace), who earned a CultureMap Tastemaker Awards Chef of the Year nomination in 2015 for his work at Ciao Bello.

As the Facebook post notes, Vallone and his business partner Scott Sulma intend to turn all of the attention to Tony's, Vallone's 50-year old fine dining institution. That restaurant has been riding high under the direction of chef de cuisine Austin Waiter, who Sulma praised in a recent CultureMap feature.

“His ability to create and use ingredients and products with purpose is unmatched in the 14 years I’ve been with Tony,” Sulma said. “Where one chef sees the need for nine ingredients for a dish, Austin sees five. That’s something that takes years to learn.”

Diners will definitely miss Ciao Bello, but hopefully the prospect of Vallone and Sulma focusing all of their attention on Tony's bodes well for its continued success.

closings

better than blini

Houston pizzeria unveils indulgent caviar pizza for the holiday season

Courtesy of Pizaro's Pizza

Get the Holiday Decadence pizza through the end of December.

One of Houston’s most well-regarded pizzerias is giving diners a way to splurge this holiday season. For a limited time only, Pizaro’s Pizza is topping one of its Neapolitan-style pies with caviar.

Called the Holiday Decadence, it’s a personal-sized, 8-inch, Neapolitan-style pizza topped simply with Pizaro’s housemade mozzarella cheese and seasoned with a little furikake. Alongside, the restaurant provides diners with lemon zest crème fraîche, a small bottle of prosecco, and a one-ounce jar of paddlefish caviar from Houston’s DR Delicacy. Priced at $59, it’s either an indulgent treat for one person or an extravagant appetizer for two.

Pizaro’s co-owner Nicole Bean tells CultureMap she sees the new pizza as an improvement on the caviar special the restaurant tried two years ago, which used its thicker, Detroit-style pizza.

“This year, we simplified things,” she says. “We made it more affordable. We added more caviar. The feature is the caviar, focusing on having a whole, one-ounce container either for yourself or to share with one other person.”

In this configuration, the pizza crust essentially serves as an oversized blini, with the furikake boosting the caviar’s oceanic flavors. Serving the caviar in the jar allows diners to add as much or as little to the pizza as they want. Introduced last week, Bean says the restaurant hasn’t sold that many caviar pizzas yet, but that doesn’t surprise her.

“People are a little hesitant with it being caviar and the $60 price point,” she says. “It’s not for everybody. It’s for people who are curious and want to try it or really love caviar and want to try it every way they can.”

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The restaurant always uses its monthly specials to experiment beyond familiar toppings like pepperoni and mushroom. Next month, Bean and her brother, co-owner Matt Hutchinson, will present dueling pies — his topped with crispy prosciutto, sautéed onions, and balsamic drizzle and hers a simple tomato pie, anchovies optional but strongly encouraged.

“The fun thing about pizza is you can literally do anything with it,” Bean says. “I want people to try different things on pizza. It can be decadent. It can be upscale. It can be fresh and new.”

The Holiday Decadence is available at both Pizaro’s locations through December 31. Find more details at the Pizaro’s Pizza website.

news-you-can-eat pizza caviar