About Restaurant Openings Around DC
A guide to the newest places to eat and drink.
DC has lots of Neapolitan pies. It’s also home to plenty of jumbo slices. Sonny’s Pizza, now open in Park View, is hoping to bring some attention to the underrepresented grandma-style rectangular.
The restaurant comes from Max Zuckerman and Ben Heller, who also run coffee shop/bar Colony Club next door. The two DC-area natives grew up on classic slice places, like Vace, and wanted to create a casual place where a family could gather after soccer practice or a couple could come for a date.
Sonny’s pizzas have focaccia-like crusts with pan-crisped bottoms, but Zuckerman notes they’re not quite as thick and bread-y as Sicilian-style pizza. The whole tray pizzas, sliced into eight pieces, feed three to four for $28 to $34. Among the options: the “Pesky Mario” with mozzarella, mushrooms, rapini, and Calabrian chilis, as well as the “Pizza Don” showered in arugula and salami. You can also get pizza by the slice ($3.75 to $4.50).
The slim menu also includes five sandwiches, including chicken parm and Italian options, served on house-made sesame seed focaccia. You’ll also find garlic knots, beef-pork meatballs with ricotta, and heaping salads for a crowd. To drink, there’s wine on tap and a handful of beers in cans.
The new spot has somewhat of an old-school feel thanks to tables made out of school desks—complete with student etchings like “jocks suck”— and benches from a former bowling alley. A postcard with an image of the FC Barcelona soccer team that Zuckerman picked up on a trip to Italy two summers ago is blown up to cover an old billboard that spans one wall.
By the end of the week, the Sonny’s team is aiming to open an adjoining bar called No Kisses. The sister space has a moodier vibe with velvety green banquettes, floral jungle wallpaper, and a ceiling made of light panels that change colors. Cody Hochheiser, an alum of Pineapple and Pearls and 2Amys, is behind the drink menu (stay tuned).
A huge patio in the back is shared with Colony Club. A vintage milk truck that the owners had initially hoped to turn into a mobile coffee stand will instead serve as a stationary bar with a few beers, wines, and batch cocktails. And in case you’re hungry, a window from the patio to the kitchen will serve Sonny’s pizzas.
Sonny’s Pizza. 3120 Georgia Ave., NW; 202-601-7701.
Jessica Sidman covers the people and trends behind D.C.’s food and drink scene. Before joining Washingtonian in July 2016, she was Food Editor and Young & Hungry columnist at Washington City Paper. She is a Colorado native and University of Pennsylvania grad.
