The Italian-American restaurant Pizza Man, located on Downer Avenue, recently reopened its doors on Friday, September 27 after closing in winter of 2023. Bought by Thomas Schafer and Krzysztof Zielinski in early 2024, the restaurant was moved back to Shorewood following the closing of its other location on Humboldt Avenue in Milwaukee.
Wael Hadid is the general manager of Pizza Man, and began working under the new ownership.
“My experience in the past is managing restaurants and hotels,” Hadid said. “Prior to Pizza Man, I was working at The Pfister Hotel, managing the banquet and the milk kitchen.”
Hadid finds his work at Pizza Man to be similar to working at the hotel.
“It’s the same field of hospitality,” Hadid said. “The Pfister Hotel was dealing with food and special events [as well].”
Hadid finds the quantity of people to be the main difference between working at Pizza Man and Pfister.
“We used to deal with 1,000–1,200 people at The Pfister Hotel in their big ballrooms,” Hadid said. “Pizza Man [is] smaller, but almost the same concept, like fine dining,” Hadid said.
Pizza Man offers a unique menu that is focused on original Italian cuisine.
“We have Italian, authentic recipes that Pizza Man has been using for about 40 years, and we are totally different from any other pizzeria around,” Hadid said. “The thin crust dough or the pan crust and the deep dish are totally different from any other pizza in this area.”
Though they specialize in pizza, Pizza Man has a variety of other foods on their menu.
“We have a nice selection of authentic Italian dishes, including pastas and steaks,” Hadid said. “We have ravioli, we have spicy ravioli, we have meatballs and pasta. We have chicken marsala, and other dishes, including salads, like Caesar salad, cow salad, and apple salad. We also have seafood, [and] every day we have a chef [specialty] dish … We have a nice variety of good, healthy, authentic dishes besides the pizza.”
Pizza Man employees Nina Papikiants and Shirley Heaviland, SHS juniors, have seen major renovations to the new restaurant first-hand.
“They have taken out the booths and changed them into high tops and reconfigured the bar,” Heaviland said.
According to Papikiants, the atmosphere of the remodeled restaurant has also changed.
“[Pizza Man] has turned more upscale, and changed from a family restaurant to an ‘evening out’ restaurant,” Papikiants said.
Additionally, the new Pizza Man location now offers live music sessions on Wednesdays from 6 to 10 p.m.
“It’s always something different,” Hadid said. “Sometimes we have keyboard or guitar [players], [and sometimes] blues or jazz.”
All three employees stated that the restaurant has been receiving an increasing amount of reservations, and its wine is becoming popular as a specialty.
Hadid has also noticed a rise in people reexploring the old location.
“We never advertised when we reopened,” Hadid said. “[When people are] passing by and seeing us open they get excited, and every day we have more new faces.”