Sunday News: Vinnie’s Minis make big impression with new Niagara Falls store

Sofra’s Turkish for mildly adventurous diners, Copping honored for Moriarty image

Vinnie’s Minis sells fresh bread at 2789 Niagara St., Niagara Falls.

Local frozen pizza startup Vinnie’s Minis has already landed its air-fryer-friendly single-serving pies in local stores, carving out a slice of the $7 billion U.S. frozen pizza market. Now it’s opened a retail bakery and pizza shop at its Niagara Falls headquarters, offering bread, pizza, and sandwiches on fresh loaves.

Following a reader tip, I showed up at 2789 Niagara St., Niagara Falls, and met Cary O’Donoghue, Vinnie’s Minis business partner. O’Donoghue launched the company with Vincent McConeghy, who was the bakery partner in Le Metro (“Buffalo born, Buffalo bread”).

That’s the clue that cracked the case: What sort of frozen food facility sells loveable loaves of fresh bread, and makes them into well-built sandwiches?

Not just any bread, either: “West Side” Italian bread in plain or sesame ($5), and puccia rolls (5/$5), favored in the Apulian region of Italy.

Vinnie’s Minis turns its puccia into breakfast sandwiches ($8), in bacon, sausage, or potato-pepper-egg. At lunch, puccia sandwiches ($12) pack fried mortadella, a double dose of chicken parm, or Philly cheesesteak, made from ribeye sliced in-house.

Vinnie’s Minis is also a slice shop, offering wedges of regular-sized cheese or pepperoni pizza for $3. There’s a Falls style square-cut tomato pie ($3), and Roman-style pizza bianca ($2.50), with olive oil and sea salt.

You can also grab a pack of Vinne’s Minis (3/$8) from the freezer, in margherita, pepperoni, Greek, veggie, and vegan. Breakfast minis (3/$10) come in bacon, sausage, and pepper-and-egg.

In Erie County, Vinnie’s Minis are in the freezers of both locations of Lexington Co-op, both locations of Market in the Square, and East Aurora Co-op. In Niagara County, Tops Lewiston, Pellicano’s Marketplace and Vegan Grocery Store in North Tonawanda’s, Niagara County Produce on Transit Road, and Latina Importing on Pine Avenue, Niagara Falls.

Not to mention Saturdays at the North Tonawanda City Market, where Vinnie’s Minis breakfast sandwiches have gained a cult following among shoppers and vendors alike.

Vinnie’s Minis

2789 Niagara St., Niagara Falls, 716-804-2184

Hours: 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesday-Friday, 10 a.m-5 p.m. Saturday. Closed Sunday-Tuesday.

Chicken souvlaki wrap with hummus, falafel, and tabouli at Natalie’s Mediterranean Kitchen.

REVIEW: Natalie’s Mediterranean Eatery was vegan before vegan was cool. The Mansour family’s falafel, hummus, babaganoush, and hummus has sustained generations of plant-based life forms, from the University at Buffalo and elsewhere, at their Millersport Highway restaurant. How does a little restaurant keep drawing after 20 years? Four housemade soups a day, including the essential chicken rice, and beef souvlaki salads make it clear this restaurant has something for everyone. (On Tuesday, for patrons.)

Tom Moriarty at Moriarty Meats’ original Grant Street location. (Luke Copping Photography)

At the World Food Photography Awards, announced Tuesday in London, Buffalo-based photographer Luke Copping won the James Beard Foundation Photography Award for his environmental portrait of Tom Moriarty, the French-trained Buffalo butcher shop and cafe owner who operates Moriarty Meats and Cafe Bar Moriarty with his wife Caitlin.

The award is for images that celebrate the people behind American food culture. The image was taken in Moriarty’s original Grant Street location. At its present location, 1650 Elmwood Ave., the cafe is next door, with a butcher-shop-based Europhile menu masterminded by Chef Jennifer Boye.

Moriarty was a junior at Canisius High School when he went to Spain as an exchange student. That inspired him to go to France to enroll in butcher school. During his apprenticeship, learning how to take animals apart muscle by muscle instead of running them through bandsaws American style, Moriarty worked in a bed and breakfast, watching and learning.

With Caitlin, his wife and business partner, they opened Moriarty Meats in 2018, cutting local animals French style and making an array of butcher shop items like sausages, stocks, and stews. In 2020, the Moriartys reopened the expanded butcher shop at 1650 Elmwood Ave., where they live upstairs.

Copping is a Canadian-born, Buffalo-based commercial and editorial portrait photographer whose clients include Forbes, NBC Sports, M&T Bank, Golf Digest, Puma, GMC, Ardbeg Whisky, and Sports Illustrated. Copping aims for images informed by the individual’s story and sense of place—something especially evident in his ongoing commitment to showcasing the revitalization and creative energy of Buffalo, New York.

Copping had two other photos shortlisted for the James Beard Foundation Photography Award category, a portrait of Hombre Y Lobo owners Ryan DiFranco and Isaac Domingue, and a portrait of Southern Junction’s Ryan Fernandez.

ASK THE CRITIC

Q: Can you suggest some outside the box places? My wife and I are open to new restaurants, just not too weird.

Jim B, Buffalo

A: I’d say the best “new” cuisine in Buffalo is Turkish, arriving in Depew in 2023 in the form of Sofra, a branch of Rochester Turkish restaurant and bakery Aş Evi.

If you like bread, meat, and cheese, Sofra has you covered.

Beyti kabab ($19.99) is beef kabab grilled, wrapped in fresh dough, grilled to finish, then served with tomato sauce and yogurt.

Iskender kabab ($19.99) layers gyro meat over yogurt and toasted bread, which is drenched in tomato sauce and clarified butter.

Karadeniz yagli ($14.99) is one of Sofra’s pides, fresh-baked delights similar to pizzas, except these are built to carry payloads. In this case, cheese and egg.

Lebni ($4.99) is yogurt with cucumber, garlic, and herbs, served with fresh bread.

Adana kebabs are beef with chile. Like other kebabs, you can get them as a sandwich in fresh bread, over rice, or “yogurtlu,” laid over a bed of yogurt, bread, and spices, as in this adana yogurtlu ($19.99).

It also boasts an extensive modern American pastry and sweets case that goes on for days.