As smooth and satisfying as its beloved Artichoke slice itself, the site of a brand spanking new Artichoke Basille’s Pizza sign going up at the corner of 91st Street and Fourth Avenue might be just as exciting for Ridge residents.
That’s right, the New York City staple is gearing up to open a new location in Bay Ridge, the family owned pizza joint’s second brick-and-mortar shop in the borough after Brooklyn’s first opened in Park Slope last summer.
“We’re really psyched to be in Bay Ridge,” Artichoke co-owner Francis Garcia told the Brooklyn Reporter. “We looked at the space about a year ago and it wasn’t really the right time for us, but now we’re just really excited to be there. We grew up in Staten Island but I hung out in Bay Ridge throughout my whole 20-something years, so I have a lot of love for Bay Ridge and we’re really looking forward to opening.”
Ridgeites, who can expect the joint to open its doors in about a “week, week and half,” according to Garcia, are already pulling out their elastic pants.
Jesse Wynn, a lifelong Brooklynite and self-proclaimed “MVPE (Most Valuable Pizza Eater)” is “so excited for an artichoke pizza to open closer to home.”
“I’m going to eat it at least three times a week,” added Dyker Heights resident Lawrence Petrosino.
“We were going to take that Yellow Hook space about a year ago,” Garcia explained of the Third Avenue location that was up for grabs after Yellow Hook Grille shuttered earlier this year. “It’s just very, very difficult to park [around there] and it’s such a monster of a space, it was so big. I didn’t get that warm, fuzzy feeling like when I found 91st and Fourth. It feels like an Artichoke and looks like an Artichoke.”
Started by Garcia and his cousin Sal Basille, after working at family restaurant Basille’s in Staten Island, the first Artichoke Basille’s location opened up shop on 14th Street in 2008, and hasn’t stopped growing since.
The Bay Ridge location will be the eatery’s seventh restaurant – not including its outpost in LaGuardia Airport. Locations elsewhere include three in Manhattan, one in Astoria and one all the way on the West Coast, in Berkeley, California.
Artichoke Bay Ridge coming soon! pic.twitter.com/2sReLOWzGb
— Artichoke Pizza (@artichokepizza) September 30, 2016
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