Dick’s Pizza will serve simple New York-style slices and pies. | Ben Coleman Sellwood is getting a brand new pizza joint with an old-school philosophy. Dick’s Pizza will open this April in the former Sunny’s Pizza spot, from the team behind the 1905 Club’s Scorfana residency, and has already begun serving slices and soda during its soft opening. The name honors owner/operator Chris Pfeifer’s grandfather, bears no relation to Dick’s Primal Burger, and yes, some puns are anticipated. Head chef Jon Wiley, a veteran of Dame, Estes, and Beast, says he’s keeping things real simple here: “No spin. It’s a New York-style joint. We could say it’s ‘neo-f-cking-whatever,’ but we just wanted to compete in the crowded center lane with something that we really believed in.” Sellwood and Westmorland neighborhoods have seen an uptick in dining options in recent years, with hip, crowd-friendly bars like the Last Rodeo slotting into the existing ecosystem of longtime dives, neighborhood restaurants, and higher-end fare like the neighboring a Cena Ristorante. Dick’s Pizza looks to bridge the gap, offering simple, no-nonsense slices and pies from a team with plenty of fine dining experience. Accordingly, the menu will look very familiar to anyone who’s ever tried to score a late-night slice: cheese, pepperoni, sausage, salad, and beer. “No spin. It’s a New York-style joint. We could say it’s ‘neo-f-cking-whatever,’ but we just wanted to compete in the crowded center lane with something that we really believed in.”Jon Wiley, head chef at Dick’s Pizza In true Portland fashion, Wiley got his start tossing dough at Flying Pie, a longtime local chain that opened its first Portland pizzeria in 1984 and still maintains four locations today. “They were great people. I had a fun time over there,” Wiley says, but as with a lot of college jobs, pizza wasn’t exactly his passion back then. “It was a really convenient place to be stoned, and they kept paying me,” he says. From there, Wiley says he worked his way up, landing gigs in prestigious kitchens like Dame, Estes, and Beast in Portland.  Wiley says he left his pizzeria days in the rear view mirror with no plans on coming back. But when Pfeifer took over management of the 1905 club in 2024, he wanted pizza on the menu, and he wanted Wiley to make it. “[He] was like, ‘Can you make pizza?’” Wiley recalls, “and I was like, ‘F-ck, uh, not really. I just stretched dough balls and put pepperoni on stuff.” But he decided to take the plunge, and Scorfana was the result. The residency is exclusive to the venue and serves traditional gas-fired New York pizza from Wednesday to Sunday, along with a variety of pasta offerings on Sunday. View this post on Instagram The partnership has been a hit with both the jazz crowd and the staff alike: “All the cooks that we’ve hired are really into jazz now,” Wiley boasts. Pfeifer and Wiley say Scorfana isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, but note that operating as a venue residency has both advantages and limitations. On the one hand, there’s usually a crowd of hungry music enthusiasts to feed every night, but it also means a $25+ cover for folks who just want to try a slice. So when the chance to open a brick-and-mortar on Sellwood’s main drag came, they jumped on it. Pfeifer, who got his start as a production manager and assistant director in the Portland film industry, working on ‘90s classics like Free Willy and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (they shot some of the ancient Japan scenes in Astoria, apparently) before pivoting to hospitality and running the iconic Barrel Room in the heyday of Old Town’s aughts club scene. He says that his time in the film industry informed his philosophy for running a happy kitchen, saying everyone has a department, and no one steps on anyone’s toes. “You’ve hired the best people to do every job, and hopefully that all works out.” It can be tempting, in the competitive Portland food scene, to go high concept with the theme or scour the globe for bespoke ingredients to stand out from the crowd. Pfeifer and Wiley say they’re resisting that urge and focusing on simplicity, quality, and community. “We can go spend twenty grand and get a bunch of vintage Italian stuff for the walls,” Wiley says, “[or we] hang the local softball team’s jersey when they come in for drinks.” ...read more read less