An 16-inch Zamboni’s Special pizza – topped with salami, pepperoni, sausage, mushrooms, onion, fresh tomato and oregano – is served with a mixed green salad alongside a glass of Cabernet Sauvignon at Zamboni’s Pizza in Orinda. The longtime local pizzeria, opened in 1994, is owned by Tim Mills, who started working there as a delivery driver in 2009 and later bought the business, continuing its traditional recipes and community-focused approach.
Tim Mills was just a Miramonte kid looking for a job.
A couple of his buddies were working at Zamboni’s Pizza, and so Mills signed on too. That was in 2009, and nine years later, he bought the Orinda pizza standby, which opened in 1994.
“I needed a part-time job,” he said, “and I did delivery.” And in the classic story, he worked his way up the ladder – “I made pizza and then I started managing” – and now is in charge of the whole operation.
“I learned the business working here,” he said, including how to make everything involved in a pizza. He’s pretty much kept to the formula that’s worked for 30-plus years, but he’s also adjusted with the times. “We use the same kind of dough,” he said, “but we make the pizzas
thinner now.”
One thing that hasn’t changed is the garlic butter that’s brushed onto the dough after the pizza comes out of the oven.
“I was introduced to that in middle school,” he said, because he and his friends would order garlic chips – garlic butter on dough (with no sauce) sliced into small bites, priced so middle-schoolers could afford them.
So you might be thinking that Zamboni’s is a traditional kind of pizza place – and you’d be right on. The menu is dotted with familiar toppings, from pepperoni to sausage to onion to bell pepper, and the sauce options are tomato and pesto.
Note, however, that the tomato sauce is a “signature mix” of different flavors, and there are fresh salads and veggie options. And of course, every pizza parlor has to offer beer.
The big sellers, though, are pizzas, starting with the Home Run Combination – pepperoni, sausage, ham, mushrooms, bell pepper, onion and black olive. The Zamboni’s Special – salami, pepperoni, sausage, mushrooms, fresh tomato and oregano – is also a big seller.
But customer Jill Gelster is also partial to the Deep Dish pizza.
“It’s great,” she said. “After visiting Chicago and having deep dish pizza there, we missed it here. It was nice to find someone locally who could satisfy that craving.”
Gelster is also complimentary of Zamboni’s support of local businesses. She and her husband David Dierks run the Orinda Starlight Village Players, and Mills donates pizzas and salads for the all-day rehearsals just prior to opening night.
That kind of community focus is part of why Zamboni’s has been in Orinda for so many years.
“It’s a small place,” said Mills, “but we put a lot of care into how customers want their pizza. If that’s extra-thin crust, then we’ll do it for them.”