Q&A with Capogiro's 'gelato queen'

"I'm either in a dough room, a dairy, or a dungeon office," says Stephanie Reitano. "But I just washed my hands and grabbed a cup - so we can talk."

But where to begin? Gelato? Pizza? Her Jersey roots and fierce Philly pride?

All of the above, it turns out, spark enthusiasm in the dynamic 44-year-old Fairmount resident and mother of three, who also happens to be Philadelphia's gelato queen at Capogiro, the exceptional gelateria empire she founded with husband John Reitano in 2002.

This month, they joined Philly's busy pizza revolution, too, with Capofitto, the Neapolitan-inspired pizzeria (and gelateria) they just opened at 223 Chestnut St. in Old City.

Q. Pizza? I thought you were obsessed with gelato?

A. Well, yes, we even own a full dairy in East Falls in order to buy raw milk and pasteurize like we do [for the gelato at Capogiro] . . . I have a farmer 50 minutes outside the city - Mark Lopez from Wholesome Dairy in Yellow House, Pa. - and he has a closed herd of Scottish Ayrshire cows that are exclusively grass-fed. When we researched gelato [in Italy], we went to the best places and figured out what they were doing and then came back and did it the hard way.

Q. You even employ professional "conistas" - what is a conista?

A. There's an art to to scooping gelato. You're supposed to work the product a little bit to form an egg shape and place it in a cup without cross-contamination or mixing so that the person eating it can sample all the flavors together, but separately if they want . . .. You scoop the color wheel from whites to dark and then nuts last. A good conista should also be able to lead a person into the right flavor combinations. For instance, in Italy, if I ordered a lemon sorbetto with hazelnut, they'd tell you no, and they should, because the lemon will crush your palate with all the acid and it will change the flavor of the hazelnut.

Q. Gelato sounds so all-consuming. Where did pizza fit in?

A. We have both always been obsessed with pizza. When we first did Capogiro, we couldn't decide whether it was pizza or gelato. So we've been wanting to do this for years. Then I bought one of those beehive ovens for our backyard. And for six years, I've been obsessed with it. Do pizza and gelato go together? In our mind, it does . . .. We're just trying to follow our passions: pizza, wine, charcuterie. This was our love child. Capofitto means "head first," when you're so headstrong you're relentless . . . We feel like we're diving in.

Q. How did you learn to make Neapolitan pizza? Did you grow up eating good pizza?

A. I'm from the Jersey Shore, not far from where they filmed the MTV show - don't hold that against me. And I grew up eating those big New Jersey-style slices, which I love. But we embarked on this pizza adventure the same way as with our gelato - by traveling to Italy to seek out the people that did it best and study with them. I worked with Ciro Salvo, who's considered to be one of the top three guys in Naples. He taught us that there were no secrets, really, just flour, yeast, water, and salt. But each pizza is defined by the method of your dough. And everything you put on that pizza should enhance and exalt the dough, which in Naples should be an experience of lightness and digestibility.

Q. We've obviously caught on to the Neapolitan pizza trend, with at least half a dozen new ones opening around Philly this fall alone. Why did we need another?

A. When I moved to Philly to go to Temple in 1988, my first complaint was that the pizza was terrible, the kind that always had rings on the bottom of the crust . . . But the expansion of our pizza scene now is just spectacular. One of the things we were taught [in Italy] is that each pizza has its own personality - and that every person making pizza has a different spin on it. There are a lot of cravable pizzas out there right now, and I love that there's so much variety. I can't wait to taste those others because some of the people that are going to be touching them can cook: Their personalities are going to be in those pizzas.

Q. Is it possible there will just be too many pizzerias, though?

A. We think Philadelphia should be the go-to pizza destination in the U.S. I don't think we should look at it as being saturated . . .. In Naples, you've got three generations of pizzaioli that come together and love each others' pizza and push each others' pizzas forward. Just like the ice cream community here supports and promotes each other. Competition is good. There's more than one coffee company here. There are tons of great breweries. There's just no such thing as too much of a good thing - especially good pizza. But we always wanted to make our own, and the pursuit of that passion - it's just fun . . .. We were meant to have our hands in dough and milk and feed people."

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