Crust Simply Italian in downtown Mesa to have speakeasy, dessert shop

🍕 An update on the Crust Simply Italian under construction in downtown Mesa, which I first wrote about in September:

The 8,000-square-foot-plus Italian restaurant will be the largest of owner Michael Merendino’s six Valley locations (which include two Crust Pizzerias, a more casual sibling concept, that debuted this fall).

The Mesa location is scheduled to open in the first quarter of 2024 at The Grid, a $75 million mixed-use development near the southwest corner of Mesa Drive and Main Street.

It not only will have a bird-named speakeasy, The Nightingale, next door – like Crust Simply Italians in Chandler (The Ostrich) and Gilbert (The Blue Heron) – but also a dessert shop.

Bombolino will sell gelato and Italian doughnuts.

Merendino also plans to launch a speakeasy called The Goose next to the Crust Simply Italian in Scottsdale in the first quarter.