Pizzeria Venti opens on John's Island

“You can’t have New York pizza outside of New York,” a friend of mine from the Big Apple once told me. “It’s all in the water.” This statement struck me as odd until I read a recipe for a famous thin crust pizza from Napoli, Italy; 500 grams flour, 10 grams yeast, 10 grams salt, 325 grams water (65% hydration). That’s it, four simple ingredients; flour, water, salt and yeast.
When it comes to water, you could have a sip from your own tap, travel twenty minutes in any direction, take a sip from that tap and notice the difference immediately. For example, anyone whose visited Florida has probably had to pinch their nose before drinking the local liquid because of the pungent sulfur smell, a result of the nearby artesian wells.
In New York, it’s their unique city water that many pizza enthusiasts claim give their crusts that perfect texture and taste. In fact, this belief is so strong that many Pizzaioli (Italian for people with a talent for making pizza) actually have the water from their favorite pizza’s region shipped to their restaurant or home in order to make their crusts just right.
This practice of shipping in bottled Italian water is one of the many important details that make Pizzeria Venti a gem among pizza shops. Having started as a single restaurant in Geneva, Illinois, the concept has quickly spread and the company now boasts eight locations across the United States with 26 more in the works. The most recent Pizzeria Venti, owned by Shannon and Bryan Carpenter, opened this past Memorial Day in the Freshfield’s shopping center on John’s Island.
The first time we dropped by it was well after lunch and Shannon was quietly wiping down the vinyl tablecloths, window bistro tables and the wide oak bar near the front counter. The air smelled of hot bread, crushed herbed tomatoes, melting cheese and garlic. One glance over the menu and I was glad I had dropped in. Beside the list of available pizza slices, which included everything from, well, everything to chicken Vesuvio and roasted garlic, there was baked pasta with plenty of options, including gnocchi and mostaccioli (similar to penne, but longer and curved; Italian for “moustache”), salads including tuna and white bean salad and a green apples and cranberries salad, Timpanini (stuffed pizza) including a Pizzeria Venti original called Bocce Balls (an Italian meatball the size of a grown man’s fist wrapped in baked pizza dough), stuffed crimini mushrooms, appetizers, soups and Italian desserts. I felt like I was able to sit down and, if I wanted to, enjoy a full Italian meal, spending four hours over salads, soups, pasta, pizza and great big bottles of Italian wine.
“We have plenty of ideas for what we want to do with this place,” said Shannon when I asked her about the food and wine menu. “We’re hoping to do more fun things in the future, like Italian wine tastings and an Italian wine club.” Their current wine menu is simple and direct, with a nice selection of chianti, sangiovese and vino de montepulciano, but they are planning on adding more as they get used to the business.
“We never thought we’d be here,” Shannon laughed. “We were both in sales and after we moved here a little over a year ago from Indianapolis, we saw a need for a good, affordable restaurant at the end of John’s Island.” So they decided to open one. After extensive research, the couple found Pizzeria Venti, a franchise that offered simple, inexpensive Italian faire with fine ingredients and one of the best training programs in the country.
“We spent a lot of time training,” Shannon said as she gestured toward the many photographs of themselves in northern Italy lining the walls. “We went to Mendocino, Montepulciano, northern Tuscany and Cortona. We even went to Sienna, but we just missed the races.” They did, however, come back with a bundle of PALIO flags and more knowledge about baking Italian pizza than they ever thought they would need to know. Today, however, the knowledge has come in handy and has had amazing results. The pizza at Pizzeria Venti is a proud tribute to it’s European brother. Fine, crisp crust, a touch of sauce and toppings of the highest quality. One bite of their red onion and feta pizza and my eyes widened. Too surprised to remember not to speak with my mouthful, I had to exclaim, “oh my goodness, I can taste the cheese!”
“We use the best cheese we can get,” said Bryan from behind the counter. He was just pulling out a fresh rectangle of pizza from the ovens to place in the clear counter display. “Along with the best sauce and imported Italian water for the crusts.” He also gave me a privileged glimpse of Sophia (Loren) and Gina (Lollobrigidia), the two charred earthen stones that they use for baking the pizzas. “You can’t have good pizza without seasoned baking stones, the crust won’t come out right,” Bryan pointed out.
Having only opened a couple months ago, Shannon and Bryan are still getting into the swing of running a restaurant, but first impressions are always the best and no matter how long they’ve worked that day or how tired they are, they greet every customer with a smile and a “how are you”, which is the key to a successful business in the south. The fact that the food is quite amazing and very reasonably priced won’t hurt, either.
Pizzeria Venti is located next to the Freshfield’s office at 133 Village Green Lane. They are hoping to be able to offer delivery by the end of summer and more fun Italian activities as well. For more information, please call Pizzeria Venti at 768-3684.