Joseph Jett, left, and Tom Conway muscle the face of Hilltop Pizza’s new pizza oven into place.
Editor’s note: Hilltop Pizza Shop has reopened. Hours are 3:30 to 9:30 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday. This story was published in our June print edition.
Although things have been going much slower in reopening Hilltop Pizza, Masury, than owners Nancy and Bill Scharba would like, the effort took a major step forward May 6 when a new pizza oven was installed.
Of course, the machine was slightly taller than the doorway from the lobby to the kitchen, and workers had to remove a piece of door frame to be able to slide the front section of the machine into the kitchen.
The Scharbas were happy to have the oven installed, but Nancy Scharba looked at it with trepidation.
“I would be lying if I was telling you I am not intimidated by this machine,” she said. “It looks like a spaceship.”
Nancy and the pizza shop employees will be trained on how to operate the oven.
The Scharbas tried to get an oven just like the one destroyed in a Feb. 17 fire, but the company that made it no longer exists. The Picard Ovens model they bought is closest to the old model as they could find, she said.
Commercial Bakery of Christmas, Fla., installed the oven.
Meanwhile, Drew Excavating and Home Improvements, Brookfield – run by Mike Scharba’s brother, Jamie – demolished the damaged sections of the building, repaired what it could and generally remodeled the building.
Mohney Heating and Cooling of Masury replaced the furnace that was damaged in the fire.
“We took the opportunity to upgrade some things that we have wanted to do for quite some time,” Nancy said. “We’re trying to make it a little more efficient for our employees and our customers.”
The owners hope the eatery will reopen the last week of June, but are waiting for some supplies before they can say for sure. Most notably, they need new pans on which the pizzas will be baked. Nancy said the pans they had been using were not pans at all – they were the lids from five-gallon lard containers.
The Scharbas had to replace anything that held the smoke smell; anything made of wood, paper or plastic.
“The fire did damage, but the smoke did more,” Nancy said.
Not everything had to go. The cooler still works fine, and the mixer used to make pizza dough, which probably dates from the ’60s, survived.
The company’s insurance company investigated the fire’s cause and did not specifically determine if it started in the oven or in electrical wiring, Mike Scharba said.
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