ADDIO E BUONA FORTUNA, CON AMORE!

Damn Shame

ADDIO E BUONO FORTUNA, CON AMORE!

Today, June 29, 2025, will be added to my list of very bad days in history. Because today, after 58 years of delicious and delightful service to Levittown, NY, Domenico’s Italian Restaurant is serving up their last pizza. Damn shame. I first went to Domenico’s the day he opened in 1967. I was 8 years old.

Back then Dominic Belcastro’s’ little pizzeria was a few doors down from today’s location. It was just north of the German Deli. Just a few stools and a couple of tables. A few years later they relocated to the corner of the shopping center, right next to Brother’s Pub. I would get a slice and a Coke almost every day of my youth until I hit my teens and developed a taste for his seafood, which was incredible.

Twice a week, every Wednesday and Saturday, I’d walk in for a take out order of Linguine with red clam sauce and a dozen baked clams. It got to the point where I didn’t even have to place the order. I’d get about two feet inside the door and Dominic, standing like the Swiss Guard by the reservation podium, would shout out to his army of white-coated cooks—“Linguine Red! Dozen Baked!” How could you not love that?

I bet he knew every standing order of his regulars and they got the same treatment. There were a lot of good Italian restaurants in Levittown back then. Sammy’s Inferno. Caruso’s. Don Ciccio’s. But there was just something special and different about Domenico’s. The food of course, was outstanding, largely based on Dominic’s Calabrese upbringing. But there was something else, something intangible. A sense of family, maybe. Certainly a sense of community because you couldn’t go in there without seeing someone you knew.

And that is about as comforting as comfort food can get. My Saturday’s with Domenico’s take out was spent with Mom watching Chiller Theater on the big old RCA. On Wednesday my sister Connie would pick up our orders and we’d watch St. Elsewhere. And now, sigh, Domenico’s is going elsewhere, too.

Even after I moved away from NY, upon my return visits I did not go directly to the old family house on Abbey Lane. I landed at LaGuardia, took the bus from there to Woodside, took the LIRR to Hicksville and hopped a cab directly to Domenico’s. One time I had been gone for almost 7 years. But when I walked in the door, there was Dominic. He took one look at me and yelled “Linguine Red and a Dozen Baked!”

He had watched me grow up, along with thousand of other kids who first visited his little pizzeria a few doors down. And in 2016 I took my son on his first trip to NY since he was an infant. He had never seen a clam in his life, let alone ate one, and he simply devoured them. The calamari, too! And when I make my own baked clams at home he always tells me, “These are great, Dad, but Dominico’s was better.” And the little Nunzio was right. And that, sadly, brings me to the end of this memory. But before I go I just want to say two things:

One: Thank you to all the staff who worked at Domenico’s over the years, including my best friend Tom and my sister-in-law Debbie, and Dominic, his indomitable self.

ADDIO E BUONA FORTUNA, CON AMORE!

Two: What are the chances SOMEBODY can send me the Domenico’s recipe for baked clams???!!! Or would you have to kill me?

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