Tonight is the official opening of Delancey, the new pizza place on 70th, and it literally took blood, sweat and tears to get the place open. For the last few months, we’ve been following the progress of Brandon Pettit’s new restaurant on their often-updated Twitter page. From painting to building to making the concrete tables, Brandon and his wife have done just about all the work themselves. It hasn’t been easy. In July Brandon tweeted, “4 hours in the emergency room, cut thumb while shopping for stainless sheet, thankfully no tendon damage.” Then just one day before their soft opening last week, “Delancey is possessed, no one else is here, mirror fell off the wall and shattered in the bathroom, I walk in and the water is running.”
Brandon’s wife, Molly, the gal behind the popular food blog Orangette, has also written in detail about their trials and tribulations. “The cook we hired to help Brandon with the pizzas didn’t show up for his first official day of work — the day before our first pre-opening dinner,” she blogged. “Brandon has burned his business card in the pizza oven.” Between Brandon’s Tweets and Molly’s blog, it’s a fascinating look into the stressful life of launching a restaurant.
Rebekah Denn of “Eat All About It” took some video of the interior, the pizza-making and the actual pizza. Delancey will be open Wednesday – Sunday at 5 p.m. closing either 9-ish or 10-ish depending on the day. And as Brandon tweeted today, they will take reservations for parties of 6 – 10.