Nearly a decade after tragedy shuttered the doors, a legacy pizzeria reopens, carrying memory, expectations, and the unmistakable smell of Old Forge pizza…
There are easier ways to reopen a pizza shop.
You don’t usually have to carry the weight of a dead brother. Or the memory of what happened to him. Or the quiet expectation of an entire town that knows exactly how your sauce is supposed to taste.
But this is Old Forge. And nothing here, least of all pizza, is ever simple.
Ghigiarelli’s is back. Even though the restaurant announced several weeks ago that it would be reopening, seeing its doors officially open for business again had an emotional impact that was felt all across the NEPA. After nine years, the lights are on again at the South Main Street staple. Within an hour of reopening, they were sold out.
Because in Old Forge, pizza isn’t casual. It’s something damn near religion.
The restaurant closed in 2017 after the death of owner Robert Baron, a loss that rippled through the community. Years later, the story deepened with the discovery of his remains and a murder conviction tied to the case, details that could have buried the place for good.
But Mark Baron chose something harder: reopening.
Not to reinvent it, but to honor it.
That meant months of work behind the scenes, tweaking recipes, testing batches, chasing a standard that lives as much in memory as it does in any written formula. In Old Forge, where “red” and “white” trays define the local language, getting it right isn’t optional.
It’s everything.
The reopening landed on Good Friday. While that day is certainly a high-demand pizza holiday, Ghigiarelli’s could have opened in the middle of the night on a random Tuesday, and people would have shown up.
Orders poured in between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m., with pickups later in the day. By early afternoon, they were out of pizza.
And still, people came.
Some to order for the next day. Some just to see it open again.
For now, Ghigiarelli’s is operating simply: takeout only, limited hours, red and white trays. No shortcuts. No rush to scale.
There are plans to bring back dine-in service, eventually. But that’s secondary.
What matters is that it’s open.
In a town where pizza shops don’t just compete, they coexist, support came quickly. Local restaurateurs voiced encouragement. Offers to help weren’t symbolic; they were real.
Because in Old Forge, every place is part of something bigger.
And when one disappears, it’s felt.
So when one returns, it’s embraced.
Ghigiarelli’s isn’t just another reopening. It’s a continuation. A piece of a tradition that stretches back generations, now carried forward under difficult, deeply personal circumstances.
You can taste that, whether you realize it or not.
It’s in the sauce. The crust. The way the box feels warm in your hands.
And for a town that never forgot, that might be the most important ingredient of all.
