Oakfire Pizzeria Napoletana up and running in Somers

But they also mixed in plenty of Wisconsin flavors as well.

Now the newest Oakfire Pizzeria Napoletana location, at 3552 Market Lane in Somers, is up and running to join the other Oakfire located on Wrigley Drive just off the lakefront in Downtown Lake Geneva.

For Scotney, who is the principal owner, both he and his entire team couldn’t be more pleased to have officially opened the doors to the 10,500-square-foot Somers location that also includes a restaurant and full bar.

“We’re absolutely thrilled to be here,” Scotney said. “Come this January, it will have been almost two years we’ve been working on developing the concept in terms of our next location. We just really fell in love with this kind of northwestern tip of the Kenosha area right in the Village of Somers. We decided that this was such a great opportunity to kind of anchor ourselves, just north of town, just outside of the main Downtown area.”

The Somers location, which officially opened Thursday, includes a full parking lot — which isn’t available in Lake Geneva — along with a back patio that eventually will include a second bar, Scotney said.

“I think that Somers is growing very quickly,” he said. “That is one thing we noticed. Our location in Lake Geneva is right on the water. We have zero parking, so we know what it’s like to operate with zero parking.

“... We wanted to build a destination. That forced us to look outside of the Downtown area. We just felt it was too congested down by (Highway) 50, and this seemed like a really cool up-and-coming area that we see a lot of continued growth potential.”

Village President George Stoner said Somers is happy to have Oakfire in the community.

“I am very glad that (Scotney) brought Oakfire to Somers,” he said. “The residents have always wanted a restaurant of that quality on the south side of the village, and I know it will be a success. It is a beautiful building and no expenses were spared. It is just one more project that makes the Village of Somers a great place to live.”

Passion for pizza

Scotney, who heads the Oakfire Hospitality Group, a centralized general management company, doesn’t just own the restaurant.

He’s lived the style of pizza that Oakfire serves to its customers.

“I’ve been studying Neapolitan pizza making for over 10 years,” Scotney said. “I studied under a master pizza maker, who worked in Naples, is Italian and trained me on all the original, authentic recipes. At the heart of our concept is authentic, Neapolitan pizza.”

But that’s not where it ends, Scotney said, as the menu incorporates plenty of Wisconsin flavors as well.

And that’s what gets him excited.

“We essentially picked an American name so that we can take the spirit of what we’re passionate about, but mix a little Wisconsin in there and infuse it with some of our local Wisconsin vendors, some local Wisconsin cheeses, and have the freedom to kind of experiment with it,” Scotney said. “... The opportunity to celebrate what’s awesome about Wisconsin with Neapolitan pizza and get creative with it was the exciting kind of twist.”

At its roots, Neapolitan pizza also is a celebration of all different walks of life, Scotney said, and it took just the first day of business to see that was coming true.

“We saw it on our opening day,” he said. “(We had) all sorts of different age levels. We saw families in here, young couples enjoying pizza at the bar, we saw older couples coming in. It was really exciting to see such a diverse crowd coming in.”

What also sets Oakfire apart is the cooking process, which is sped up compared to normal pizza establishments by the kind of dough that’s used and also the temperature it cooks at, Scotney said.

Most pizza restaurants will cook at 475-500 degrees and use a dough that includes some sort of fat — but the dough at Oakfire is made from just flour, salt, water and yeast and cooks at about 1,000 degrees. The restaurant features two imported Stefano Ferrara wood-firing ovens.

And that means a quick turnaround.

“Right now, it would probably be out in three or four minutes,” Scotney said. “In Lake Geneva, on a busy summer day, we’ll average 12- to 15-minute ticket times and do 1,000 pizzas a day.”

Another twist to this location is a separated bar area, which differs from Lake Geneva.

“This is really the first opportunity that Oakfire has had to have a legitimate bar,” Scotney said. “The two bars we have in Lake Geneva are simply a part of the dining room. We intentionally bifurcated the restaurant so that the bar could be on one side and family dining could be on the other.”

Giving back

Being a significant part of the community also is important, Scotney said. The Lake Geneva location currently is donating back portions of sales to an animal shelter, and for Thanksgiving Oakfire partnered with a food pantry to feed 150 people.

“That’s something that’s really important to me, my wife, to our brand,” Scotney said. “It’s one of our core values. We’re really excited to partner with the Village of Somers as well as the City of Kenosha any way we can to leverage this place as a venue for the community.”

Oakfire’s current local staff is at about 40 people with the expectation it should build to around 80 for the summer, Scotney said. The restaurant is open from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. during the week and serves food until 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday.

Joining Scotney on the management team are Executive Chef Nick Crawford, Operations Manager Paul Meckler, Front House Manager Daniel Silva, Head Chef Paul Benigno and Catering and Events Manager Nan Elder.

More information, including a full menu, can be found online at www.oakfire.pizza.