Food truck Bella Sorella to launch restaurant
The two sisters who founded Bella Sorella food truck and who have been serving up Neopolitan-style pizzas from their mobile wood-fired ovens since 2013 are planning to open a brickand-mortar restaurant.
The project is still early in its development stage, but if all goeswell, the newrestaurant could open in late summer or early fall of 2021 at 14 E. Main St. in Tipp City.
Thefounders are Elizabeth Corrado Weizman of Clayton, who started using her first brick oven more than a dozen years ago in her backyard; and her sister, GailCorrado Okafor of Dayton, who previously spent 12 years in the Bay Area in California, where she trained tobecome a professional chef, before returning to theDaytonarea.
The food truck founders are inthe process of purchasingthebuilding, knownasthe Benkins building, Weizman
told this news outlet.
“We have not yet closed on the building. We don’t anticipate any problems, but we still have an inspection and closing process to go through,” Weizman said.
“We’ve been looking around for a brick-and-mortarforseveralyearsandknew this space was for us. It has
everything we need: space, location, andespecially, room for both of our trucks. It’s a dream location for what we want to do.”
Weizman said she feels the communities north of Dayton are underserved in many aspects. Tipp City, she said, “likes their small business, supports them, and the
other businesses therework together.”
The 11,000-square-foot building has a second floor, which the founders plan to use for catering, which Weizmansaid is “a huge part of our business. We will continue to run both trucks in addition to offering a family-friendlydining roomin the downstairs space ... . We’re anticipatingwe can seat 140 to 160 downstairs with extra
seating overflow upstairs if not being used for the private catering space, which can seat 100 to 150.” A patio also is planned. “Our menu will be our wood-fired pizzas, salads, some appetizers and desserts,” Weizman said. “We will continue to grow our family gardenandfarmsowe can provide amajority of the herbs, vegetables, and pork for themenu. We have some special and unique things planned for both menu and the aesthetics. And we will offer local craft beer, domestic beer and wine.”
Thecoronaviruspandemic has pushed back the founders’ projected timeline, and Weizman is being treated for a form of blood cancer, but Weizman said she and her sister are hoping to start build-out before the end of 2020 and to open in late summer or early fall 2021.
“This is our eighth year running the trucks, and we realized, ifwe want to grow Bella Sorella, the trucks can only handle somuch capacity,” Weizman said. “So the natural step was a family brick-and-mortar.”
Bella Sorella already has a staff of 15 to20, andplans call for adding “at least another 20 to 30” by the time it opens, Weizman said.