THIS FAMILY OF SOULFUL ITALIAN EATERIES CELEBRATED ITS LATEST ADDITION IN COLTS NECK THIS SPRING

BY AMANDA McCOY PHOTOS BY ALEX BARRETO

Every morning, in each of Via Sposito’s three New Jersey locations, the kitchen begins to stir long before the dining room opens for lunch service. The brick pizza ovens require hours to heat up, and the fish, delivered fresh and whole daily, is filleted on site. As bread slowly rises in the oven, Italian chefs are busy kneading home-made pizza dough, hand-rolling pasta, and chopping Garden State-grown vegetables and herbs to craft the signature coal-fired pies, oven-baked sandwiches, hearty pasta plates, and Italian entrées that Monmouth and Middlesex County residents have been falling for since the first Via Sposito opened in 2017.

“We don’t cut corners,” noted Vincent Esposito, who co-founded the trio of restaurants with his sons, Anthony and Vincent Jr., and his daughter, Dolores. “Everything we do is from scratch, from the breads to the mozz, which is made fresh every day in-house.”

The Via Sposito concept was created by Vincent Sr., Anthony, and Vincent Jr. The first location debuted in Old Bridge, followed by Red Bank in 2021 and Colts Neck this May. Cooking has been instilled in the Esposito family for generations. At age 12, Vincent Sr. began working in his grandparents’ Italian restaurant in Brooklyn, starting off as a busboy before moving into the kitchen.

By 16, he was the main chef, sharpening skills and honing techniques he would one day pass onto his sons. After Anthony and Vincent Jr. graduated from college, both with business degrees, they approached their father with an idea for a restaurant one that would bridge the old and new worlds, honoring their family’s rich culinary legacy while pleasing (and often surprising) the tastes of the modern diner.

“They didn’t want to go the corporate route,” noted Esposito. “They wanted to come up with something on their own that we could all do together. That’s how the idea for Via Sposito was born.”

Today, Anthony Esposito steers the Old Bridge location, while Vincent Jr. oversees Red Bank. The brothers’ sister, Dolores, manages the front-of-house operations.

“You can rest assured you’ll see one of our faces no matter which restaurant you visit,” added Esposito. “There’s always a family member on site. It’s a true family owned business, and from the beginning we wanted to ensure everyone who steps foot inside the restaurants feels like a guest in our home.”

Even before Old Bridge served its first coal-fired pizza, the plan was always to expand without sacrificing authenticity. The Red Bank location opened with a similar aesthetic and menu to its Middlesex County cousin. Though the décor differs, both restaurants offer a cozy bistro setting, marked by reclaimed wooden tables and vintage accent lighting. The menu spans a sweeping variety of hot and cold apps, crisp salads, from-scratch soups, homemade pastas, bubbling oven-roasted sandwiches, and Italian staples like Chicken Francese and Veal Marsala, plus a slate of the house specialty: pizza.

“The pizzas are Via Sposito style,” noted Vincent Esposito Jr. “It’s our own creation, a blend of New York, Naples, and Roman styles. The dough and sauce recipes were both developed by my brother and I in house.”

The pizzas require a full page of the menu, with over a dozen options to choose from. Traditionalists might opt for a quintessential Margherita, topped with pomodoro sauce, homemade mozz, imported pecorino romano, basil leaf, and extra virgin olive oil from Italy, while spicier tastes have choices like the Curiosa, with hot capicola and Mike’s Hot Honey. White specialties include a classic Bianca (drizzled with garlic-infused olive oil) and the Toscana, featuring a bed of house mozzarella, fresh figs, stracciatella, baby arugula, prosciutto de parma, and balsamic glaze. There are gluten-free varieties on a cauli f lower crust, too.

When the Esposito family began cooking up the recipe for the Colts Neck location, they decided upon a slightly different approach. Where the Old Bridge and Red Bank locales lean casual, the newest outpost offers a more fine-dining experience. Décor is sleek and elegant: glossy wooden tables and upholstered chairs, soft ambient lighting, leafy plants, and a dreamy wall mural depicting scene from Italy. There’s also a full bar (the Colts Neck location is the only Via Sposito with a liquor license, though Old Bridge and Red Bank serve local New Jersey wines), offering classic cocktails along with house signatures, plus post-meal indulgences like cordials, port, or a decadent tiramisu martini made with RumChata, Kahlúa, and Cartron Creme de Cacao.

The menu is upscale with a larger focus on premium entrées, like a full rack of Australian lamb chops, a French-cut veal chop, and wild-caught fish. USDA Prime steaks are a Colts Neck exclusive, dry-aged in-house for 30-35 days and served in meaty 24-30oz portions.

“They are exceptional cuts of meat; we get the steaks from the same meat market in the Bronx that supplies all of the iconic steakhouses in New York,” added Esposito.

But superfans, fear not. Many Via Sposito staples are available in Colts Neck, too, like the pizzas and the heaping bowl of pappardelle Bolognese, smothered in veal and pork sauce. And every Sunday, the owners extend a personal invitation to the Esposito family dinner across all three of their restaurants by offering their Sunday Sauce, a cherished family recipe passed down by their great-grand- parents, who laid the groundwork for Via Sposito all those decades ago.

Via Sposito

3857 County Road 516, Old Bridge / 20 Broad Street, Red Bank

323 NJ-34, Colts Neck / viasposito.com