Dave Portnoy stopped by the popular eatery during his trek down the East Coast over the holidays, and he was impressed. by both the slice, a bonus cheesesteak – spoiler, he liked that too – as well as the story of the restaurant’s history.
According to the owner, his father and his cousin Frank came over to the United States in 1981, where they worked at a couple pizzerias in the area of Poughkeepsie, New York, and Toms River, New Jersey, before deciding they could do a better job on their own, so they set up shop in a strip mall on Belair Road in Baltimore.
Four years later, a neighboring pharmacy was robbed and the pharmacist behind the counter took out a gun to defend himself wildly shooting at the would-be robber, with one bullet going through the wall, striking a pizza oven that deflected the bullet into the back of Frank’s head, killing him.
The dent is still in the oven 36 years later.
“They wanted to add a two-top burner, so they flipped a coin to decide whether to push it toward the road or back,” the owner said. “It moved six inches, and if they didn’t move it, it may not have hit him in the back of the head.