Bosco’s Italian-To-Go — Great People Serving Great Value!

Nancy and Charles Frankulin invite you to check out their Buffalo chicken and other hand-tossed pizzas and homemade Italian specialties. (Photo by Charmaine George)

I consider Bosco’s Italian-to-Go owners Nancy and Charles Frankulin to be my friends, even though they know that because their thin-crust pizza is made “Detroit style,” or on a conveyor belt oven, instead of on a traditional New York-style stone, their pizza is never going to finish at the top of my list of local favorites. 

Even so, I give them high marks for quality ingredients (I do love the taste of their pizza sauce and mozzarella cheese), super-fair prices and for being quality people who genuinely care about their community.

These Wesley Chapel High graduates have seen a lot of local pizza places come and go in their nearly five years since taking over the Bosco’s location in the Freedom Plaza on S.R. 54 from original owner David Bosco.

And, while many more restaurants failed because of the Covid-19 pandemic the last year+, Bosco’s has maintained its clientele and has continued to deliver (more on that below) its Italian fare to more and more people in every community in Wesley Chapel.    

Plenty Of Favorites… 

I do want to make it clear that although Bosco’s isn’t my favorite pizza locally, there are plenty of options on their menu that I do genuinely enjoy. 

First of all, the pepperoni on the hand-tossed pizza (above) is delicious, and I also like their plain cheese and “meat feast” pizzas (the latter with pepperoni, Italian sausage and bacon). Photographer Charmaine George, who took all of the photos on this page, said the Buffalo chicken pizza had just the right amount of spice and there also are veggie, “Honolulu pineapple,” white winter spinach and chicken Alfredo pizzas on the menu, starting as low as $11.50 for a 14” plain cheese and going up to no more than $20.99 for the 18” meat feast and “Works” pizzas.

I also genuinely like Bosco’s crispy, naked baked chicken wings (I get them plain, as shown below, with the sauce on the side; 8 wings for $7.99, 16 for $14.99 and 40 for $35.99), the sides of homemade meatballs or sausage ($3.39), the chicken Alfredo pasta dinner ($8.49) and especially, the chicken parmigiana dinner ($8.99, it also comes with pasta) and hot sub sandwich ($8.49). The cut-up strips of chicken parm aren’t breaded, and the thicker tomato sauce is extra zesty, so you can enjoy the entrée even if you’re on a low-carb diet (although you’ll probably want to try it with one of Bosco’s fresh salads instead of the pasta if you’re keto-ing). 

  • Naked chicken wings
  • Charles Frankulin tossing pizza dough.
  • Chicken Alfredo
  • Chicken Parmigiana sub

As for the subs, the bread does come out with a crispy edge, so I do recommend not only the chicken parm, but also the meatball ($8.49) and sweet Italian sausage (with onions and peppers) subs (also $8.49). There also are cold Italian ($8.49) and ham and cheese ($7.49) subs that Nancy says are very popular but I haven’t tried. All of Bosco’s subs come with a bag of chips and a can of soda, too.

Speaking of salads, Bosco’s has a very tasty Greek salad, with olives, feta cheese and banana peppers ($8.99), as well as Caesar ($6.49), chicken Caesar ($8.99), grilled chicken or chicken tender salads (both are $8.49) and an antipasto salad ($8.99) I’ve never sampled.

  • Cannoli
  • Meatballs
  • Greek salad
  • Cheese pizza
  • Nancy Piping the Cannoli

I do also like Bosco’s garlic bread sticks ($4.99) and garlic cheesy bread sticks ($5.99), as well as the lasagne ($9.49), baked ziti ($7.99) and stuffed shells ($8.49). All dinners are served with a small salad and garlic knots. I’ve also never tried include calzones (with one topping of your choice, ricotta and mozzarella, for $11.49), strombolis (stuffed with 3 Italian meats & 3 Italian cheeses for $12.99). Add $1.75 for each additional topping with your calzone or stromboli. 

Save room for dessert, as Bosco’s offers hand-piped cannolis ($3.39) and delicious CinnaStix ($5.50). “There’s a baker in New Port Richey who provides our cheesecake ($3.39), tiramisu ($3.99) and cannolis,” Charles says.

Helping Those In Need

Charles and Nancy also enjoy doing their part to help the local community, as they have done school supplies drives in years past and now have a small food pantry on at Bosco’s to help local residents in need.

“We collect non-perishable food items and offer them to anyone in the community who says they need help, no questions asked,” Nancy says. “There is no stigma here. We’ve only been collecting items for a few months, but already have had a lot of locals thanking us for the help.”

Bosco’s also provides its own pizza delivery, instead of using Grubhub, Uber Eats or other delivery services. “We deliver to all of Wesley Chapel,” Charles says proudly. 

Bosco’s Italian-to-Go is located at 30122 S.R. 54 and is open Mon.-Thur., 11 a.m.-10 p.m., and 11 a.m.-11 p.m. on Fri. & Sat. For more information, call (813) 907-2440 or visit BoscosItalianFL.com.

Bosco’s Owners Celebrate Two Years In Wesley Chapel With New Menu Items!

WHETHER YOU LIVE in Meadow Pointe II or Epperson, the husband-and-wife owners of Bosco’s Italian-to-Go, located in the Freedom Plaza on S.R. 54 (near Curley Rd.), are proud to deliver their pizza and Italian specialties to your door.

“We’re one of the only pizza places that delivers both to Epperson and to all four areas of Meadow Pointe,” says co-owner Charles Frankulin. “If you have a Wesley Chapel address, we’ll deliver to your door.”

Charles and his wife Nancy, whose first date was their senior prom at Wesley Chapel High, took over a reasonably successful little pizza place two years ago next month and continue to put their own imprint on Bosco’s already pretty good menu.

Go Gator!

The most recent additions include some that are, well…pretty unique.

“We wanted to have something that no one else in Wesley Chapel was offering and we decided to give gator a try,” Nancy says. “We now serve gator fettuccine Alfredo, gator on pizza and even something we’re calling ‘Swamp & Turf’ pizza, with both gator and steak.

Gator Alfredo

Charles is quick to point out that, “People who say they don’t love gator because it’s usually too tough are usually talking about gator tail, which is tougher because their tails are so muscular. We’re bringing in tender gator belly, farm-raised in Louisiana.”

I certainly have always been one of those folks who has never been too impressed with the chewiness of gator tail, but I’ve also always been at least somewhat adventurous when it comes to food, so I gave both the Cajun-style gator fettuccine and Swamp & Turf pizza a try, and offered samples to senior video producer Gavin Olsen and sales assistant Janet Levins.

We all agreed that the gator is indeed tender and sweet, almost like a cross between lobster and calamari, but I definitely enjoyed it more with Bosco’s mild (not overly thick or cheesy) Alfredo sauce.

I definitely recommend giving it (or the chicken fettuccine Alfredo) a try.

I also really enjoyed Bosco’s new Tuscan-style tater tots, which are basted with a small amount of oil and baked in Bosco’s conveyor belt oven and come out crispy, with a hint of garlic (third photo from the top on the next page).

Garlic knots.

And, speaking of crispy, although they’re not a new menu item, I wanted to give a shout out to Bosco’s garlic knots. I’ve always preferred regular, crispy Italian bread to knots with my lasagne, meatballs (photo, left) or chicken parmigiana, but Bosco’s come out super-crispy, without overdoing the garlic. Nice!

Another tasty new menu item is the smoked mozzarella raviolis (photo, right), which are stuffed with the flavorful, smoky cheese and covered with Bosco’s zesty red sauce and fresh (not smoked) mozzarella.

Meatball sub.

The only new menu items we haven’t sampled yet are Bosco’s crispy boneless or bone-in wings with Frank’s Redhot Sweet Asian chili hot sauce. I’ve always loved sweet Thai chili sauce, so I’m sure Bosco’s oven-baked wings will be great with them.

And, even though Bosco’s hasn’t yet toyed with keto pizza, they do offer 14-inch gluten-free pizzas, for those who are reactive to gluten.

“We sell quite a few gluten-free pizzas every week,” Nancy says. “There’s a pretty steady number of regulars asking for them.”

Speaking of demand, although I didn’t get a great picture of them either, you have to try Bosco’s crispy cinnamon sticks with cannoli icing for dessert. Decadent! There’s also cannolis, cheesecake and tiramisu on the dessert menu.

To celebrate their second anniversary, the Frankulins are offering one-topping, 14-inch pizzas for only $7.99, with the coupon from Bosco’s ad on pg. 35 of this issue. Congrats, Nancy and Charles!!

Bosco’s Italian-to-Go (30122 S.R. 54) is open every day but Sun. for lunch and dinner, 11 a.m.-10 p.m. and until 11 p.m. on Fri. & Sat. For takeout or delivery orders or for more info, call (813) 907-2440 and tell Nancy and Charles I sent you. Or, visit BoscosItalianFL.com!

Bosco’s Italian-To-Go Is A True Wesley Chapel Love Story With A Great, New Menu!

Bosco’s Italian-To-Go owners Charles and Nancy Frankulin went on their first date for their senior prom at Wesley Chapel High (WCH) 14 years ago. They’ve been together ever since. Both started working at Bosco’s Italian-To-Go in the Freedom Plaza on S.R. 54 (about a mile east of Saddlebrook Resort) several years ago, where they learned the restaurant business and talked about opening their own eatery some day.

It didn’t take long for “some day” to happen, as Linda Carr, the owner of Bagelicious & More in the same plaza, purchased Bosco’s from the former owner, but always with the intent of fixing the place up a bit and flipping it.

The Frankulins purchased Bosco’s in January and have slowly been building a following for their tasty Italian fare at very fair prices. It took them a while, but Nancy, Charles and Nancy’s mom recently started revamping and upgrading the menu and the interior of the small, mainly take-out restaurant.

“The menu hadn’t changed for 14 years,” Charles says. “We felt like it was time to start adding some new items and improving some of the old ones.”

Some of the improvements are immediately noticeable — like upgrading the sauce, cheese, crust and toppings on Bosco’s Detroit-style conveyor belt pizza. While it may never be like true New York-style pizza to me, there is a definite difference between what the Frankulins are serving now, compared with what was being served before they took over.

The thing I like is the addition of some great new dinner entrées, including a grilled (not fried) chicken parmigiana. Now, even though the chicken is grilled and not breaded, it is still sitting atop a heaping pile of spaghetti, covered with a zesty tomato sauce and topped with mozzarella cheese, so you can’t really call it “dietetic” (especially with a side of tasty garlic knots), although you can call it “delicious.”

The Frankulins also were proud participants in the recent Taste of New Tampa. “We had a lot of people tell us they didn’t now we were there or that there were new owners,” Nancy says. “It was a great event for us.”

I recently took our office to lunch at Bosco’s and the reviews were all pretty terrific. Billing manager Stephanie Smith loved Bosco’s cheese ravioli, which she got with a side of sweet Italian sausage. Graphic designer Blake Beatty also raved about the huge, traditional calzone, to which he added pepperoni. New sales and marketing rep Tom Damico enjoyed the cold Italian sub, which came with a can of soda and a bag of chips. Staff writer Celeste McLaughlin enjoyed her tossed salad with grilled chicken and we agreed that the Greek dressing served with it was excellent.

And, assistant editor John Cotey and I agreed that our 14” (the small size) pizza was really tasty. The Frankulins tried a recent special, offering the 14” pizza with one topping for just $7.99 (14” pizzas regularly cost $11.49 with no toppings)! We got pepperoni on all of it and meatballs on half for just $1 more.

“We tried it for the week of graduation, in order to get people with graduation parties to order a lot of them,” Charles says.

“And it’s been working great,” Nancy added. “We’ve sold a lot of $7.99 pizzas this week!”

Bosco’s also serves 18” large pizzas starting at $13.49. Specialty pizzas include “Vegilicious”, “Italiano” and Bosco’s Winter White Spinach pizza, starting at $16.99 for a small and $19.99 for a large.

I also really enjoyed Bosco’s spaghetti ($7.49) and side of meatballs ($3.39)and the meatball parmigiana hot sub ($8.49). In addition to the calzones ($11.99), Bosco’s stromboli stuffed with three Italian meats and three Italian cheeses start at $12.99.

Bosco’s also has oven-baked chicken wings, a chicken Caesar pasta salad ($8.99) and a huge antipasto salad (also just $8.99).   

Other dinner entrées include chicken Alfredo ($8.49), lasagne ($9.49), baked stuffed shells ($8.49) and manicotti ($8.49).

I haven’t sampled the desserts yet, but Bosco’s does have cheesecake, cannolis and tiramisu, all for $3.39-$3.99 each..

Special Offers, Too?

Bosco’s has lots of great “regular” specials, too, from the $16.99 18” pizza with your choice of garlic bread, cheese bread or any two-liter Coca-Cola product for just $16.99 (see the ad on page 46 for the coupon), as well as two pizzas with two toppings each, plus 8 wings and a two-liter soda for just $28.99, and more.

Please note that these special offers are for carry-out only.

Bosco’s Italian-to-Go (30122 S.R. 54) is open Monday-Thursday, 11 a.m.-10 p.m., and 11 a.m.-11 p.m. on Friday & Saturday. It is closed on Sunday. Delivery is available, too, to a limited area for a delivery charge of $2.25 and a minimum order of $20. For more info, visit BoscosMenu.com or call (813) 907-2440 and please tell them we sent you!