Aracri Pizzeria on Gay Street offers tasty Italian-American fare – The Columbus Dispatch

While seating ourselves in Aracri Pizzeria on Gay Street during a recent weekday visit, my designated dining companion and I gave the Downtown restaurant a once-over. 

We saw a long, narrow and inviting space with parlor-style furniture, a compact bar (with a few Ohio brews on tap), vintage brick and wood, subway-style tiles, a tall raftered ceiling, a lengthy fabric-covered banquette and stout wooden tables. 

Adding to the cozy, counter-ordering place’s ambience were whimsical decorations and posters extolling Italian locations, cars and liquors plus smiling customers and notably personable servers — one who jokingly grasped a pizza paddle like a baseball bat during what appeared to be a social media photo op. 

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Taking this all in, as well as the aromas of fresh dough and long-cooked tomato sauce, my companion turned to me and said, “This place seems like it’s been around for decades.” 

Well, it has and it hasn’t.   

Aracri Pizzeria on Gay Street only opened in January. But operating under its previous name — Cafe Napolitana — the business had enjoyed “neighborhood favorite” status at different Downtown addresses for about three decades. (A related Aracri Pizzeria near the Ohio State campus, which is not part of this review, premiered in 2018).  

With the relocation and name change came a retooled menu. New York-style pizzas featuring house-made dough are still the focus, but several starters, sandwiches and pasta dishes are currently offered that include fresh dough baked into comforting bread.

Two hefty garlic bread rolls with crusty, oven-darkened, Parmesan-dusted exteriors and soft interiors played the second-fiddle part of the meatballs and garlic knots ($9), a crowd-pleasing appetizer that could function as an entree. The rolls/“knots” made fine, sopping-up partners for the dish’s star — a spot-hitting Italian-American-style casserole of five pleasant pork meatballs drenched in thick, tart-sweet, herb-accented house marinara sauce enriched by oven-browned mozzarella. 

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Glistening, right-from-the-oven, golden-brown baked dough enveloped pizzeria ingredients in the sausage roll ($13) and baked three-cheese calzone ($10). Served with sides of marinara, both dishes were hearty and satisfying, but I wish their innards had been more evenly distributed. 

I preferred the sausage roll — essentially a stromboli whose delightfully crinkly, lengthy shell held sauteed onions and peppers, oozing mozzarella and a garnish-sized portion of fennel-seed-flavored ground sausage. The heavier and breadier calzone wasn’t as crisp but it tasted good — provolone, mozzarella and alluringly milky ricotta made a formidable trio.   

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House dough gets baked into thin-crusted discs with puffy, toasty edges in the eatery’s signature pizzas. When taking advantage of Aracri’s fantastic dinner discount during happy hour (5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Wednesdays through Fridays), customers can enjoy an unbeatable pizza value: $5.50 for 10-inch (although they seemed bigger), one-item pies.

Prices otherwise range from $10 for a 10-inch cheese pizza to $30 for a whopping 16-inch supreme pizza adorned with every house topping (there are 14). A duly popular order — a 12-inch pie whose toasty-yet-pliable crust and good cheese were boosted by salty, slightly crisp pepperoni — costs $16.

Aracri’s chicken parmigiana, one of the better pasta entrees from a pizzeria I’ve had lately, is the same price. A piece of deep-fried boneless chicken breast so massive that it looked like a raft I could float away on was juicy beneath its crackly, cheese-enhanced breading. This was crowned with attractively browned provolone and mozzarella and then ladled with enough marinara to start my imaginary raft journey. Below deck was sauced spaghetti cooked to al dente — a rarity at many pizzerias in my experience. A garlic knot presented on the side played the role of life preserver.

No, it wasn’t a revelatory dish. But like most everything I sampled at new-yet-old Aracri, that Italian-American classic was a solid, good-tasting and rib-sticking reminder that, while embracing change is often reinvigorating, there’s something to be said for continuity, too.  

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Aracri Pizzeria

Where: 51 E. Gay St., Downtown

Contact: 614-224-3013, www.aracripizzeria.com

Hours: 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays and Tuesdays; 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Wednesdays and Thursdays; 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Fridays and Saturdasy; 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. Sundays

Price range: $8 to $30

Ambience: often lively yet cozy, vintage-looking Downtown space with parlor-style furniture, stout wooden tables, decorations celebrating Italian culture plus friendly and personable servers 

Children’s menu: no

Reservations: no

Accessible: yes

Liquor license: full bar

Quick click: The New York-style pizzas and Italian-American fare served at this rebranded and recently relocated old neighborhood favorite seem better than ever.