Honors for Anopoli Ice Cream Parlor after over 100 years

Not long after the father and son duo of Steve and Manny Saviolakis opened Anopoli Ice Cream Parlor and Family Restaurant at 6920 Third Avenue, on March 6, 1995, Kathleen Hanlon was there. The Bay Ridge Towers resident is still a regular, 17 years later. And although she raves about the food, it is the personal touch that has made it her perennial pick.

“They’re friendly people, very friendly, very warm, and so is the help,” Hanlon said. “That’s what keeps me coming back. I go to other places, but this is my favorite.”

Hanlon was enjoying her lunch on the afternoon of March 2, when State Senator Marty Golden presented Anopoli with a certificate of achievement celebrating 115 years of serving the community by a restaurant in that location.

And although the Saviolakis family has only run the business for the last 17 years, Manny still takes considerable pride in the recognition.

“This is an unexplainable feeling,” he said. “I’m in awe.”

In the preceding century, the neighborhood mainstay had several different incarnations, even at one time being run by former Hinsch’s Luncheonette owner John Logue, who still supplies the restaurant with homemade ice cream and candy. Yet Steve Saviolakis says the formula for Anopoli’s success is simple.

“My prices are very reasonable,” he explained. “I have good food and good service.”

The food is good – as Golden points out – because it is locally made.

“They’ve got fresh homemade ice cream,” he said. “They’ve got fresh homemade candy. And it’s got that nice neighborhood feel to it.”

That’s exactly why, the senator says, the locals keep coming back for more.

“You can come in here and you’ll see the same people at the same time that have been coming here for years and years,” Golden said.

That includes regulars like Bay Ridge native Linda Denoto, who has been coming to the historic restaurant site since she was a child.

“I like the atmosphere,” Denoto said. “It’s cozy. It’s homey, and of course the food.”

And it’s an atmosphere that the Saviolakises – who have 13 years left on their current lease – have no intention of changing.

“Say I had an opportunity to buy the building, as much as I’d like to, you don’t change a place like this,” Manny said, and pointing to the vintage décor, he added, “People come here for this.”