A custom Spanish-built woodfired grill is about to start throwing flames on First Street in Downtown Phoenix. Stefano Fabbri, the restaurateur behind Pomo Pizzeria, Rosso Italian and Luna Gelateria, is opening Salta, an Argentine-inspired steakhouse serving meat, seafood and vegetables cooked over fire, right next door to his original pizzeria.
A Grill Built for Theater, Not Just Steak
According to the San Luis Obispo Tribune, Salta will open this fall at 705 N. First St. in Downtown Phoenix, sharing an entryway, valet and hostess stand with Pomo Pizzeria next door. The report notes that guests will be able to grab drinks at Pomo before dinner at Salta, or vice versa, blurring the line between the two concepts into one extended night out. Fabbri has said the restaurant will not serve fully authentic Argentinian cuisine, but instead lean on Argentine fire-cooking techniques layered with his own Italian sensibility.
The centerpiece is a grill custom made in Spain, according to Fabbri, built to handle meat, seafood and vegetables cooked directly over fire. The same reporting lists a menu built around empanadas, tableside milanesa napolitana, wood-fired provoleta and potato dishes, alongside a central bar serving cocktails and grill-focused small plates. Fabbri has said he wants Salta to draw in a young, lively crowd rather than function purely as a formal steakhouse.
Roots in a Seventy-Year Family Food Business
Fabbri's path to Downtown Phoenix traces back generations. His family's food business dates to 1949, when his grandfather opened a bakery in Sant'Agata, in Italy's Emilia-Romagna region, according to Frontdoors Media. His parents later opened a pizzeria and gelateria named Luna in 1969 — the same name Fabbri gave his own Phoenix gelateria concept decades later.
Fabbri brought that lineage to Arizona in 2010, opening Pomo Pizzeria Napoletana at the Borgata in Scottsdale as one of the first pizzerias in the state to earn official Neapolitan certification, the Phoenix New Times reported at the time. Pomo still holds its designation from the Naples-based Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana, which governs everything from dough fermentation time to the origin of the wheat flour used, per the organization's standards. Fabbri has said Pomo represents his Italian roots, even as Salta pushes his menu in a new direction.
From Pandemic Losses to a $15 Million Operation
Fabbri's restaurant group has weathered real financial turbulence to get here. In a June 2023 interview with Italian outlet Corriere Romagna, Fabbri said Pomo Restaurant Group had grown into a $15 million annual enterprise employing 165 people, despite losing $3 million during the COVID-19 pandemic, when he was forced to close or sell four locations. Salta marks a bet that the recovery can keep scaling upward.
This isn't Fabbri's first attempt at a high-end steak concept. He previously co-founded The Americano, an upscale Italian steakhouse in North Scottsdale that opened in February 2020 just before pandemic shutdowns hit, before parting ways with the concept later that year, PHOENIX Magazine reported. He's continued building out his Downtown Phoenix footprint since, launching Rosso Italian, a 5,000-square-foot contemporary Italian concept at CityScape, in February 2023.
A Corridor Transformed, and a Crowded Steak Scene
The First Street stretch where Salta is landing has changed dramatically over the past decade, going from a sparse commercial strip to a dense, walkable restaurant corridor located four blocks from the Valley Metro Rail station at Roosevelt and Central Avenue, according to PHX Rail Food. Streetscape upgrades like bike racks and shaded walkways have helped drive foot traffic to the area. City of Phoenix municipal records through May 2026 show zero liquor license violations and minimal calls for police service at the Pomo Pizzeria address, which operates under a Series 12 liquor license.
Salta also arrives amid a broader Valley push toward live-fire, theatrical steak dining. Hoodline previously reported on Bistecca & Bones, a 7,500-square-foot Florentine-style chophouse from Square One Concepts targeting an early 2027 opening with tableside flamed porterhouse steaks. Downtown competition is building too: hospitality group Pretty Decent Concepts announced plans in February 2024 to redevelop nearly 10,000 square feet at the nearby Arizona Center into multiple venues, including a reimagined upscale steakhouse.
Fabbri has said he wants diners to remember Salta for the entire night, not just the steak, framing the restaurant as a Latino-Italian experience built around shared cultural ground between Argentina and Italy. Whether that dual identity resonates in a downtown core already filling up with ambitious steakhouses remains to be seen.
