Midwood’s legendary Di Fara Pizzeria opens sandwich shop 1012 Kitchen down the block 

By Scott Lynch

At some point over the years at Di Fara, as you posted up at the counter awaiting the next round of slices to come out of the oven, watching the late Dom DeMarco snip those basil leaves one by one with his little scissors, you may have noticed the stained and faded “Italian Heroes” signs.

Not that you’ve actually been able to order a sandwich there for a long time.

“We used to make them in the back of the pizzeria many, many years ago,” DeMarco’s daughter, Maggie Mieles, tells Brooklyn Magazine. “When we were kids my dad worked seven days a week, and the only way to be with him was to come here. So he taught us at a very young age how to cook all kinds of Italian food. But with the rise in popularity of the pizza, we needed to utilize the kitchen to make dough and toppings throughout the day, so we stopped with the heroes and the pastas.”

In 2012, the family resurrected Di Fara’s non-pizza dishes down the block, opening a tiny restaurant called MD Kitchen, with DeMarco’s youngest son Harry at the helm. But as Mieles tells it, when their father started to slow down, Harry was needed more and more back at the pizzeria, and so they shuttered MD Kitchen in 2018.

Dom DeMarco died in March of 2022, Mieles re-acquired the MD Kitchen space last September, and two weeks ago the family opened what is now called 1012 Kitchen, serving a menu of classic Italian heroes from a cute takeout window on 15th Street.

“This is everything that my dad taught us,” says Mieles. “Everything is my dad’s recipes.” The meatball parm at 1012 Kitchen, for example, uses the same tomatoes, and the same cheese, that you get at the pizzeria. It’s a fantastic sandwich, with the fat and impressively garlicky headliners more than holding their own under all that sauce.

Meatball parm, $11 (Scott Lynch)

Eggplant also gets the parm-hero treatment here, with equally satisfying results, as does Mieles’s chicken cutlets.

Eggplant parm, $9 (Scott Lynch)

The sweet sausage and pepper hero is a delicious sloppy beast (you can get your pork paired with broccoli rabe if you prefer). 1012 Kitchen also makes that Italian comfort food classic, the potato and eggs sandwich.

Sausage and peppers, $9 (Scott Lynch)

All of the above are squarely in the DeMarco family wheelhouse, but finding the best bread for the job was a little trickier, mostly because it had been so long since they needed a supplier. After experimenting with local bakeries as well as numerous customer taste tests, Mieles found a winner: Kings Highway Bakery near West Seventh Street. It’s an excellent choice, with a lovely crisp crust and just enough give so that everything doesn’t slide out the side when you bite down.

1012 Kitchen opened with almost no fanfare earlier this month, but Di Fara’s fanbase has definitely taken notice. The first time I pulled up to the place, it was unexpectedly closed due to “low inventory,” and this past Saturday people putting in orders at the window were quoted a 45-minute wait for their sandwiches. To avoid disappointment, Mieles suggests calling ahead “to reserve your hero in advance. We prepare everything on the spot, and when we sell out at the end of the day, that’s it.”

Mieles has plans to expand the hero menu, and the hours, as well as adding pastas and “home cooked” entrees to the mix, but for now 1012 Kitchen is basically a lunch spot. Prices are cheap, too, with the sandwiches topping out at $11. “I’m not here to get rich,” said Mieles. “I’m already rich in my father’s integrity and his recipes. That’s how I feel.”

1012 Kitchen is located at 1012 East 15th Street, just south of Avenue J and Di Fara Pizzeria, and is currently open on Monday through Saturday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., or until they’re sold out. Order ahead by calling 917-648-1369.