This pizza shop started with 18 seats. Now its 30th spot is open in Coral Gables

After 12 years and 29 pizzerias, a Miami-born favorite is opening its 30th restaurant on June 30.

Mister O1 Extraordinary Pizza has brought its famous star-shaped pizzas, slow-fermented dough and specialty oils to Alhambra Circle in Coral Gables.

The brand was founded by Italian-born chef Renato Viola, who famously named his business after the “O-1 visa” he was granted by the U.S. government, a designation that goes to “individuals with extraordinary ability or achievement.”

“We had a dream and the United States gave us the ability to live this dream with this visa,” Viola told the Miami Herald in 2017. “Mister O1 is proof that with quality and hard work, you can have success.”

Viola started working at a pizza shop in Agropoli, Italy, near the Amalfi coast, when he was only 11. It was the first lesson of many in the art of pizza making, at which he excels. His pizza is, indeed, extraordinary, particularly the spicy Star Luca with ricotta filling its points, which launched any number of copycats.

There are traditional pies, too, but why be boring when you can try the peculiar but undeniably delicious Coffee Paolo, which features gorgonzola, spicy salami, honey and ground coffee? It probably shouldn’t work, but somehow it does.

The first Mister O1 opened in 2014 in a nondescript office building in South Beach, which had 18 seats but drew up to 200 diners a day.

The brand went on to open in Aventura, Bay Harbor Islands, Brickell, Coconut Grove, Doral, Pinecrest and Wynwood, and throughout Broward County including Dania Beach, Fort Lauderdale and Pembroke Pines. There are also restaurants in Orlando, Melbourne, Naples and Sarasota as well as Georgia and Texas.

For Viola, the opening of the 30th restaurant is “incredibly meaningful.”

“Mister O1 started with one small location in Miami and a very simple mission: to make extraordinary pizza with extraordinary care,” he said. “Seeing that same passion connect with guests across South Florida and beyond is something I never take for granted. This milestone belongs just as much to our loyal guests as it does to our team.”

Mister O1 Extraordinary Pizza

Where: 110 Alhambra Circle, Coral Gables

More information: www.mistero1.com