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September 26, 2008
Fire Strikes Tov Pizza
Maayan Jaffe
Staff Reporter
Tov Pizza, a popular kosher restaurant located at 6313 Reisterstown Road in Northwest Baltimore, will be closed until further notice because of a fire that broke out early in the morning Sept. 17.
The fire began shortly before 5 a.m. Baltimore City Police and Fire Department crews responded to the blaze. There were no injuries.
Owner Ronnie Rosenbluth said it took about 45 minutes to extinguish the fire, and by 7 a.m. crews were leaving the scene.
At this time, according to Mr. Rosenbluth, preliminary reports indicate the fire was electrical. Restoration companies and insurance adjusters are working as quickly as they can to get the shop — which is nearly 25 years old — back in business.
“We’re going to work as quickly as we can to get it re-opened,” said Mr. Rosenbluth. “And I want to thank everyone for their expressions of help and for their calls of support.”
Mr. Rosenbluth first learned of the fire when he heard a call on his Shomrim radio that morning. Mr. Rosenbluth is vice president of the volunteer community anti-crime organization. The police, he said, were asking on the radio if any Shomrim volunteers could respond to the fire.
“I was the first to respond to the call,” said Mr. Rosenbluth. “I identified myself to the police officer, and then I froze for a couple of seconds. I threw my clothes on and when I got to the shop, 12 other Shomrim guys were there. I was in shock seeing the flames coming out of the back of the building.”
Mr. Rosenbluth said that it is not yet possible to estimate the financial losses suffered from the fire. “A lot of work needs to be done,” he said. “The fire didn’t burn the kitchen, but there was a great deal of smoke and water damage, that kind of stuff.”
Tov Pizza was founded in 1984 by the Rosenbluth family, and is a favorite meeting place among local observant Jews and others. It is Baltimore’s longest-running kosher restaurant in the same location. Tov also caters lunches to many of the schools in the Jewish community.
Five fire trucks responded to the blaze, according to the police report. Between Kenshaw Avenue and Bancroft Road along Reisterstown Road, traffic was stopped in both directions while firefighters battled the blaze.