Casa di Stefano
Cooking with fire in Lower Sackville
BY LINDSAY WICKSTROM
PHOTOS MICHELLE DOUCETTE
You might say Casa di Stefano is an unlikely oasis, situated as it is in a Sackville strip mall with its Neapolitan wood-fired pizza oven and bustling ambiance. Sitting in the lively yet cozy space, one could easily forget they weren’t at a trendy downtown restaurant. But the neighbourly vibes are felt in the warmth, hospitality, and familiarity exuded by the owners to the space and people around them.
Engineer-turned-pizza-nerd, Maayan Harel, and his wife, Rita (fresh out of maternity leave), put a call out on Facebook looking for a business partner to help them launch a restaurant. They had been hosting pizza parties since they moved to Middle Sackville four years ago and built a pizza oven during the Covid years.
“I always liked having a lot of people over and feeding a lot of people,” says Maayan. “And with pizza it’s easy: you just make 10 times the dough, 10 times the sauce and 10 times the cheese and it’s pretty much the same thing. So for the last four years I’ve done pizza parties, many pizza parties with upwards of 50-60 people.”
But the couple realized they needed someone with more relevant experience in culinary arts/restaurant management.
Nissim Balas saw the Facebook post and showed it to his wife, Michal. They were both trained chefs with long careers, but Nissim had started a successful construction company, and Michal had her own nail business after a 7-year stint at The Bicycle Thief. They decided to hear Maayan and Rita out, and the two couples soon started hatching a plan, becoming friends along the way.
“I closed the clinic and sold everything, and here I am, back in the kitchen,” says Michal. “And I love doing nails. I love doing … art, but my true place is cooking, feeding, pastry.”
Maayan takes care of the pizza side of things, and Michal is in charge of the rest of the menu. While pizza is the focus of the restaurant, the theme is more “wood-fired cuisine” than strictly Italian.
The oven was custom-ordered from Italy and is the central hearth of the restaurant. The brand is Stefano Ferrara Forni, which is a fourth-generation oven builder out of Naples.
Maayan explains, “When we were looking at ovens, there was the easy route of buying an oven from the U.S. … But then a friend of mine was like, ‘How about you try and get something from Italy?’ And I’m like, that’s crazy … [But] it was actually cheaper to get a traditional oven made in Naples and ship it here than to get one from the States [due to tariffs]. It had to go on a dedicated container and go through all the ropes to get here. So we decided to name the restaurant after the oven, and we named the oven Stefano.”
They opened a few days before Easter Weekend and had no idea how busy they were going to be. It was a struggle to keep everything stocked and staffed.
“And we were like, okay it’s the first week. Okay, it’s the first month. Okay, it’s the first two months. Yeah, it’s still … There’s a buzz. But you know what? Thank God the buzz is still there!” says Michal.
Three months later, the gang is a well-oiled machine. Maayan and Michal are the main powerhouses behind the food, Rita focuses on front-of-house and communications, and Nissim (the handyman, who built and designed the space), also chefs it up after working his construction job all day.
The menu features appetizers, pastas, salads, sandwiches (made with pizza dough and focaccia), pizzas, and desserts.
“On the one hand, we wanted to give it some Italian spark, and on the other hand, we wanted to keep it simple and local,” says Michal. “Because we’re not feeding Italians, we’re feeding Canadians. So we wanted to approach the crowd, the people that we’re feeding.”
You’ll find wood-fired garlic fingers (laden with fresh garlic) and Pictou County Pizza alongside fettucine Bolognaise, roasted artichokes, and cheesy eggplant.
I get to sample a good chunk of the menu, including the most popular appetizer, The Brassica Royale (roasted brussels sprouts meet caesar salad), the tender Bonfire Artichokes (which were kind of like tender artichoke “wings”), and a couple of salads. The Goat & Grain Salad (mixed greens, creamy goat cheese, grains and avocado) is tremendous, and the Tuscan Panzanella is light and colourful. Rather than using soaked stale bread, Michal serves it with a side of her focaccia crostini, which is so addictive I could have sat there all night just drinking wine and snacking on it.
The lasagna is one of the best I’ve had. It is a tidy stack with perfect layers of bechamel, beef ragu, and roasted vegetables.
I am also impressed by the Beet & Four Cheese Ravioli: tender pockets of spinach and cheese coated in a vibrant beet cream sauce.
Michal’s pastas are hand-made with perfect texture and bite. Clearly, Casa Di Stefano is no one-trick pizza pony.
But the pizza is, indeed, excellent stuff that warrants a drive to Sackville.
Maayan uses a Neapolitan oven, 00 Caputo Flour and San Marzano tomatoes, but he’s not trying to make “authentic” Neapolitan pizza per se, nor does he care about VPN certification.
“The goal was to do something that’s good. It doesn’t have to be certified. We don’t need any certificate on the wall other than the food permit.”
Maayan makes a 72-hour slow fermentation biga (a pre-ferment made of flour, water and yeast) which is the starter for the dough. Since the dough absorbs so much water (72% hydration), the intense heat of the oven quickly vaporizes it, which puffs up the crust. The action creates a crispy soft crust with “leopard marks” characteristic of Neapolitan pizza. The pizza is thin and pliable with an airy, structured cornicione.
The sauce is classic and simple: San Marzano tomatoes are hand-crushed and combined with garlic and salt. Each slice is saturated in flavour and has a satisfying cheesy chew.
Maayan favours a standard mozzarella for the pizzas, but he is also a big supporter of local cheesemaker Ciro, known for his traditional Italian cheeses.
The Queen’s Classic (Maayan’s take on a Margherita) and The Smoky Pesto feature Ciro’s scamorza and smoked scamorza, respectively. Any pizza can come with a scoop of Ciro’s stracciatella, and his cheeses are also featured on the charcuterie board.
While I can appreciate the simplicity of a good Margherita, I am happy to see big, bold flavours like anchovies and blue cheese represented (Michal is a pizza maximalist and insists that Margherita is too “boring”).
While The Crowd Pleaser (cupping pepperoni and aged parmesan) is the most popular pizza, The Mariner (briny anchovies, creamy goat cheese with a balsamic glaze) and The Blue Flame (blue cheese, pears, and dainty prosciutto flowers) are more my style.
The pizzas come to the table unsliced, with scissors on the side, and the act of cutting out a slice is oddly satisfying. I’m told some locals even use the scissors to make perfect garlic finger cut-outs.
By that point, I had sampled much of the menu, but made sure to save room for dessert. Michal, being a pastry chef, takes dessert seriously, and her carrot cake has converted many haters to lovers. It is the best seller, with layers of cream cheese icing and mascarpone. It is sweet, moist, and has the perfect cake-to-icing ratio.
Then there is the Chocolate Bliss cake, an incredibly rich, layered, chocolate cake that I couldn’t get enough of.
I finish with Stefano’s Treat: caramelized pineapple skewers with a “whisper of smoke” from the oven. Served with vanilla ice cream, this is a unique dessert that shows off the spirit of wood-fired cookery.
Local cans of beer and cider, and a delicious lemoncello spritzer that Rita whipped up, complemented the meal. This restaurant team has a unique mix of authenticity, hospitality, passion, warmth and vibrancy that is hard to match.
“We are two families and we want people to come here and feel like they’re part of the family,” says Maayan.
Sackville is lucky to have such a community foodie hub in its realm.
Casa di Stefano
111 Cobequid Road, Lower Sackville
BISTRO & PIZZERIA $$-$$$ L/D (GF/V)
casadistefano.ca
