Roma-TX in Allen Serves Family Recipes with a Texas Twist

Roma-TX, “Home of the Brisket Pizza,” sits at the corner of State Highway 121 and N. Watters Road in Allen. Inside, you'll find walls covered with Italian and Texan memorabilia, tables with red and white checkered tablecloths and chef Fernando De Almeida in the back making pizzas.

Bread is baked into De Almeida's family history. His father moved from Portugal to Venezuela and built the first bakery in town, where he worked growing up. Now, nine such bakeries exist throughout the area within the state of Lara.

Many years and countries away from where he learned to bake, De Almeida still uses the same family formula to make authentic Italian-style dough, including a 48-hour pre-fermentation process called biga that renders a crispy Italian crust.
De Almeida opened his restaurant, then called Trattoria La Buccia, in 2021 amid the pandemic. He faced an uphill battle that he describes as a very hard time. “I never gave up. I never threw [in] the towel. I was focusing on my dream,” he says.

Despite positive reviews from customers, financial issues threatened his dream. One day, the owner of Silver Thai Cuisine, Ken Dokthonghom, came in for a meal and returned with a potential investor, Kevin Smith.

As soon as Smith, a retired electrical engineer, tried De Almeida's pizza he knew the concept would work. Smith came on board to run the front-of-house and logistics side of the business. He saw the potential in revamping the restaurant to appeal directly to Texans. Smith thought the restaurant would benefit from a slight tweak on the concept and a new name.

When Smith suggested barbecue brisket as a more popular approach, De Almeida replied, “What’s that?”

The two embarked on a tour of many barbecue restaurants, including Soulman’s Bar-B-Que. De Almeida soon realized the flavors were very similar to his favorite dish that his mom makes: asado negro. So, he adapted his mother’s recipe to create a brisket that he says is different from any other brisket, combining Venezuelan and Texan seasonings.

Now De Almeida reduces one of the pizza ovens from 650 to 250 degrees and cooks the brisket for nine hours before serving it atop pizza or inside tacos with pico de gallo and barbecue sauce.
Other menu standouts include the Diablo Pizza, which comes with a spicy marinara base topped with mozzarella, hot capicola and jalapeños. The Allen Pizza is made with San Marzano tomato sauce, mozzarella, Italian sausage, pineapple and a sweet teriyaki swirl. The Prosciutto comes fully loaded with mozzarella, dried tomatoes, prosciutto and lots of arugula, and topped with a balsamic glaze.

Roma-TX also has a full bar with wine, cocktails and craft beer, including Manhattan Project’s Half-Life Hazy IPA on draft.

All the restaurant needed was a good slogan to bring the theme together. Smith came up with “Come and Take It,” a phrase with ties to the Battle of Gonzales during the Texas Revolution that doubles as an invitation to customers: come and take a box of pizza.
Two "Come and Take It" flags hang from the ceiling next to other Texas-themed flags. Complaints by two customers over the flag’s more recent associations with far-right groups have led De Almeida and Smith to consider taking the flags down. They want to assure customers they are not making a political statement with these flags but simply want to celebrate the independent spirit of Texans.

Roma-TX wants to serve only the best food they can make. This approach is illustrated by what they sell, and what they don’t sell. When Smith implored De Almeida to add wings to the menu, the owner said that everyone can buy the same wings from the same provider, but nobody makes the same pizza dough he makes.

Business is picking up fast as North Texas residents continue to try the new pizza place and come back for more, with return customers making up "a very high percentage" of sales.

De Almeida's parents are still back in Venezuela but come to visit each year. He's proud of the fact that he's carrying on family traditions locally. “The beautiful thing is that my father was doing this in another country, and I am doing the same thing here," De Almeida says.

Roma-TX, 977 Sam Rayburn Tollway, Allen. Monday – Wednesday, 11 a.m. – 10 p.m.; Thursday – Saturday, 11 a.m. – 3 a.m.; Sunday, noon – 8 p.m.