Bello Pizza

Andrew LeBlanc ran the kitchen at Soho House Toronto before he decided the thing worth building was pizza. Bello Pizza is where that decision landed — a twenty-five-seat shop on Collingwood's First Street, a chef's-kitchen sensibility pointed at a format most people file under takeout. The restaurant's own line is Traditional Values, Not So Traditional Pies, and the menu makes good on the second half: pies named like a crew roster, built on fior di latte and pecorino, finished with hot honey and Calabrian chili. They read less like a pizzeria's checklist than like a kitchen working out how far it can push a circle of dough.

The pizzas carry the visit. Spicy Goat Pizza is the clearest signature — Niagara goat cheese, garlic pesto, Calabrian chili, and hot honey, tangy and sharp and sweet in a single bite. The Bronson is its heavier counterpart, loud with blue cheese, bacon, buffalo-butter sauce, olives, and more hot honey. Between those poles sit Queen Goomba, dense with Italian sausage, double-smoked bacon, and a mushroom melange; Di Rienzo's, stacked with pepperoni, mortadella, soppressata, and fennel sausage; San Diego Surf, which folds oven-roasted pineapple and banana peppers into a pepperoni-and-bacon base; and Super Dave-Ola, soppressata and taggiasca olives lifted with hot honey. For contrast there is the Portabella under truffle cream and pickled chili, and the plain Bello — tomato, basil, and three cheeses — for anyone who wants to see what the dough does on its own.

Plant-based diners get a real choice rather than an afterthought. 3 Peat Vegan leans on tomato, garlic, basil, piquillo peppers, and garlic pesto, built sturdily enough to hold its own beside the cheese-heavy pies. The supporting plates are sharpened the same way the pizzas are: Mozza Sticks pushed with banana peppers and spicy asiago, a Caesar built on kale with anchovies, guanciale, and pangrattato, Frites Italiano under truffle and ricotta salata, and a dessert that runs from plain soft-serve to a butter tart sundae. Nothing is dressed up beyond what the food asks for, and nothing is careless.

The kitchen has a named identity. LeBlanc is founder and chef; his chef-partner, Mike Trudeau, brings time at Piano Piano, Soho House, and Victory Pizza to the dough and the toppings. Henrik Tonning joined in the summer of 2024 to run the bar and the front of house, and Leah LeBlanc handles operations and events. Bello did not start in Collingwood. It began as a pandemic-era pizza project tied to Toronto's Hot Black, then moved north in 2023, opening on First Street in what had been the San Diego Italian Restaurant. The Toronto location closed in January 2025, the partners folding everything into the northern shop.

All of that shows up in how the evening is built. There are cocktails and a wine list, Tonning's side of the operation, enough to stretch a couple of pizzas into a full sit-down dinner rather than a quick slice. The scale forces a rhythm: reservations are strongly recommended, though the team tries to hold a few seats for walk-ins, and the same kitchen takes private dinners, buyouts, and catering when a night asks for more than a table. Regulars learn to order for contrast — something tangy like the Spicy Goat beside something rich like The Bronson, with the vegan pie to reset the table. Takeout runs by phone for anyone carrying the pies home instead.

Traditional Values, Not So Traditional Pies turns out to describe the whole operation, not just the menu. It is an old-fashioned idea of hospitality — book ahead, sit down, let someone pour you a drink — wrapped around pizza nobody's grandmother would recognize. Collingwood got a chef's restaurant that happens to run on pizza, and learned to plan its nights around it.