Woodshed Pizzeria Napoletana opens this week in Point Pleasant Borough

As you make your way to Point Pleasant Beach this summer, be sure to leave time for a stop at the Shore's newest pizzeria.

Woodshed Pizzeria Napoletana opens Friday, July 5, at the corner of Bridge and Bay avenues. The restaurant is the first for the Nevard family — Ken, Vicki and their children Kasey, Kamryn, Karli and Kenny — who have been cooking wood-fired pies through their mobile pizza company, Woodshed Pizza, since 2021.

The dinner-only restaurant is opening in the former Lovelandtown Grocery & Provisions space, where Woodshed Pizza has been based for about a year (New Jersey law requires food trucks and mobile food businesses to prepare and store food at a commissary kitchen).

"After being in here for several months, I thought 'this is an awesome spot,' " Ken Nevard said. "It's a great location, and he (Lovelandtown co-owner Joe Weyrauch) did a really nice job of renovating this space inside.

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"I would come in here and look around and envision what it would look like if we were ever to take over the space," he said. "Then the opportunity came about and we thought about it for a few minutes and said let's do it."

The restaurant, with 10 tables inside and more on the patio, will serve 12-inch Neapolitan-style pizzas, appetizers like meatballs and chicken wings, and salads. The pies will be cooked in a 6,000-pound wood-burning oven built in Naples, Italy.

The pizza menu features eight pies that have proved most popular during the Nevard family's years in business, including a Margherita; a white pizza with ricotta cream sauce, fresh mozzarella and lemon; and a jalapeno and hot honey pizza.

"The sauce that we use on all of the pizzas (except for the white) is just San Marzano tomatoes and a little salt," Nevard said. "That's it — just good, simple ingredients."

There are vegan options, he said, and the possibility of gluten-free menu items if customers want them.

Diners can bring their own beer or purchase wine at the restaurant. Dessert will come from Kiersten's Creations, another food truck-turned-brick and mortar that opened on Bridge Avenue earlier this year.

Go: Woodshed Pizzeria Napoletana, 219 Bridge Ave., Point Pleasant Borough, open from 3 to 9 p.m. Wednesdays, Thursdays and Sundays, 3 to 10 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays (closed Mondays and Tuesdays); woodshedpizzanj.com.

Sarah Griesemer joined the USA TODAY NETWORK New Jersey in 2003 and has been writing all things food since 2014. Send restaurant tips to sgriesemer@gannettnj.com, follow on Instagram at Jersey Shore Eats and subscribe to our Jersey Shore Eats newsletter.