Bloomfield, Pittsburgh's Little Italy: a food guide to Liberty Avenue

Bloomfield sits a few miles east of downtown Pittsburgh, and for more than a century it has been the city's Italian neighborhood. Liberty Avenue is its spine, and the blocks around it hold pizzerias, bakeries, delis and sit-down restaurants. Here is how the neighborhood works, what to eat and how to plan a visit.

What is Bloomfield, and why is it called Little Italy?

Visit Pittsburgh's dining guide describes Bloomfield's food district as running along Liberty Avenue and says Italian immigrants dominated the neighborhood by the 1900s. The area still has Italian shops and restaurants, and a banner hangs over the street each summer for its Little Italy Days festival. The neighborhood today is more mixed. The same guide lists Thai, Chinese, Indian, Japanese, Turkish, Eastern European, Mexican and Azorean cooking among the cuisines now found there, so you can eat Italian one night and something quite different the next.

What kinds of food should you look for?

Start with the Italian standards. A red-sauce restaurant will serve chicken parmigiana, lasagna and spaghetti with meatballs, usually in large portions. A pizzeria may serve thin pies or Sicilian-style square slices with thick, airy crust. Delis sell cured meats, cheeses, bread and olive oil, and a bakery will have cannoli, biscotti, Italian cookies and bread. Beyond Italian, you will find Eastern European dishes such as pierogies, Portuguese-influenced Azorean food with sweet bread and chorizo, and a range of Asian restaurants.

When is Little Italy Days?

Visit Pittsburgh lists Little Italy Days as a free event on Liberty Avenue between Ella Street and Gross Street, held each August, with food stands offering pizza, pasta, cannoli, wine and sausages, plus music and a bocce tournament. If you attend, arrive early, since crowds build in the evening, and bring cash for small stands.

How do you plan a visit?

Bloomfield is compact. Liberty Avenue from Gross Street to Ella Street makes an easy stroll. Park on side streets or take a bus from downtown, and note that weekend evenings are busy. Start at a bakery or coffee shop in the morning, browse the delis at midday, and choose a dinner restaurant. Because the neighborhood is small, you can often see the line outside each restaurant before you commit. If the first choice has a long wait, walk a block to the next.

What should you know about reservations and hours?

Many Bloomfield restaurants are small and traditional, with a few taking reservations and others keeping a first-come list. Some close on Mondays or Tuesdays, and a few have a break between lunch and dinner. Cash is still welcome, and a few places accept only cash. Call ahead if you are a group of six or more, since tables are limited. Check hours on a restaurant's own page before you go.

How does it connect to the rest of the city?

Bloomfield is close to Lawrenceville and the Strip District to the north and west, and to Shadyside and Oakland to the east and south. A plan could combine a Strip District market morning with a Bloomfield dinner, or a Lawrenceville afternoon with a pizza supper. Buses link the neighborhood with downtown. Ride-share is easy at night. The pairing with the Strip District works well because the Strip's produce and Italian groceries grew up serving the same communities.

How do you eat on a budget?

Pizza by the slice, a deli sandwich and a bakery pastry are the least expensive meals. Lunch specials at sit-down restaurants are often cheaper than dinner. Share an entree. Ask whether a restaurant is BYOB, since Pennsylvania has a BYOB tradition, though it is less common in Pittsburgh than in Philadelphia. A bakery box of cookies is a low-cost souvenir.

What about dietary needs?

Italian food has many vegetarian dishes, but sauces may contain meat stock, and pasta contains wheat. Gluten-free pasta is available at some restaurants, but the kitchen may share boiling water and surfaces. Tell the server of any allergy at the start. Pizzerias with cheese and flour have few choices for dairy-free guests. Newer restaurants in the neighborhood tend to have more flexible menus, and a quick look at the menu online will save time.

If you are visiting with children, Bloomfield is easy: pizza by the slice, bakery cookies and gelato appeal to most ages, and many restaurants welcome families early in the evening. Strollers fit on the wide sidewalks of Liberty Avenue, though some older buildings have steps at the entrance, so ask about access if you need it. Evenings on summer weekends can be loud and crowded, and a quieter time for a family meal is a weekday at 5 p.m. On a Sunday afternoon, many families come in for a long lunch, so plan a wait.

How do you remember the best cannoli and pizza in Bloomfield?

Liberty Avenue puts a bakery, a pizzeria and a deli within a few steps of each other, and the cannoli blur by the third stop. Mosey is a food app for finding, rating and sharing places to eat, and it rates by the dish, so the cannoli, the Sicilian slice and the chicken parmigiana each keep a score of their own.

Tag what you try, collect your favorites in a Bloomfield list and share it through an invite link with whoever is joining you for Little Italy Days. Friends you follow add their finds, and the avenue gets easier to walk.

Rate the dish you would carry home in the Mosey app.

More guides to read next:

• Pittsburgh food guide: the Strip District and Lawrenceville
• Pittsburgh food words: stacked sandwiches, pierogies and haluski
• Late-night food in Pittsburgh: where to eat after midnight

More in the US food guides and the ranked lists of places.