The NOLA Mia crew have braved cooking with wood fire in Louisiana heat while building a dedicated online following
By Jesse Brooks
Published: Oct. 11, 2024 at 7:35 AM CDT|Updated: 22 hours ago
PONCHATOULA, La. (WVUE) - The heat in South Louisiana is already a special kind of heat.
Now imagine that heat while standing close to a 900-degree wood fire oven five days a week for 10-12 hours or more. That’s what life has been like for Chef Matias Rojo and his crew for the last six years.
The NOLA Mia Pizzeria crew, not to be confused with NOLA Mia Gelato Cafe on St. Claude Avenue, started a food truck with a custom pizza oven imported from Italy inside it, braving all elements of the service industry while setting up shop at parties and parking lots everywhere between New Orleans and Baton Rouge.
With every stop along the way, NOLA Mia has made dedicated followers through their pies crafted by a classically trained chef and social media outreach.
The business is based in the sleepy swamp town of Ponchatoula where the Rojo family lives. After serving up pizza from town-to-town, Rojo is counting on the truck’s fans to come to him. The truck is now in semi-retirement and a new brick-and-mortar location has taken its place.
“It’s really been amazing to see people show up wherever we announce we’re going to be," Rojo said. “But we’re happy to be home and bring something new to a historic place like Ponchatoula."
NOLA Mia officially opened its doors on Wednesday (Oct. 9) on West Pine Street in a completely renovated building. Patrick Ryder of Ryder & Ryder Construction is the building’s owner and is leasing to Rojo. He says it’s over 100 years old and needed a major overhaul.
“This project took over nine months to complete and involved a lot of permits and approval from the fire marshal,” Ryder said. “But all the public officials we worked with to make this possible, from the mayor to the council, were great and believe this is something the town needs.”
Inside the building is a new massive pizza oven that takes up space as the heartbeat of the operation. Rojo said that all of the building parts and shell of the stove were produced in Italy. It was then imported to New York City, where he and his crew made the trip to pick it up and take notes on pizzas they tasted along the way.
As a native of Argentina, Rojo has lived a rambling life but he’s also a community man that’s proud to have planted roots. He’s leasing the building but sees it as a long-term home. The building features two murals, both by artist Hans Geist. The one on the outside depicts a photograph of Ponchatoula’s main street in the early 1900s. The second one is inside, depicting the images of his family, crew, and the origins of the food truck.
“This has been like 20 years since culinary school in Argentina, starting my own business and getting to this point,” Rojo said. “It was my parents who said I was talented and should do what I want to do. This is for them.”
Rojo gets emotional talking about his parents, who were killed by a drunk driver while cycling back home in Argentina. He admits there’s still a lot of pain but said that their memory gave him the courage to take a chance on a truck. A picture of them always hung in the back of the truck while he worked, he notes.
After graduating from the Celia Institute of Culinary Arts in Cordoba, Argentina, Rojo landed in Louisiana by finding work as a sous chef in some of the most prestigious hotels in New Orleans right before Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005. He later moved to Ponchatoula near his wife’s parents with their seven kids.
On opening night, families lined the door for an early dinner. Kids ordered classics like cheese and pepperoni pizza. Adults eager to try something they may have seen on the business’s Instagram page opted for the innovative muffuletta pizza or the “Porky”, which features boudin and pulled pork.
“I’m a chef so I’m trained in high-quality ingredients," Rojo said. “And if I try something I like and I want to know how to make it or experiment with it, then I’ll learn."
To be able to make boudin in-house, Rojo says he gathered his crew and brought them on a trip to Scott, Louisiana in the heart of Acadiana, the boudin capital of the world. The restaurant features boudin on two of their signature pizzas and offers boudin balls as a starter.
“It’s funny, coming from Argentina, everyone thinks it’s all rice and beans but I didn’t really eat any rice and beans until I came here," Rojo said.
Argentina, as he describes it, has a very European culture and his family’s culinary tastes were based on the Italian, Spanish, and German influences that arrived in the country after World War II.
“There was a lot of beef, a lot of what is like barbecue,” Rojo said with a smile. “One day I will own my own Argentinan steakhouse, mark my words.”
There’s reason to believe Rojo when he makes a promise. He’s patient but delivers results and he’s ambitious. He sees NOLA Mia as a potential cultural hub for Ponchatoula, bringing new commerce to town and options for families.
“We want to bring an experience and we really work on our price,” Rojo said. “But we’re still importing our flour from Italy. We want to have kids picking their own toppings and making a pizza. And I want to teach cooking classes here."
Rojo’s crew has catered for movie productions and professional athletes. Saints defensive end Cam Jordan has a signature pizza (Margherita plus pepperoni) and Pelicans guard C.J. McCollum once bought out the truck for all staff and players to have lunch.
But now, Rojo’s road stops at home where it all began, the same town he began firing up an oven in.
“For most of the last six years, we’ve been parked in the parking lot of Gabriel’s Building Supply," Rojo said. “Can you believe they’ve never charged me a dime to be there?"
It’s that kind of care and hospitality Rojo wants to give back to his community. On the inside mural in the restaurant, next to images of the truck and his crew, Rojo made sure that the artist included a rendering of the sign out in front of Gabriel’s, forever painted in local history.
See a spelling or grammar error in our story? Click Here to report it. Please include the headline.
Subscribe to the Fox 8 YouTube channel.
Copyright 2024 WVUE. All rights reserved.
