Elberta Pizza Co. Opens Friday
Mmmm. What’s even better than pizza? Really close pizza.
Brian and Desiree Fast are soft-opening their new pizzeria on Friday from 4 to 8 pm. After the hard opening, hours for pickup and delivery will be Wednesday and Thursday 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., Friday and Saturday 11 to 9, and Sunday 3 to 8. Burn that on the insides of your eyelids and stick that number (231-399-0071) in your phone. (If for some crazy reason you’re not in Elberta, check the delivery zone map at the end of this story.)
I’m ecstatic, and I told them so.
“The feedback has been really good,” Desiree said. “People stop usually every day that we’re here and knock or ask questions.” Someone even came to the back door the other day, with a special request for a buffalo chicken pizza. “We told her we don’t have that on the menu at the moment, but it’s definitely something we’ve wanted to have as a special or add later. She was tickled at the idea of not having to go all the way to Honor.”
Elberta Pizza Co. is the latest food establishment at 619 Frankfort Avenue. The Google Maps photo still shows Elberto’s Taqueria, two businesses ago. By Brian’s reckoning, it’s Elberta’s third-ever pizza place. There was Midnight Pizza on the first floor next door (at 623 Frankfort), and years before, in what later became the Conundrum Café (603 Frankfort), he says he heard there was a pizza parlor in the back. “Hopefully we’re the third one that will stick around.”
Out front there’s a long bench that still sports the Elberto’s colors of orange and green. But according to Brian, who pointed out some lettering routered into the top slat, the bench originally belonged to the Harbor Dairy Bar ice cream shop, owned at this location by the grandparents of Andy Odette, of Odette Electric (Odette confirmed this). “The bench is from 1982!”
The Fasts have seen a lot of these changes firsthand. Brian was born and raised on River Road in Frankfort, and Desiree was born and raised in Beulah, on Cinder Road. They’re no strangers to the area, the local food industry, or pizza.
Brian’s parents used to own Harbor Shores Pizzeria in Frankfort. He managed Papano’s for a few years, worked at Stormcloud doing their pizzas, and for the past seven years has been managing That’sa Pizza on Hammond Road in Traverse City.
“This has been a pipe dream for a while,” Desiree said. “He wanted to do a food truck initially, so a lot of our thinking went into that, but then our cousins [Josh and Isabel Fast] bought the Lighthouse Café in December. We happened to be eating breakfast there one day and Brian said, “I’m going to look at that building.”
It obviously wasn’t a dine-in place, but it had the makings of a fully functional to-go place, with new HVAC, a new dish station, and a new compressor in the walk-in refrigerator, as well as updated windows and fixtures, all done by the previous owner, Kim Smith of Carried Away Gourmet. The Fasts’ pizza oven even fit perfectly under the hood system. The “green flags” were many, Desiree said. They bought it. “It’s a scary jump. We would have rather rented for a year to see how it goes, but …,” Brian said. “We’ll figure out what needs to be here if pizzas don’t work.”
They were able to sell some of the equipment they didn’t need to other local food entrepreneurs: some dishware went to a caterer just starting out, the Cook’s House in Traverse City got a small fridge, and a local baker, Simply Sourdough, got an oven. Already part of the culinary ecosystem, they are reinforcing those relationships.
So, important question: How do you categorize your pizza?
“It’s a hand-crafted, hand-tossed American or family-style pan pizza,” Brian said. “It’s not New York and it’s not Detroit. House-made dough. Hand-ground cheese. House-made sauce, including the ranch.” “Which is make-or-break,” Desiree said.
So, movie-night style?
“That’s kind of the demographic we’re looking at. We want to stay at a price point that’s good for families. We want to do specials that everybody can eat—whether it’s a salad or sandwich or wings. Even the kid who just wants a plain cheese pizza,” Desiree said.
“Nothing wrong with that,” said Brian. “Our menu will be expanding after the soft opening. We’ll be offering sandwiches, wraps, and subs, and monthly pizza specials.”
What’s their most special specialty?
“A must-try item is the Idaho pizza,” Desiree’s favorite. When fully loaded it has: mashed potato, bacon, cheese, broccoli, green pepper, onions. “You can minus any of those ingredients,” Brian said. (But, why would you?) Then there’s the three-cheese garlic bread stick.
Bacon made me think: Breakfast pizza? Well, they’ll have to see if they get any spillover clientele from Lighthouse Café. Josh and Isabel Fast have already been a huge help, and they’ll be here pitching in this opening weekend. Their daughter Eloise is about the same age as Brian and Desiree’s Samuel, and the two kids have been able to spend a lot of time together at the restaurant.
Brian’s sister Amanda, who many people may know from Bayside Printing, is lending her skills to developing the website and all the graphic design, and perhaps the kitchen if necessary. “She was born and raised in the pizza industry as well, so she knows what she’s doing,” Brian said.
Desiree’s very first job was at the Cabbage Shed when she was an early teen. “I did daydream about and go to school to become a nurse, and I did work at the hospital and really enjoyed that, but the money is really good in the hospitality industry and it’s what I feel I really flourish at.” Her experience is more at the front of the house, but Brian plans to get her up to speed cooking-wise so that if he’s ever not there “you won’t even notice.” Desiree also brings customer service and bookkeeping skills from her most recent job, at Crystal Mountain.
“That was her last paying job,” Brian says. “For the past 18 months she’s been a full-time stay-at-home mom. We have been blessed—well, we sacrificed—so she could stay at home, but it’s been the best thing for our family.”
“Emotionally lucrative if not financially lucrative,” Desiree says.
“We bought a house in 2020 in Interlochen. We knew we wanted to move more of our life this way. We wanted to get back to our roots,” Brian says. “Dropping Sam off at his grandparents’ while we come in to work will be a blessing. Sam will have cousins to hang out with. I wish the train was still here at the park!”
He’s the second person to mention the Penfold Park trainscape to me this week! President Wilkins says that though we didn’t win the grant Parks & Rec applied for to replace it, there will be another chance in six months, and they’ll keep trying. The price tag is an estimated $14,000.
“Once we get established we want to get involved with the community, maybe host a fundraiser for park equipment for the Village—or, one thing that’s close to our heart is the St. Phillip’s baby pantry,” Brian said. “They helped us when we needed it, and we would like to do a night when part of our proceeds go to it. Be watching for that, because Josh and Izzy want to do the same thing, so we might team up—breakfast at their place, dinner here.” A full day of dining in Elberta for a good cause.
Also look for mutual discounts through Toast online ordering, Desiree said. A lot of places already use Toast, and it’s another way to fit right into the local restaurant ecosystem. “We understand the ebb and flow of this area. The summer rush and the winter dead. We are prepared to some degree for that.”
Being open during the winter can be tough, “but locals still have to work—there’s Willoughby’s, there’s the bank. We’ll be open during the day, starting at 11, and we’ll offer slices at lunchtime, things that are easy,” Brian said.
We talked a bit about short-term rentals, the coming 9-acre development on the east side of Elberta’s Waterfront Park, and the need for both more affordable housing and more casual rental venues and community centers. The site of the Lion’s Club, where Brian’s grandparents had their retirement party, is now the Homestretch rentals on Lake and Main. Can we have both more places to gather and more places to live?
“I am hoping to supply late-night pizza to weddings at the Life Saving Station,” Desiree said. She’s pretty sure there’s a need.
The Fasts got married at the ELSS. “It was a beautiful day,” Desiree said. “Every time I look out over the water, I’m just like, I got married there! It’s gorgeous. But man, I was hungry by the end of the night. I would have loved if someone had shown up with pizza at my wedding!
Elberta Pizza Co. Delivery Zone
Within Elberta limits, $3 delivery! Note: They will go to the overlook, but not down to the beach. Probably wise.
