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After a couple of decades of paying dues selling slices out of a corner shop, the family behind Ronald’s Pizza Café has opened a restaurant to fit their ambitions. A new wood-burning oven holds pride of place on the main floor. The pizzas it produces are superlative, closer in class to Lombardi’s than Famous Ray’s, with thin and crunchy crusts, subtly charred on the bottom. Garlic notes inform the sauce, which is made from fresh tomatoes—no canned, stewed love apples here. Flavorful mozzarella stretches across each pie, topped by traditional picks like pepperoni, sausage, or sweet red peppers. A small menu of fresh salads and veal, chicken, and fish entrées backs up the pizza. Pasta influences run from Sicily to Bologna, with combinations you don’t see every day like ricotta ravioli swimming in a rich pine nut and arugula cream sauce. Like the restaurant’s name, the interior is a little clunky. Tomato soup–colored walls support paintings that are a cut or two below hotel art. The structure is narrow but airy, with a double-height ceiling in front leading to a loftlike second-floor dining space. This perch keeps diners at a healthy distance from the blazing oven, which steadily cranks out handmade pizzas that far outshine their modest surroundings. — Ethan Wolff

Pepperoni pizza, $16; ravioli de ricotta, $14.95; chicken Marsala, $18.75