Renowned Pizzeria Opening In Sicklerville Honors Grandmother's Culinary Legacy

SICKLERVILLE, NJ — At Genova Pizza, the food is made from scratch, the recipes come from grandma and the TikToks go viral.

Genova Pizza, which has operated in Audubon for over 70 years, will open a new pizzeria in Sicklerville on Thursday.

Genova's locations in Audubon and Williamstown are defined by Julia Rita Brown — the late matriarch of the family business. Recipes for Genova's grandma pizza, chicken cutlets and many other menu items came from Brown, whose illustrated face graces the logo and artwork throughout the restaurants.

Brown died in December 2024 at age 93. But her legacy lives on at Genova Pizza, which is now co-owned by her grandsons, Ali and Omar Doukali.

"It's homemade flavor," Ali Doukali told Patch. "Everything we do is from scratch. We make our own bread. We craft our own chicken tenders, and we've been doing that for decades — meatballs, dough, everything. It's different recipes we've inherited from my grandmother."

Genova Pizza has a foot in tradition and another in the new world, where honoring your grandmother and social media virality work in tandem. Genova has blown up on TikTok, where their main account has generated nearly 950,000 likes and 61,000 followers.

And even after more than seven decades, Genova Pizza continues to evolve. Over the past year, Genova debuted a mural of Brown outside the Audubon restaurant to celebrate her life. They also opened a second location in Williamstown.

Genova Pizza will now open a third eatery in Sicklerville, taking over the former home of Epiro's Pizza. Doukali says he wanted to modernize and infuse new energy into the restaurant space.

He has also paid homage to his grandmother, commissioning a new mural. While the Audubon mural honors Brown's life story, the artwork in Sicklerville focuses on her culinary legacy.

"I wanted to show more of her passion for cooking and her love for what she did in the kitchen," Doukali told Patch, "and more of the science of her recipes, so we have a couple of her recipes on the wall. That's kind of a unique twist on our stores."

Genova Pizza in Sicklerville will be located at 1185 Williamstown-Erial Rd. It will open Thursday with the following hours:

• Sundays and Mondays: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.
• Tuesdays: closed
• Wednesdays and Thursdays: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.
• Fridays and Saturdays: 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.