Cafe Ciao To Open in the Central West End Tuesday, Offering Pizza and Gelato

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Courtesy Darmin Beganovic

Cafe Ciao will open at 4 p.m. on Tuesday.

Darmin “Dado” Beganovic first visited Italy from Bosnia, his home, at 18 years old. He’d gone with a couple friends, and they stayed a handful of days, traveling from city to city, seeing everything they could — and eating plenty of pizza and gelato. 

It was the start of something for Beganovic.

“You're traveling to Italy, and I love it, pizza,” he says. “I love it here.”

Now, more than a couple decades later, he’s set to hold the grand opening for Cafe Ciao (4501 Maryland Avenue) from 4 to 10 p.m. on Tuesday. At the Central West End storefront on the corner of Maryland and Taylor, he’ll serve the Neapolitan-style pizza, gelato and espresso he first tasted as a teen.

Jennifer Silverberg

Cafe Ciao will have some similar menu items as Mia Pizza, like the Mia, which has pesto, shredded mozzarella, chicken, red peppers, artichoke, olive.

Beganovic says the cafe will have 19 different pizzas on a crust that’s soft in the Italian way with a light crunch on the outside. Those pizzas will include the Bianca, with tomato sauce, fresh mozzarella, broccoli, red onions, artichokes, tomatoes and roasted red peppers; Mia, with pesto sauce, shredded mozzarella chicken, red peppers, artichoke and olive; a quattro formaggi, or four cheese; a gyro pizza; a spinach pizza topped with a homemade garlic sauce; and more.

There will also be salads, pasta, espresso drinks and 25 cakes, which Beganovic’s mother will help make. Then, there will be the gelato. Beganovic says he makes hot-process gelato, which results in a super smooth and creamy base. 

Beganovic isn’t new to the St. Louis restaurant scene. He’s the owner of Caffe Milano, a Bevo Mill Bosnian coffee shop. He also had a previous concept at this very spot: Pizzeria Mia, which opened its doors in 2014 and closed in 2016. The space held a different pizza place for a time four years ago, but Beganovic always had his eye on reopening.

Then, COVID-19 happened, and the timing was wrong. But now he’s back in his old haunt, though he can’t say exactly why the spot has continued to draw him.

“I don’t know,” he says. “I feel good in this place. I love it here.”

A Bosnian refugee, Beganovic and his family moved to St. Louis in 1997 from Boston. They started off by opening a video store on Kingshighway, then a food store, a butcher shop and coffee shop. 

“Step by step, we grow up, and that's working here,” Beganovic says. “I'm happy here. This is now my second country.”

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Courtesy Darmin Beganovic

The dining room at Cafe Ciao.