Pezzo the Grossi family's pizza-pocket party opens in Flinders Lane, Melbourne
You've probably heard about Pezzo (pronounced pet-so). It's the Grossi-Rodriguez family's foray into the fast-casual dining market armed with 48-hour fermented pizza dough pockets, loaded to the hilt with familiar Italian favourites like veal scallopini and meatballs in sugo.
Having served the pockets at their salumi and wine bar, Ombra, for the past year they have been planning the first of what they hope will be many outlets.
The flagship, at the top end of Flinders Lane between Exhibition and Russell streets is now open. Here's what you mightn't know.
Pitzy Folk, owner of Melbourne's Capi soft drink, is a business partner in the store. As such, your drinking options, along with single-serve sized bottles of wine, include Capi's new range of ready-to-drink 'spritzes' such as grapefruit soda spiked with Old Tom gin.
Also notable, given Pezzo's proximity to the Fitzroy Gardens, a general liquor licence means that you can also get boozy drinks to-go, alongside your swag of pezzo, and perhaps a zabaglione ice-cream sandwich or frozen tiramisu (their 20-year-old recipe turned into takeaway dessert).
There's breakfast, too, from 7am. Coffee, obviously. But also bombolini (Italy's fat, filled doughnuts), pastries and breakfast pezzo filled with eggs and bacon, or prosciutto and mozzarella, which will be pre-made for speedy grab-and-go service.
The pezzo proper ($10.90-$14.90), which includes the original, filled with polpette (meatballs) in sugo with provolone; a vegetarian eggplant parmigiana; porchetta, replete with crackling and sauerkraut; and one that's basically a roast dinner in a bun – slow-roast lamb shoulder, rosemary potatoes, lots of parsley and onion – start at 11am until late.
It all goes down in a luminous canteen of blond tables perched on a space-y, glossy blue swirled floor, designed by Folk and Guy Grossi and executed by ZWEI Interiors Architecture. If this is the Grossis future-proofing themselves, that future looks bright.
Open daily 7am-11pm.
88 Flinders Lane, Melbourne, pezzo.com.au
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