Angelo’s Pizzeria returns to South Jersey

Angelo’s Pizzeria will return to South Jersey as owner Danny DiGiampietro plans to buy Di’Nics Roast Pork & Beef, a fixture in West Collingswood Heights — the latest piece in a fast-moving expansion that includes his partnership with actor Bradley Cooper in New York City and a forthcoming pizzeria in Conshohocken.

Di’Nics’ last day will be Saturday, “and we’re getting the keys right away,” DiGiampietro told The Inquirer. “We’ve already got engineers and architects, and we’re going to build this place out right.”

DiGiampietro had no timetable for the new Angelo’s, at 310 Black Horse Pike, near the Walt Whitman Bridge. Plans for the renovation will include an expansion of the building, with additional seating.

Joe Fabrizzio, Di’Nics’ owner, had been telling customers of the pending shutdown, as reported Wednesday by the blog 42Freeway. Fabrizzio had declined to identify the buyer, citing a nondisclosure agreement. DiGiampietro disclosed his plans on Angelo’s social media accounts on Thursday afternoon.

Fabrizzio, who bought the shop nearly eight years ago, told The Inquirer that he wanted to simplify his life and de-stress. “It’s been a long 7½ years,” he said. “When you run your own business. It’s always on your mind, 24/7.”

“The opportunity came up and we jumped at it,” said DiGiampietro, who, in his days delivering bread and rolls to sandwich shops, sold to Di’Nics. “The previous owner, Bobby Criniti, was one of the greatest human beings in the world,” he said.

» READ MORE: All you need to know about Angelo's Pizzeria

This Di’Nics — with the added apostrophe — was once related to the DiNic’s sandwich shops founded by Tommy Nicolosi and his cousin Franky DiClaudio. Nicolosi’s son Joe Nicolosi now owns the Reading Terminal Market location and is a partner of DiGiampietro in Uncle Gus’ Steaks at the market.

DiGiampietro said the South Jersey Angelo’s would sell the same combination of pizzas and sandwiches that it offers at the shop on Ninth Street in South Philadelphia and through UberEats. The Ninth Street store, which opened in 2019, was a follow-up to the first Angelo’s location, which opened in Haddonfield in 2013.

DiGiampietro said the new location will be open early for breakfast, and will bake its own bread — “like a mimic of the [original] Haddonfield store, but bigger and better,” he said. “I’m going to neon the [sucker] up and we’re going to have fun.”

The South Philadelphia location, which has a much smaller kitchen (and crowd-control issues that have grown to be nearly as legendary as its steaks), offers meatballs only on Wednesday, cutlets on Thursday, and pork on Saturday. But “we’re going full menu here,” DiGiampietro said of the South Jersey outpost.

DiGiampietro and associates, who took over Conshohocken Bakery last year to bake bread for the delivery and wholesale business, are planning a restaurant in that borough, he said. Earlier this year, DiGiampietro and the actor Bradley Cooper opened Danny & Coop’s, a cheesesteak-only shop, in downtown Manhattan.

The Ninth Street shop, which bakes its own bread, is “never going to change.”