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Totonno's Joel Cimineri Dies

Posted by Adam Kuban, December 10, 2004 at 9:17 AM

A sad bit of news to wake up to:

Joel Cimineri has run out of dough for the last time.

Brooklyn's legendary pizza man — who manned the oven at Totonno's in Coney Island and famously closed for the day if he ran out of dough — died this week from diabetes. He was 59.

A Brooklyn legend, Cimineri not only helped keep alive a pizza-making tradition dating from the turn of the 19th century, but with every thin-crusted pizza he made, he stood up against fast-food culture.

"We live in a Burger King world of 'Have it your way,' " said Dick Zigun, who runs the Coney Island sideshow. "But when you ate at Totonno's, you were with a loving Italian family that did it their way"

Cimineri learned the art of pizza-making from his uncle-in-law, Jerry Pero, who learned it from his father, who learned it from Gennaro Lombardi — the man who brought pizza to America more than 100 years ago....

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Tags: Brooklyn, Coal-Oven, Coney Island, NYC, Obituaries, Totonno's