Michele’s Specialty Pizza blends the mouth-watering flavors of basil, garlic, tomatoes and sausage in a pie designed by owner Jim Wroblewski’s daughter, Michele.
Mary Therese Biebel | Times Leader
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Owner Jim Wroblewski, seated, runs Ruby’s Inn with help from his three daughters, including Kim Colleran, who was on duty on a recent Thursday.
Mary Therese Biebel | Times Leader
Ruby’s Inn is located on Espy Street, near the intersection with Front Street, in the Hanover section of Nanticoke.
Mary Therese Biebel | Times Leader
Ruby’s Inn offers several specialty pizzas, but when I read the ingredients for the Michele’s Special on the online menu, I suspected that was the one my husband and I would enjoy the most.
Tomatoes, garlic, basil, sausage. It sounded great. And it looked beautiful when the server brought it to our table, with slices of ripe tomato decorating the soft cheese.
“Who is Michele?” I asked, wondering about the designer.
“My youngest sister; she’s the creative one,” said Kim Colleran, who is the oldest of owner Jim Wroblewski’s three daughters.
Daughter Kim, Nicole and Michele all have their own careers but pitch in to help their dad run Ruby’s Inn at 109 Espy St., in the Hanover section of Nanticoke, where their grandparents, Stanley and Eleanor Wroblewski, started making pizzas in 1971.
When Jim Wroblewski found out we were doing a story for this latest stop on the Luzerne County Pizza Trail, he came out of the kitchen to join my husband and me.
He’ll be 73 in May, Wroblewski said, but doesn’t want to retire from the business, regarded by many as a neighborhood gem. “I can’t stay home and do nothing,” he said.
But he did have a stroke a few years ago, so he’s had to reduce his work week.
The place is open three days each week — from 3:30 to 8 p.m. Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.
Making the dough is good physical therapy, Wroblewski said, and he’ll make a batch or two each day, enough for 12 or 24 pizzas. When it’s gone, that’s it for the day.
“Good thing you called ahead,” he said.
Jim Wroblewski grew up in Nanticoke’s Hanover section, about a block away from Ruby’s Inn. The restaurant’s name comes from a nickname his father’s Navy buddies gave him when he was in the service “Ruby,” which sounds a little like the first syllable of Wroblewski (the W is silent).
By this point in our conversation, we’d started eating the pizza, which was an outstanding blend of flavors.
“Our ovens are very old, and I’ll never get rid of them,” Jim Wroblewski said, giving the traditional ovens credit for the crispy crust.
Ruby’s Inn has the feel of a cozy old-time tavern, with vintage photos on the walls and regulars seated at the bar.
You can get pizza with various toppings as well as stromboli, calzone and cheesesteaks.
Other specialty pizzas, besides the Michele Special, include Chicken Wing, Chicken Bacon Ranch and Meat Lovers. If you’re really hungry, you might want to check out the “Double-stuffed” or “Belly Busters” listed on the menu.