The Verona Village Inn, a landmark on Wildwood Avenue at the Penn Hills border that served red-sauce Italian comfort foods for 34 years, has closed.
According to an announcement on the restaurant’s website, “We have lost our lease for available parking and will not be able to operate as a viable restaurant.”
Reached at home in Plum, owner Eric DiIanni said the issue “came about rather suddenly” and he shut down the restaurant this past Saturday. However, he plans to open a restaurant in another location. “I definitely want to reopen.”
In the meantime, he invites customers with outstanding gift cards to mail them to him for a refund — by Feb. 3 — at the restaurant, which also was leased.
"We been around for a long while and we appreciate everyone's patronage and when it comes time to do something else, we'd like everyone to come visit again,” said Mr. DiIanni, whose late father, Tony, and mother, Lena, started the place in 1983.
Also thanking his employees, he added that his mother is 84 but was still making the restaurant’s sauce. "We gotta get her back to work."
The restaurant’s address is 551 Wildwood Ave., Verona, PA 15147.
Bob Batz Jr.: bbatz@post-gazette.com, 412-263-1930 and on Twitter @bobbatzjr.
First Published: January 2, 2017, 9:10 p.m.
