Lauren Maslov, owner of Pietro’s in East Meadow, celebrated the family restaurant’s 50th anniversary this year.
“We're very excited,” she said. “Sometimes I can't even wrap my head around the whole thing, but here we are, 50 years later.”
It was 50 years ago, Maslov’s grandfather, Peter Ippolitio, opened the restaurant on March 1 in 1976. It was his first restaurant pizzeria that he did on his own. He opened previous eateries with his brother-in-law.
“He created the concept of the sesame seed crust pizza, and no one had done this before, and even to this day, not a lot of places even still do it,” Maslov said. “That was kind of his gimmick of sorts that he wanted to use to try and drum up some business.”
At first, the new type of pizza did not catch much traction. Ippolito dropped the price to completely free, which got the community hooked.
“That's what we're really known for,” Maslov said.
Pietro’s specialties go beyond pizza.
“We were also kind of this pasta house red sauce joint — the old school red and white tablecloth,” Maslov said. “As you come and you get chicken parm or a baked ziti or lasagna, and you sit there with your red and white tablecloth table in a booth, and people have continued to come back to that old school feeling for all these generations.”
Maslov’s grandfather died after 10 years of stewardship. Maslov’s father, John Arigo, a CPA by trade, took control in 1986.
“He was helping my grandmother out with the books, and then he started to fall in love with the with the business,” Maslov explained. “It was completely different than anything he had done career wise, so he ran it for a little while with my grandmother, and said, ‘you know what, I'm going to purchase the restaurant.’”
After 30 years, Pietro’s came to its next pivotal moment. After years of health struggles relating to cancer, Arigo decided it was necessary to sell the building. The challenges of maintaining a restaurant building separate from a strip mall was too great. After several years on the market, an interested buyer approached the family.
“I was in property management, working in Manhattan, and my parents came to the dinner table one Sunday dinner and said, ‘The restaurant sold, we're so happy,’” Maslov said. “I just started hysterical crying.
“My husband found me in the other room 20 minutes later, like ‘where'd you go?’” she continued. “I was sitting there going through old photo albums of the restaurant, and I was like, I can't believe this is an end of an era. This is my safe place, this is my home, this is a part of my life, this is part of my story, and he's like, ‘if the deal falls through, maybe we will buy it.’”
The interested buyers chose not to proceed at the last minute, just as the family realized how important it was to keep the restaurant. From that point forward, Maslov began her journey to preserve Pietro’s traditions and make the restaurant her own, upgrading tableware, building a patio, decorating for the holidays and more.
“We've recognized that in the last few years is probably post-COVID is that people are looking for an experience,” Maslov said. “They're not looking just to eat out, so we've tried to evolve with that. Right now, we recognize that doing special nights like a trivia night, bingo night, psychic night, those are the things that bring people in, and it gets everybody together.”
While Pietro’s journey has been long, the spirit has stayed the same.
“We obsess over every single detail, and every customer is just so precious to us,” Maslov said. “I didn't just inherit a restaurant; like I inherited people's memories, which is really cool.”
For the rest of the year, Pietro’s will be selling a pizza pie for $19.76, commemorating the year of its founding. Pietro’s also offers other attractions, such as birthday parties and event catering. For more information, visit Pietros-Pizza.com.
