Our Story
Truly Pizza is a loving testament to collaboration, friendship, and respect for the world’s greatest communal food. Founded by Las Vegas hospitality veteran Donna Baldwin and renowned pizza maker and educator John Arena, Truly pizza is the culmination of their lifetime of shared friendship and love of healthy artisanal handcrafted food. Together with World Pizza Champion teammates Chris Decker and James Beard Award semi-finalist Michael Vakneen, Truly Pizza has set a new standard for culinary excellence and hospitality in pizza.
“We’ve created Truly Pizza to serve as a neighborhood pizzeria that is welcoming, enthusiastic, service oriented and thoughtful to our customers throughout the entire guest experience,” says Donna Baldwin, co-founder of Truly Pizza. “We value and care deeply about our local community and look forward to expressing our passion for hospitality, design and of course amazing pizza with our neighbors here in Dana Point.”
“Food is the expression of our community, the environment and the background of the people who make and eat the food, and we’ve created Truly Pizza to be a hub that brings these expressions to life through great pizza,” says John Arena. “Our menu is informed but not bound by tradition, and mindfully curated from the ingredients to the food’s aesthetic – every decision is selected for a purpose with a focus on local sourcing and supporting farmers in our community.”
The design imagined by Ted Berner & Dayna Lee, Powerstrip Studio lets guests dine in a garden and drink wine on the rooftop. The restaurant design is a romantic piazza that brings people home to stay. The exhibition kitchen to showcase Truly Pizza’s passion and love for hand-crafted pizza.