Lamberti family reopens restaurant with a new post-pandemic concept

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The owners of a pizzeria that closed early in the pandemic of reimagine their concept to include a market. We're really trying to be there for our guests. It's just one example of how the pandemic has impacted the restaurant business model. This is a podcast about food in and around Philadelphia quick, delicious flavorful bite. That was really hard for me to get into. It has a wood-burning oven from Italy. Cookie stuff to scream as quickly as you can and then resume the 5K, is what's cooking on KYW.

I'm Hannah's cousin. It's at 707 Chestnut. Street with Rosita Lamberti who is director of restaurants for Aldo Lamberti family of restaurant. Tell me where we are Rosita. Thank you so much. And I like to have you. We are at Lamberti Pizza & market, like you said, right at 707 Chestnut Street, we recently opened our doors with a brand new concept. Then we're just so excited about it though. Our concept is both Pizza & market, so you can come in and you can grab a slice of pizza to go. We have ready-made sandwiches, pastas entrees. And then we have a whole grab-and-go section that has vegetable sides again, on Tracy, sasses fresh-made pasta things that you can grab and then take home with you to heat up. So how much has the pandemic influenced, what? You're opening, what your concept is actually, this is an official come back. We were actually down the street, just two doors down, and we were forced to close down because of the pandemic, we were missing the tourist traffic people started working from home, so

At lunch traffic from people working in the area as well as the tourists visiting the Independence Visitor Center and the other tourist attractions in the are we really are bread and butter, that's how he knows. That's what we thrived on and when the pandemic hit, original location, West Pizza Fresca we we try to keep our doors open for delivery and takeout, But ultimately we were just missing that traffic. So we closed. We had the opportunity to rent this larger space, a few months later. So, my father Aldo reimagined it with a little bit of a different concept, so it's meant for convenience. If it's fast, but without compromising flavor on quality of the food that we are known for as Liberty Family Restaurant. So how will be Imagining the, you know, the lunch traffic and the grab-and-go, how does that influence your business? Do you anticipate if people are not coming in to sit down, but they will come into grab-and-go, yes, we've actually seen Gasser, really excited about it. So they do they come in and grab something for lunch. And then at the same time, they'll take something home for

And that's the idea. That's what we're hoping to introduce our guests to is that you can come in and you can actually even grabbed dinner for the family, doesn't just have to be you and if you have picky eaters and things of that nature that you can get something special just for them. And we trying to make it super affordable to especially given the last year year-and-a-half with the pandemic. We're really trying to be there for our guests and do what we can do it is Grab & Go, but you have people at the counter that are making food fresh and packing it, or they can pack it at the counter. Still go with the refrigerated section. But then, if you walk down the counter, you'll see that we have sandwiches that, we can heat up that are ready to go. We were entrees that are ready to go that we can heat up for you as well as pizza by the slice. It seems like you're getting more and more casual because you also have Caffe Aldo Lamberti in Cherry Hill which is white tablecloth. You have Positano Coast, which is an old city tell me about your Evolution. So well, I mean that's my dad right there. So he is the creative genius.

Behind our family, a restaurant. So I think that he will still love Caffe Aldo Lamberti and luckily we've been busy as opposed to Tunnel post, we've been busy and you know, we're just trying to cater to what else is out there. So if you want to fine dining experience and live in the door, the area or willing to drive over the over the bridge, you can come visit us at the cafe if you're looking for a little bit more fun and maybe something with happy Buzz. The brunch with bottomless mimosas excetra you can go to Positano. And if you're looking for something quick and fast and you're just in the mood for pizza salad sandwiches, you found care how has the past year been for you. And how do you envision the comeback for not just you, but all the restaurants to be totally Frank. March of 2020 was a really scary time for the restaurant industry as a whole and the mandates foreclosures came. We really don't know what to do. I will say that my dad Aldo is a, they announced the closure is he said we're not going to close. We are opening tomorrow and were going to be doing, takeout and delivery. And we did, we created

Turns out it was a challenging at first, we don't really know what we were doing. We had never really done, take out and most of the restaurant, but we did and then, you know, slowly but surely we are a lot of oil gas released the board at the end. That was the most amazing thing. And I think I've heard that over and over from other restaurant tours, just how loyal the gas work because everyone everybody loves restaurants going out his life. You know, my life revolves around food. I'm Italian but I'm also in the restaurant business. But what we found was that people really want a restaurant Sister Wives. Do it, whether they were ordering delivery, whether they were ordering, takeout from side, pick up, depending on, which restaurant, that is how we made it through. And then with our outdoor, dining weeks, banded, or outdoor dining. And most of our restaurants, and we were able to cater to those guests that wanted outdoor dining. And we really did see a lot of gas to come visit and loyalty excetera. So I think restaurants are ready for a comeback. I think, as a Man dates are being lifted, people are ready to go out which seeing an uptick in reservations as well as it down two.

And take out orders. So it's been an interesting. Interesting, turnovers you can stay in last month or so, it sounds like as far as the restaurant industry is going, you are a kind of situating yourself in a position to diversify. Cuz you've got casual you fat white tablecloth, you've got, you know, if the bottomless brunch we have a great reputation. People really people recognize our name and they recognized the body of our food. So, they know whether it's a fine dining experience of find brunch experience or grabbing Pizza that you're getting the same quality of food. Even if the Ambiance is our friend, I felt tell me about the market. Let's, let's walk to the cases. Yeah, I want a, I want a connoisseur walking in the restaurant, and we're going to the cases. You've got cases on one side and like, and Pizza on. The other gets here is a refrigerated section. So you can see we have a little bit of everything. So we have prepared foods, we have salad pasta with some chicken dishes. We have our famous garlic bread, which we have at most of our

Jason some sides, some sandwiches. But then we also have, you know, jars of Olives that are ready to go. We have soups and sauces that are ready to go with a handmade pasta that we collectively work with talluto's. So you can buy handmade pasta and you can buy a jar of sauce and you can take it to go, we are expanding our offering is a little bit. So now we have some Cheez-Its and burrata some Salon he's so you can he don't even make a fist and of course we have desserts and it seems a little bit like the business model that the Bruno's Brothers started with one of my favorite places. But they definitely brought to the Philadelphia Market. I think the grab-and-go section for differentiates us a little bit. I think is all of these items on this side to that are made to that are ready to go, that we can heat up for you. So there we had pulled pork, we have roast beef, Stromboli and calzone, then we have entrees that go to the refrigerated section but that are ready to be heated for you, so that you can eat them here or take him back to the off.

That's or wherever it is. You're going sandwiches that we can also heat up ready to go. The fried chicken is particularly popular, as is my favorite, of course, the roast pork and broccoli rabe. And then we have a variety of pizzas. So many to choose from that you can order by the slice. You could also order pizza hole, if you have a little bit more time, you started to talk about the desert, we did talk about the desert to have a variety of options here, has been our tres, leches cake, as well as our limoncello cake. I can let it run out of the trees are not. There it is to Tres Leches Cake right over there and now we have frozen desserts over there too. So especially as it gets warmer out. This on seasonably Warm Spring weather, we're having we have some frozen desserts, some gelato some for babies that are ready to go over. These are beautiful. He's like plastic, champagne flutes, they are actually glass eyeglass. You're buying a glass, can we have chocolate chocolate, hazelnut limoncello and then guava mango guava, mango.

We order that money don't make the gelato is and we got them from an Italian company which might be familiar with bendy. They have some great, great, great desert. Oh, what is this, the orange gelato in the R&R bait store at the store? But I actually am the whole fruit though as a little bit of difference in two things that is vanilla and chocolate ice cream with a maraschino, cherry in the middle and I found to come here every single day. We have something new going on, so there's four different kind of bumpas going on. Now there's a peanut butter one of passion fruit one and that green one might be men. Are these like traditional Italian dessert. These are traditional Italian desserts. I think they do have a little bit of a living Americans been to them just to touch right there a dessert that you can find. Another of those sorbet is what kind of Renovations you have to do. I know this was Rosa Blanca. That was fancying. Out-of-market, there was a bar here that we

That's where are grab-and-go case is branded up. There was a lot of teal and other color than here, so we painted everything white. Yeah, we have courts. We have we had a Philadelphia artist. Sean, martorano, I want to say his name is who painted these various Graphics throughout the restaurant with the ingredients, like fresh vegetables. Slimy things that we use within the app for restaurant in our items and we we just we really wanted to frighten, frighten it up. And what I've actually heard a lot of gas stay when they walked in and said they were going to call this sober, right? It's so areas. So clean and neat in here. Which is not what are your goals are expectations for this year?

You know, we are excited that we were able to open, it took a long time for us since we originally rented the space to the time that we opened recently. In the slimy, will be out in cookies and crackers and jams and things of that nature from you. I think as more and more people go back to work. I think I keep hearing a lot of lot of people that I know are going back to their offices and September. I think there's going to be an increase in gas flow, and we're really excited about that. All right. Where can people find you online? Lamberti Pizza market.com. Rosita Lamberti is director of restaurants for Aldo Lamberti family of restaurants, and their newest addition to the family is here at 707 Chestnut Street, it's called Lamberti Pizza & Market. Thank you so much Rosita. Thank you. Appreciate it.

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