This Award-Winning Filipino Pizzeria Is Opening in Japan's Premier Ski Resort

(SPOT.ph) Crosta Pizzeria is going full throttle. Even with their many accomplishments this year—from being heralded by the 50 Top Pizza Asia-Pacific leg for a second year in a row, to opening a second Manila branch, to their head chef Yuichi Ito being named one of the top pizzaioli in The Best Chef Awards—the homegrown pizzeria isn't stopping yet. Their next big project? The highly anticipated opening of Baby Crosta in Niseko, Japan happening tomorrow, December 12.

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Here’s an exclusive sneak peek of what’s coming for Crosta Pizzeria in Japan and Manila:

Niseko is a snow resort town located in Hokkaido where locals and tourists come to ski. “It gets really busy in winter,” Crosta's Chef Yuichi Abellare Ito says in an exchange with SPOT.ph. “So the idea of us bringing in Crosta into the scene is that there's a lot of ski goers… in Niseko, people go into the mountains and then they ski down. Some people get hungry [afterwards], so we wanted to create something that people can [get in] 10 minutes [so they can] go [back up to] the mountain to ski.”

“We wanted [the pace] to be really fast… like moving, moving, moving.” In practice, that translates to pizzas that can “come out in two minutes”—speedy cooking, speedy eating. The Crosta team thus took inspiration from the Roman pizza styles known as pizza al taglio, which is baked in a pan and typically sold in square or rectangular slices. “It’s [around] 80% baked,” says Ito. A quick two-minute reheat in the oven and you get the crunch and flavor of a freshly baked pizza. 

The opportunity to open Baby Crosta came as the team was offered a place in the area. “One of our business partners now in Japan owns a couple of hotels in Niseko, and I think they wanted to revamp the whole area,” says Ito. “To do that, [they sought to] bring in restaurants that they think would be good for that area, and one of them was Crosta.” They visited the location and found it to be a “fancy” place—"because the thing is, Niseko is known for being expensive compared to other ski resorts in Japan. It's probably the most expensive one compared to other countries as well. But considering it's Japan, it just makes sense to have very good restaurants in Niseko."

The place had already been built as they arrived, which made it easy for them to settle in. “We just had to do a couple of fit-outs,” says Yuichi. They’re highlighting local on the interior front, as “90%... or even 100%” of their furniture is also from Hokkaido. “They are made in Hokkaido and they are designed in Hokkaido.”

As for the name? Baby Crosta, Yuichi shares, was originally another pizza concept Crosta owners Ingga Cabangon-Chua and Tommy Woudwyk had planned to open. Ito himself stumbled upon it as he searched Crosta on Instagram and instead landed on the Baby Crosta account; the project, however, was “sleeping” by then. As the Niseko opportunity came up, they figured to revisit the then-dormant concept, or the name of it at least. “[To Ingga and Tommy,] I was like, ‘let’s call it Baby Crosta. This has been in your mind the whole time, you already like the name, then we just have to make the product. Tommy, Ingga, and me were just on the same line [of thinking] the whole time.”

Their Niseko store would also be home to a second concept on its second floor: a pizza omakase Ito describes to dish out “the highest expression of pizza.” They’d be using “the best-quality products” primarily from Hokkaido itself—an area known for its seafood, beef, “amazing” pork, and game meats.

For this, Yuichi and his sister Naomi have been working on preserving the said ingredients (specifically the venison, beef, pork, and duck) into cold cuts, drawing from the tradition of doing so to prepare for the colder seasons. “The way I see it is, during the old times, when winter was about to arrive, people would try to preserve their products through salting, curing, pickling, preserving, freezing, drying, [and so on]. So, we want to recreate this idea.” They’ve been at this for about the past three months, as these products can take months to finish curing—up to a year, in the case of prosciutto.

“The idea is to [use] zero preservatives. Zero chemicals. Zero nitrites. Zero pink salt in all of our products.”

They’re also focusing on Hokkaido produce for this omakase leg—expect to see everything from Hokkaido dairy products for their cheeses and sauces, local vegetables from autumn to winter ("which we preserve naturally in-house so we can use it during winter," Ito tells us), even Hokkaido-sourced grains for their dough. "We rented a small house in Hokkaido just for these home-made cold cuts."

Coming Soon to Crosta in Manila

Sound familiar? Quick flashback to the similar pizza omakase Ito held in Manila back in June of this year. This was meant to tease about an upcoming spot here in Manila, slated to open next year—which Ito shares more details about with SPOT.ph.

Yuichi shares that this would house two concepts—beginning with the Philippines’ own counterpart of his pizza omakase spot. “It’s mainly gonna be me. I will be standing there, I will be cooking there, I will be explaining the dish and I will be serving the people. And I will be there every day,” he explains. “This is like an open kitchen by the chef. It's gonna be an eight-seater counter or private room, which is very intimate.”

As with the pizza omakase in Niseko, Ito says they’ll be serving the “highest expression of pizza”—but it doesn’t stop there. “The idea is to have the best dining experience that we [can] have… not only pizza, but [we’ll also be showcasing] different cooking techniques,” he elaborates. “I would say it would be like 60-70% pizza, but in a very unique way.”

“We've always thought that in the Philippines, we’re missing [having] finely executed food without being too fancy,” the chef continues. “And as a Japanese [person], I always miss this concept. You go to a restaurant and you feel like you're not even finished with your dining. You want to come back again. And this is what I want to build.” He admits that locally, options for this kind of dining is limited. “I'm always wishing now that everybody could understand that we have to raise the bar.”

The other half of the two-concept equation is a “bigger space”—one that’d have elements of, among others, natural light, a garden, a greenhouse, and a cream color palette. And as opposed to its more refined omakase sibling, here, they’d be serving more “casual” and “enjoyable” fare.

This, he explains, is a bit of an attempt to pay ode to and merge the best of the two cultures making up his roots: his Japanese side, and his Filipino side. “Being [half-Japanese and half-Filipino], I think there's always a side of Philippines and Japan that I enjoy, and [that] I don't enjoy,” Ito admits. “So what I want to do is to… get the things that I enjoy in both sides and mix it together.”

One of those aspects he appreciates about Filipino, for example, is the communal way we dine—which isn’t as big in the Land of the Rising Sun as it is in these parts. “In Japan, you don't really enjoy the big tables and eating all together in the other rooms as much as Filipinos in Italy. [But] for me, I really love [communal dining]... people now are so into techies, phones, computers and stuff. Sometimes we forget that we have people around us. And for me, food has always been the center of the thing that brings all the people together.”

On the other hand, he praises Japan's sense of "finesse" and flawless execution in the culinary context. “[In Japan], when we execute things, [it’s] like a fucking art. We execute it like super solid.”

“I want to combine [them] together… like [the elements of] finesse, friends, family, food that’ll bring people together.”

The service, too, is something the Crosta team will be fine-tuning for the upcoming spot. “I think for me, interaction with the restaurant and the diners is very important—it's part of the experience,” Ito tells us. “It [should] make them feel that this restaurant is really taking care of me. Making me enjoy, making me want to come back.”

“At the end of the day, I always say that going to a restaurant is not always about the food. It's about the real experience that you get… for me, going into a place, it's always been hard to explain things. But I know how I want to feel. And I know how I want you to feel. And this is what I want to share with people.”

Also read: 
Crosta's Chef Yuichi Abellare Ito Is Raising the (Pizza) Bar to New Heights  
The SPOT.ph 50 Great Restaurants of 2023: Best of Manila and Beyond

UPDATE (December 15, 10:31 p.m.): The article has been updated with additional information following an exchange with Chef Yuichi Ito.

UPDATE (December 18, 6 p.m.): Ito has provided pictures of the store in Niseko that have been added to the article.

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