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Photos courtesy of Rosati’s Chicago Pizza.
A deep dish pizza from Rosati’s.
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Photos courtesy of Rosati’s Chicago Pizza.
Rosati’s Chicago Pizza serves square-cut pizzas on thin, deep dish, double dough, stuffed and gluten-free crusts.
Lee Branch will soon be home to the first Rosati’s Chicago Pizza in the state.
The Chicago-based eatery will be located next to Chicken Salad Chick in the former Uncle Maddio’s space, 210 Doug Baker Boulevard, Suite 100. Family-owned and operated, Rosati’s has been around since 1964. When Midwest residents began to move to Florida and Arizona, the business began to expand.
Mark Schmidt, vice president of marketing, said what makes Rosati’s different is they make everything from scratch, including the dough, and get fresh products locally.
“We make sure everything is fresh,” he said. “Our tagline is ‘Keeping It Real.’ It’s real and it’s good.”
All of the recipes are original from the Rosati family. The patriarch and owner, Fred Rosati, is 102. His son, Rick, is the company’s CEO.
The owners of the new Birmingham location are Tamara and Charles Seitz. The couple graduated from the University of Alabama and moved to the suburbs of Atlanta. While living in Suwanee, Georgia, they were frequent customers at their local Rosati’s in Cumming, dining there weekly.
Both were working as engineering managers before being laid off in July 2016. Charles got a new job in Mississippi and was commuting back to Georgia on the weekends when they decided to move closer to family and shorten his commute. The couple moved to Vestavia Hills in 2017. Finding themselves without a Rosati’s nearby, they decided to open a franchise.
“We did our research and ate at a lot of different pizza places around Birmingham,” Tamara Seitz said. “We decided to open up a Rosati’s, because there’s nothing like it.”
It took a while to find the right location, but once they came across the space in Lee Branch, they knew it was the right spot. They signed a lease, and their loan was approved in August 2018.
The Seitzes recently spent four weeks working 11-hour days at the Rosati’s training location in Illinois, cooking the products and learning the business. They’ve already hired a manager, and she attended the training with them.
The menu is extensive and features appetizers, salads, sandwiches and pastas in addition to pizza. Pie options include Chicago deep dish, thin crust, double dough, stuffed and gluten-free.
“We really do pile on the ingredients,” Schmidt said. “We are very generous with cheese. The pizza is cut into large squares. It’s a Chicago thing, and it’s really filling. You can have a couple meals from it for several days.”
Charles Seitz said, “Most of the typical pizza places around Birmingham serve brick oven pizzas. We use a bakers oven to cook the pizzas. Another unique thing is that our sausage is the Rosati’s family sausage recipe. The raw sausage cooks within pizza, and isn’t precooked like most places.”
The couple said they hope to open around the middle of March.
Dine-in and carry-out options will be available, and delivery (within a 5-mile radius) will follow a few weeks after opening.
“We want to be heavily involved in the surrounding schools and want to support the community,” Tamara Seitz said.
Rosati’s Birmingham will be open Sunday-Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., and Friday and Saturday, 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Pizza by the slice (cheese, pepperoni and sausage) will be available until 5 p.m. daily. The location will also serve beer and wine. For more information, visit rosatispizza.com.
Editor's note: This story was updated to reflect the correct business hours and oven type.
