Wicked Pie Pizza is opening in downtown Puyallup

A second-generation Italian restaurant family is expanding again.

Mary and Randy Anderson, owners of Orting’s Route 66 Pizzeria, are opening Wicked Pie Pizza in downtown Puyallup.

The 50-seat restaurant is opening in the former home of J.C.’s Music, and if you’re thinking to yourself that the restaurant’s been a project-in-the-works for a pretty long time, you’d be right. They started demolition in October 2015.

“We definitely took our time,” said Mary Anderson. Her father, Italo Carosiello, owned Italo’s Casa Romana near Seattle’s Columbia City before he moved the restaurant to Lake City. Mary and Randy met and worked together at Italo’s.

In 1994, the Andersons decided to open their own pizza place and started Route 66 Pizzeria in Graham before moving the restaurant to Orting in 1996. About five years ago, they opened a pizza stand at the Washington State Fair. They grew their restaurant arsenal to include New York Vinny’s Pizza, with locations in Federal Way and Lacey.

They weren’t looking to expand in downtown Puyallup, but when their daughter-in-law Monica Anderson was out for a jog one night, she noticed that the space on Meridian was for lease.

The restaurant will feature a gas-plumbed stove from Wood Stone, a Bellingham stove maker. Anderson said that oven will change the character of their pizza. While they cook the pizza at Orting’s Route 66 with a conveyor oven, the stone deck in the Wood Stone oven will cook the pizza at a much higher heat, she said. Because of the heat difference, they changed the formula of their dough, which they make daily using a poolish (dough-starter) the way her father did. The same tomato sauce used at Route 66 will be served at Wicked Pie.

The menu is more focused at Wicked Pie. The opening menu will include eight or nine specialty pies (and a build-your-own option), a few appetizers, two sandwiches and two pastas (the bolognese is Italo’s recipe).

Anderson’s son Randy, who designed the menu at Wicked Pie and will help run it with his wife Monica, has selected slightly more premium topping choices, said Mary. She described one house pie with fresh ricotta and mozzarella, fresh oregano, sausage, bacon and pepperoni. A pizza called the Flying Pig will come with five kinds of pork. There’s another that comes with a garlic-infused olive oil with fresh mozzarella, prosciutto and caramelized onions.

A beer and wine menu will be served, as will cocktails. The restaurant will be for diners 21 and older only.

Table service will be offered. Expect an opening in late December or early January.

This story was originally published December 22, 2016 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Wicked Pie Pizza is opening in downtown Puyallup."