A Main Line cheesesteak shop’s nearly 70-year-old tradition will soon be history

The bold yellow sign above the front door still says Mama’s Pizzeria, but it’s been at least a decade since a pizza has emerged from the oven.

Mama’s in Bala Cynwyd is strictly a cheesesteak joint now. The steaks are cooked by second-generation owner Paul Castellucci in the same way they have been for nearly 50 years: with a three-cheese blend twisted throughout the finely chopped sirloin. A cheesesteak prizefighter, Castellucci’s spatula never stops sparring with the flattop as he steals glances at the wall clock, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., Wednesday through Saturday.

There’s no paper menu. “You can take a picture of the sign,” Castellucci’s son, also Paul, said.

The younger Castellucci — Paulie — cuts rolls, takes orders, and runs the numbers. Paulie is the third, and seemingly final, generation of Castelluccis to work at Mama’s. At one point, an additional seven workers were required to handle the line that regularly snaked out the door. These days, it’s just the two Pauls.

Paulie, 25, dresses in overalls and wears a red cap with the insignia of St. Joseph’s University, where he’s studying for his accountant’s license. He’s slated to graduate in 2026.

“Once I get that, I’ll be done here,” he said last week.

“And I’ll retire,” the older Castellucci, 64, said.

After nearly 70 years, Mama’s is simply no longer viable as a business, the father-son duo said. It’s facing rising costs — beef prices are at near-record highs — and a dwindling customer base, perhaps drawn away to newer, buzzier steak slingers.

The end of Mama’s will be a loss not just for Bala Cynwyd, but for the wider cheesesteak scene. Its consistency is a hallmark of the family-run shops that sprouted up in the region throughout the 1960s and the following decades. Stalwarts remain, but that kind of shop, and all of the idiosyncratic ways they cook steaks, have increasingly given way to chains, viral sensations, “concepts,” and dogma.

» READ MORE: Frusco’s Steaks was one of Philly’s only woman-owned cheesesteak shops. Here’s what she taught me about great steaks.

In 1958, World War II veteran Paul Castellucci Sr. and his wife Miriam found a spot on Main Street in Manayunk to start a family pizza shop. They named it Mama’s, after a grandmother. In 1960, they moved a mile away, to their current spot off Belmont Avenue, and bought a grill to make cheesesteaks, which were gaining in popularity.

Over the years, Paul Sr. and Miriam put the whole family to work: kids, grandkids, spouses, cousins.

“You didn’t have a choice. Once you’re old enough to walk, you can do dishes,” Paul Jr. said. “You always did have somebody from the family here. It’s a little easier to yell at your family than to yell at people that aren’t.”

Fast-forward to 2025. “I’m the only one who stayed,” Paul Jr. said. (He, his father, and his son all have different middle names.)

Paul Jr. makes cheesesteaks the way his parents did: He chops the steak into a mound of thin-cut ribbons, sprinkles a shredded three-cheese blend on top, then, once the cheese starts to soften, folds the meat over until the cheese twists with the meat and it all melts together.

“Over and through it,” he said.

What cheeses are in the blend? “That I don’t tell ya,” he said.

I recently took my 79-year-old father to the family-run shop, where he remembers eating in the ‘70s and ‘80s. He guesses that the cheese is a mix of mozzarella, provolone, and Romano. “It’s like a pizza blend,” he said, with a nod toward the shop’s original purpose.

I ate the steak over a napkin to get a sense of how much oil is in it; there was barely a footprint left behind. Paul Jr. said he uses both vegetable and olive oil on the flattop griddle. “Olive oil can be too strong sometimes,” he said.

The warm, spongy roll maintains its structural integrity until the last bite, which is impressive for a soft roll that’s so completely filled with meat and cheese. “Our bread here is so much different than in any other part of the country,” Paul Jr. said. “I think that’s what does it. That’s what it starts with.”

The roll is from Del Buono’s in South Jersey, but for 50 years, it was a Conshohocken Italian Bakery roll. (The legacy family bakery closed last year and the facility became part of the growing Angelo’s empire.)

Part of the reason Paul Jr. will be the last grillman at Mama’s Pizzeria is that he’s the only one who can do it. “I like to cook, but I can’t make these cheesesteaks,” Paulie said, pointing back at his dad. “Fifty years’ experience, you can’t beat that.”

The shop will begin its closure after Paulie passes his CPA exam, and after nearly 70 years, the Castelluccis’ signature steak-making style will fade away. For now, they still make a great sandwich, and for at least a few more years, they aim to keep the tradition alive.

Bells and birds help tell the city’s story, but it’s a sandwich that helps explain Philadelphians. How we evolved from farmers in the cradle of liberty to DoorDashers in a melting pot of orange whiz is informed and defined by the cheesesteak. Raising the Steaks is a weeklyish chronicle of this long-rolled reminder of life’s redeeming qualities.