"The collaboration is years in the making. Ralph Scamardella, one of Tao Group's chef partners, went to Pizza Savoy in Tokyo with Jason Hall and Yoshi Kojima (both culinary VPs for Tao Group) over six years ago. "We had a great experience. We took pictures with the guys," Scamardella says. When they returned two years ago, they learned "the guy who had started Pizza Savoy left and started his own pizzeria" named Seirinkan."
"When Tao Group decided to activate the underutilized pizza oven at Sake No Hana, Scamardella contacted Kakinuma. "I just reached out to him on Instagram. And he didn't answer; reached out again, he didn't answer. So I had Yoshi reach out to him in Japanese," he said - and he responded. After several conversations and an in-person meeting in Tokyo with Kojima, Kakinuma agreed to come to New York."
Susumu Kakinuma, widely regarded as the godfather of Japan's Neapolitan pizza movement, will cook at Sake No Hana on the Lower East Side from Feb 24 through Feb 28, with reservations available on OpenTable. The appearance follows a recent pop-up and Pizza Studio Tamaki's move into the Moody Tongue space. Tao Group chef partner Ralph Scamardella and culinary VPs Jason Hall and Yoshi Kojima visited Tokyo years ago, later discovering Seirinkan and following Kakinuma. Initial Instagram outreach went unanswered until Yoshi messaged in Japanese; after conversations and an in-person Tokyo meeting, Kakinuma agreed to come to New York. Hall notes Japanese pizzaiolos often toss sea salt on the oven floor, producing a saltier, smokier result.
Read at Eater NY
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