Conzo's

1279 Bloor St W,
Toronto, ON M6H 1N7

Restaurant Categories

About the Restaurant

Conzoโ€™s is a casual pizzeria and eatery from the team behind Bloor West's popular Italian-American restaurant Sugo. The new spot is serving wood-fired pizzas, pasta, meats, and classic cocktails with a philosophy of simple recipes made with high-quality ingredients.

Following the success of Sugo, which opened its doors in 2016, partners Conor Joerin, Lamine Martindale, and Alex Wallen ventured to open Conzoโ€™s this February.

conzos-dining-space

โ€œI grew up down the street from here,โ€ explains chef and co-owner Conor Joerin. โ€œConzo was a nickname that was initially used to bully me as the only Irish kid in an Italian neighbourhood. It became my nickname, and when we were kicking around restaurant names it just seemed right to take some of that negativity and put it back out there with a positive spin.โ€

conzos-pizza-pepperoni

Joerin and his partners travelled across Canada and the U.S. to taste pizzas and develop their own recipe for the perfect pie, and it paid off. With seven choices for wood-fired pizzas made fresh in a hand laid brick oven, the inspiration behind each option work to defy traditional categories.

conzos-chef-Ivan

โ€œThe first time I ate Napoli pie was when Libretto opened on Ossington,โ€ recounts Joerin. โ€œSo if I was going to sell you a story of โ€˜authenticโ€™ Italian food, it would be fake. Itโ€™s not my story, and I didnโ€™t want to do it. My story is: I grew up down the street, eating Italian-American food, and so we tried pizzas everywhere from Detroit to California to Ontario and found our own narrative.โ€

The Food

Executive chef Ivan Kuuts works closely with pizzaiolo Fusako Shimada to craft each pizza to order.

conzo's-zucchini-pizza

The zucchini pizza ($28) has a white sauce base, and is accompanied by basil pesto, fior de latte, and thin rounds of zucchini topped with dollops of whipped ricotta. Itโ€™s finished with black pepper, basil, and olive oil.

conzo's-pepperoni-pizza

The pepperoni pizza ($28) has the perfect amount of kick with small flavourful cuts of meat, onion, chili, and basil.

conzos-skirt-steak

The Sicilian-style skirt steak ($18) is grilled and finished with olive oil, salt, and fish sauce. Having worked in Vietnam, Joerin has a particular affinity for kicking meat dishes up a notch with a quality umami-inducing fish sauce.

conzos-fettuccini

The fettucine ($18) is freshly made by Famiglia Baldassarre and topped with Sugoโ€™s recipe for a rich tomato sauce, Padano cheese, olive oil, and scallions.

conzos-bar-ape-gelato-bar

Though the popular Bar Ape doesnโ€™t usually make their gelato available in the winter, youโ€™ll be able to find a few of their delicious gelato bars at Conzoโ€™s year-round.

โ€œWhen you come to Sugo or Conzoโ€™s,โ€ says Joerin, โ€œweโ€™re cooking our story for you. My business partner Lamine and I grew up in Little Italy: one kid of Irish descent and one of West African descent. We were called nasty things and told we couldnโ€™t cook Italian food. But itโ€™s really something to welcome those people back in, give them a bit of love, and show them that we grew up in the same places, eating the same foods.โ€

The Drinksconzos-amaretto-sour

Mixologist Drew Dinsmore is behind the bar, pouring classic cocktails like the amaretto sour ($11).

conzos-espresso-martini

The showstopper on this cocktail menu is the espresso martini ($11), which is silky, packed with complementary flavours, and mixed with vodka and Kahlua.

The Space

conzos-sugo-american-tables

When you walk into Conzoโ€™s there are a series of small tables with checkered white and red tablecloths. The bar comes up on your left, and high-top tables stretch out on the right. The pasta and meats are prepared further down to the left, flanked by a bar with stool seating. The place is casual and bright, and your eye is drawn down to the kitchens beautiful brick wood-fired oven.

conzos-dining-room

โ€œWe realized all the pizzas we loved on our tasting tour were coming out of wood ovens,โ€ says Joerin. โ€œSo even though it delayed construction, we had to do it. The high school Lamine and I went to was being torn down, so I hopped the fence and took a few bricks from it, and we put them in the faรงade of the oven.โ€

CONZO'S-PiZZA-OVEN

โ€œItโ€™s things like that,โ€ Joerin continues, โ€œdoing this when I was told I couldnโ€™t, having Conzoโ€™s as the name, that mean so much to me now. We just want to show people that you can take some of that negative stuff and use it to build community. Toronto is the perfect place for that narrative.โ€

By: Saliha Chattoo, Posted: Mar. 6, 2020