Tasty taco champions, Pellizco, are all-set to open their second Sheffield site in Sharrow Vale Road’s Dyson Place this week (Friday, 9 December), bringing an expanded menu and full dining experience to the new 30-cover restaurant.
All your favourites from their Cutlery Works joint are on offer, including their award-winning Lamb Barbacoa, as well as new small plate dishes like pescada (fish) tacos and for the first time burritos, alongside sharing boards of spatchcock chicken and pork belly carnitas, new wine and cocktail menus (yep, margaritas!) and even Mexican desserts (yep, churros!).
Explaining the concept for the new restaurant, owner Danny Pinch told Exposed: “The new space is designed to be an elevation of stuff we’ve done in the past. We’re well-known for our street food dishes and tacos, and we want to take that to another level and give more of a dining experience.
“We’re not going too far from our roots, but just sort of bringing it up a little bit and doing things that we couldn’t do before because of space constraints or being in a street food setting.
“We won’t be making it too formal, it’s still casual dining. We still want it to be fun, with a relaxed atmosphere, but we will also make sure the food is well-presented, with good flavours, good textures, locally sourced products and keeping that independent, sustainable vibe.”
Pellizco returns to Dyson Place after a successful lockdown pop-up, taking over the unit left by Vietnamese restaurant Nam Song, who moved out of the square last month.
“We chose Dyson place because it’s quite a special place for us, as were here during the lockdown in winter.” says Danny, “That was the springboard for us coming into Sheffield because previous to that, even though we’re Sheffield-based, we’d done mostly street food events here, there and everywhere across the country, and never really did much in Sheffield, other than Peddler.
“It was our first time solidly trading in one spot in Sheffield for an extended period of time, and that helped us become more well-known within the city that we originated from. We’re really happy to be back here.”
Following the success of those pop-ups, post-lockdown Danny took the plunge and moved Pellizco into Cutlery Works, which eventually lead to further recognition from the British Street Food Awards, where they won Best Newcomer.
Danny said: “Pellizco was initially just a takeaway from my dad’s drive. Coming out of lockdown, we entered the British Street Food Awards and won the best newcomer. That was within six months of the brand’s existence, which was amazing recognition.”
The recognition for Danny’s food has been hard earned and well-deserved, and at just 31 years-of-age, he has come along way from his humble beginnings as a chef.
“I’ve been a chef all my working life, really.” says Danny, “I started off at Toby Carvery at Bowshaw, before moving onto a few other chain restaurants and just sort of worked my way up from there.
“I learned a lot from the guys at S17 when I worked there, Andy Forder and Ben Short taught me a lot and I just learned on the job. It was initially just a part time job at Toby Carvery, which ended up turning into a career.
“Street food came about because of a trip to Peddler. One of my friends said to me, ‘this is a bit of you, you should have a go at this!’ Then, I think about a month later, my dad and I bought a trailer and started converting it. Pellizco, which is the translation of my surname from Spanish, was born from there.”
Given the success and rise of Pellizco, how is Danny feeling about his latest venture?
“I’m not gonna lie, it’s terrifying! Half of the days I feel really positive about everything. Yesterday I was getting myself really organised, and I was really looking forward to everything, and then I woke up this morning and, again, pure terror!
“But I think it’s just a case of, once everyone’s in, we’re all pulling together and we’ve got the place looking like a restaurant, that’s when it all falls together, and the nerves calm down.
“It is exciting, and I’ve got so much stuff that I can’t wait to show people. I’m proud of what we’ve done and I’m proud of the food that we put out at Cutlery Works, but I do believe that this is going to be another level again.”
Pellizco version 2.0 opens in Dyson Place on 9 December and will be open five days a week from Thursday to Monday, 12 – 10pm (with 11pm close at weekends), offering separate daytime and evening menus. They also plan to offer takeaway from January and have plans for collaborations with other local talent in the coming months. For more info and bookings, go give them a nudge on Insta.
