First Look: Side Hustle Goes Full Time As Falcone Brings the Barone Siblings’ Pizza to North Adelaide

Getting your hands on a slice of the Barone siblings’ pizza used to be a real challenge.

The pair’s first pizzeria – Side Hustle – started in their parents’ Carrickalinga backyard. If you wanted to try their beautifully blistered pizzas, you had to ring ahead and pre-order. They almost always sold out.

“At Side Hustle, you were lucky if you got a pizza,” says Anna Lisa Barone, who runs Falcone and Tonino alongside her brother Nick and husband Leo Triantafyllidis. “With Falcone, we’re excited to reach a lot more people who weren’t able to make it down to the Fleurieu.”

The trio’s new North Adelaide pizzeria Falcone opens on February 24. It’s named after the Barones’ nonna, Teresa Falcone, who ran the alimentari in her Italian village before migrating to Australia.

“Nonna has been a big food inspiration for us,” says Anna Lisa. “She was always a very good cook, and we’ve drawn on flavours that remind us of her cooking – but she was a one-man band. She would never let anyone else in the kitchen.”

Inspired by the team’s favourite pizzeria in Naples, the focus is on takeaway and casual outdoor dining, with around 20 seats spilling onto the footpath. Inside, the space is compact, with textured rendered walls and exposed copper piping.

A window into the kitchen puts the dough-stretching and firing on display for waiting guests. Dominating the space is a wood-fired oven shipped from Naples. Beyond providing a beautifully blistered crust, the oven lights the room with its warm glow.

“Apart from one pendant [light], the rest is all candle and woodfire,” she says. “Most of the lighting comes from natural sources, which I love. The vibe is very functional-pretty – it feels like a little cave.”

The menu mirrors Side Hustle, with margherita, salamino, capricciosa and prosciutto pizzas leading the charge alongside white-base options like quattro formaggi and patate. The Falcone (topped with garlic butter and marinated prawns) is a worthy signature. There are rotating weekly specials, including a carbonara-inspired number with fresh mozzarella and crispy pancetta on a creamy parmesan and egg base, which is already a favourite among the team.

The menu’s “bread and butter” section includes four garlic bread varieties: one classic; one cheesy; one spicy, and a Sicilian-inspired offering with capers, lemon, parsley and anchovy. There’s also a sweet number called the Sticky Lips, with cinnamon, brown sugar and cream cheese frosting.

“We also have two sweet pizza options – one is our Nutella and the other is with our own white chocolate hazelnut spread – as well as Nonna’s tiramisu recipe and a panna cotta for dessert.”

Falcone is alcohol-free by design, pairing its pizzas instead with Mole Cola and Italian soft drinks. 

“So far, we’ve been really well received by the community and even the council; everyone’s been lovely and really welcoming,” says Anna Lisa. “We’ve been wanting to do a pizza place in the city for a long time, and we just want to walk away feeling like we did Side Hustle justice – if we’re happy with it, we hope everyone else will be, too.”

Falcone

58 Melbourne Street, North Adelaide

No phone

Hours:

Tue to Sat 5pm–9.30pm

@falcone_pizza