Peek inside Pizza Shop, opening soon
July 1, 2022
Brooklyn-style pizza will be ready by the slice or the whole pie with the opening next week of Pizza Shop.
Josiah Urban, who opened his first restaurant on the Jersey Shore five years ago, has moved it here. The grand opening is Wednesday in a retail center at Empire Place along 41st Street in front of The Empire Mall.
“Everything is made from scratch in the traditional Brooklyn style. Our actual recipe for the dough and sauce is from a New York pizzeria in the 1960s,” said Urban, who worked with his wife’s family in the pizza business. “It’s New York authentic and then interpreted differently.”
The pizzas are tossed by hand and then baked in a gas-fired brick oven at 600 degrees, he said.
From start to finish, it takes 10 minutes to make a pizza, but “that takes a lot of skill to get that fast at it,” Urban said. If there are lots of orders, it will take longer than 10 minutes for a pizza.
“We try to get everything done in 45 minutes or under. On Friday and Saturday nights, we encourage customers to call ahead, and we’ll give them a time when it will ready.”
For people who don’t have a lot of time, Pizza Shop will have slices ready to go. One special offers two slices and a drink for $8.
And they aren’t tiny slices. “That will definitely feed you,” Urban said.
Pizza Shop’s pies come in two sizes: 12 and 19 inches. Customers will find specialty pizzas, or they can build their own, picking from 36 toppings.
“Our cheese pizza is less than $20 and can feed a family of four. We are for everybody. People can come in and feed their family.
“Cheese pizza in a lot of ways is my favorite,” he said. “Everything that makes the recipe so special, you can taste the sauce, the cheese, the dough.”
The menu includes pasta dishes, including lasagna made with Italian sausage instead of ground beef that’s from a recipe from Italy in the 1940s. There’s a classic spaghetti with housemade meatballs. Diners will have four sauces to choose from: marinara, white, vodka and pesto.
Sandwiches are built on focaccia that’s made from scratch.
“It’s a bread made from pizza dough. It’s pretty dense piece of bread. It’s fresh baked with a little rosemary, a little diced onion and tomato on top. It’s coated in olive oil and has a great flavor to it.”
There are calzones, boneless wings in eight flavors, salads and fried Oreos for dessert.
Pizza Shop will serve fountain Coke products with unlimited refills. It doesn’t have a beer and wine license, but diners can bring their own, he said.
Customers will order at the counter. There is seating for two dozen people inside and a half-dozen outside. It’s also dog-friendly.
Delivery through Door Dash will be available.
While Pizza Shop has sufficient staffing, it’s still hiring, Urban said. Starting wages are $15 an hour plus tips.
“I would prefer to get full time,” he said. “It’s kind of a hard product to handle; it does require some training.”
Urban, wife Toni Cruthirds and their two rescue dogs have made Sioux Falls their home.
“Honestly, I plan on staying on here as my major location for the business. It’s a very pro-business state. As we expand, I think it would be a good place to be centered.”
Pizza Shop has a location in Oxford, Mississippi, and is opening one in Frisco, Texas.
The restaurant will open at 11 a.m. daily, closing at 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday.
