Dario's pizza expanding to Massapequa Park

It’s been a busy few months for Dario Carosi. Late last year, the chef returned to his eponymous 3-year-old West Hempstead pizzeria after a short stint at Taglio in Massapequa Park. Then, in March, Carosi’s Philly cheesesteak went viral and landed him on "Good Morning America."

Now the much-rumored location of the second Dario’s, a Newsday top pizzeria, has been revealed: 4952 Merrick Rd. in Massapequa Park, formerly Sgambati’s Pizza in the Southgate Shopping Center. "We were looking all over the South Shore for months. One place didn’t work out, and then this place fell into our laps," Carosi said. He hopes to open this summer.

The team targeted that neighborhood, he said, "because a lot of our customers come from the south and from the east." He acknowledged that the Massapequas are home to "many great pizzerias" — among them, Taglio and Umberto’s in Massapequa Park, Undici in Massapequa, Saverio’s in North Massapequa — "but we are not afraid of competition."

Italian-born Carosi trained as a baker, not a pizzaiolo, and his round, crisp-crusted New York pies and lofty rectangular Roman pies have always been supplemented by pastries such bomboloni (Italian doughnuts) and sandwiches on homemade bread. He offered a new special sandwich every Saturday and, one evening in March, he found himself on YouTube geeking out on cheesesteaks videos made by Angelo’s Pizzeria in South Philadelphia. "I love steak," he said, "and I love that they make their own bread. I said, ‘This Saturday, it’s going to be cheesesteaks.’ "

It turned out that Saturday could not contain the demand. "The first week, we sold 500, the second week it was 1,000, now we are selling about 2,000 a week. It’s not a special anymore."

At Dario’s, the griddled rib-eye is chopped with onions and red peppers and slathered with a sauce made of Cooper Sharp White (which chefs consider a step up from Kraft American) that has been thinned out with cream to penetrate every morsel of meat as well as the nooks and crannies of the homemade sesame-seeded sourdough roll it is served on. It costs $22.99. There’s no reason not to follow it up with a pistachio-cream-filled bombolone ($4.75).

Dario’s, 239 Nassau Blvd., West Hempstead, 516-279-4390, dariospizzali.com.