Pizza House Pushing Past The Fifty Year Mark
Posted by CMH Gourmand on June 20, 2011
Pizza House is located off the beaten path. The current location is in a former convenience store, tucked between Sinclair Road and railroad tracks. The former location was across Lincoln Ave. The original seated maybe twenty while doing a brisk carry out business. Pizza House is also located in my memories of middle school and beyond. It may have been my first non-Clintonville pizza pie (it is located yards from the border of Clintonville and Worthington. Pizza House is still the place that tradition dictates that I travel to when my childhood friend comes to town as we visit a place we have gone to since we were kids.
Pizza House was hot in the 1980’s, it appeared in numerous publications as one of the best pizzas in Columbus. Even as the Columbus pizza palate has grown over time, I would still include the Pizza House pepperoni and sausage pizza among my top twenty-one pizzas in Columbus. Their open-faced meatball sandwich is one of my top ten comfort foods involving bread. Pizza House is an institution in the neighborhoods around 161 and Sinclair as well as the communities on the other side of the tracks. Business is still booming and carry out business is brisk. Although the business has fallen off the media radar it is still doing quite well.
Pizza House turns fifty in the fall. It opened in 1961. The first non family employee was fifteen year old Billy Colasante. He stayed with Pizza House when it moved in 1991 then he bought the business in 1993. Some employees have worked there over thirty years, a rare thing in any business. The familiar faces among veteran employees and other Colasantes working in the house does give the restaurant a friendly, family feeling. The interior is lined with local little league baseball and soccer trophies accumulated from years of supporting teams in the area.
Any small business, especially in the restaurant trade, that can thrive after fifty years must be doing something right. In the case of Pizza House it is the case of the same people making the same product consistently and taking the time to connect with the community.
Pizza House
747 Lincoln Ave.
Columbus (and my memories)
CMH Gourmand - Eating in Columbus & Ohio 
Leanne said
Had my first pizza there in ’68 – love at first bite. Their capicola pizza was the BEST – wish I lived closer now.
patient_zero said
Delicious pizza and good company in Pizza House. Not many establishments have their sense of community.
Yummycbus said
I heard good things when I moved to the neighborhood, but I am sorry to say that I found their pizza lackluster compared to the other options we have. I had a pizza with veggies, which may have been the issue, for they tasted as though they were frozen rather than fresh. I live less than 1/3 mile from here, and I haven’t been back in 18 months.