By Rick Hynum
A struggling orphanage in the heart of Ecuador. A group of teens with bleak prospects for the future. A master pizza maker from Naples with the buzzy, nimble mind of an entrepreneur and a big, loving heart.
Put them all together, and what do you get?
Something good. Something hopeful. Something very, very tasty.
You guessed it: Neapolitan pizza, handcrafted by those teenage orphans under the tutelage of a pizzaiolo familiar to PMQ readers—Alessio Lacco, co-owner of Atlanta Pizza Truck and co-founder of Latinos en Pizza—and sold to the community for a profit.
Desperately needed money gets raised. The kids learn job skills. And, suddenly, the future looks a little bit brighter—maybe a lot brighter.
It almost sounds like a tale from a Charles Dickens novel, but with pizza instead of gruel. And, if all goes according to plan, this tale, like Oliver Twist, will have a happy ending.
Related: Love at first bite: How two soulmates made Atlanta Pizza Truck an unstoppable force for change
Finding Love in a Danger Zone
Lacco and his partner/wife, Sofia Arango, founded Latinos en Pizza as a U.S.-based nonprofit with an international mission: supporting and promoting the Latino community’s invaluable contributions to the pizza industry worldwide. Along with other Latino-American pizza leaders, they have been traveling to faraway countries like Bolivia, Venezuela, Chile and others to teach pizza-making skills, encourage entrepreneurship and drum up excitement about the world’s greatest food.
To make a long story a little shorter…back in 2024, Lacco found himself visiting Hogar del Niño San Vicente de Paúl, a Catholic-run facility in Quito, Ecuador. Also called Casa Hogar for short, it’s dedicated to the comprehensive care of children, adolescents and youth who are abandoned, orphaned or at risk.
“And I honestly fell in love,” Lacco recalled. “I fell in love with the kids there, with the sisters, with the history.”
Lacco’s grandfather was an Italian orphan who overcame the odds to develop his cooking skills and build a career as a chef. “If nobody had helped my grandfather, would I even be here?” Lacco reflected.
The youngsters at Casa Hogar face even tougher odds: Due to “skyrocketing violence combined with persistent economic pressures” and escalating poverty, the International Rescue Committee ranked Ecuador as “one of the countries most at risk of experiencing a worsening humanitarian crisis” in 2024.
That’s especially bad news for Casa Hogar, which houses about 60 kids ranging from infants to 18-year-olds. Government funding has been cut. The nuns who run it often don’t have funds to pay for healthcare; Lacco recalled holding a sick infant girl in his arms and learning the orphanage couldn’t afford a doctor to check her out.
Lacco forked over the money himself. Meanwhile, he thought, sure, someone might one day adopt that baby—infants have a much higher adoption rate than older children—but what about the other 59 kids? When they turn 18 and have to leave the orphanage, where will they go? What will they do to survive?
“They will find themselves on the street, with no work, no job experience,” Lacco said.
And in a city like Quito, the capital of Ecuador, life on the street brings dangers and dark temptations for young people without families and marketable skills: crime cartels, drugs, prostitution, thievery, you name it. As the Associated Press reported in August 2023, “Ecuador was one of the calmest countries in Latin America until about three years ago. Today, criminals prowl relatively wealthy and working-class neighborhoods alike: professional hitmen, kidnappers, extortionists and thousands of thieves and robbers.”
“I was, like, I want to try to do something small, something I can do with the skills I have, which is pizza,” Lacco said. “So we started a conversation. What if we open a little pizza place where we teach the kids how to make pizza, and we donate a pizza oven and everything they need, and the orphanage keeps the profit?”
Seeking Sponsors, Donors and Funds
That approach is often termed social entrepreneurship: using the principles of capitalism to fulfill a social mission and do good in the community. And Lacco and Arango, both in their early 30s, aren’t ones to dilly-dally—once they’ve taken on a mission, they get to work fast.
Using the orphanage’s kitchen and two small ovens, including an Ooni, they already have a pizza pro in place, Roland Escalona, who’s teaching four 17-year-olds—three boys and one girl—how to make pies. The results were impressive after just two days of training: gorgeous, flame-kissed Margherita pizzas with just the right amount of blister on the crusts.

They’ve also found a company to build a wood-fired oven for the orphanage, although whether that will come free, Lacco doesn’t know yet.
Meanwhile, Lacco is looking for pizza industry vendors who will provide ingredients such as flour, sauce and cheese to build out the project. Additionally, a GoFundMe campaign, created by Arango, is now in place to accept donations. The current goal for the campaign is $7,500, with $380 raised so far.
Click here to donate to the GoFundMe campaign!
“These children dream of a brighter future, and we believe we can help them achieve it,” the GoFundMe page states. “Our vision is to transform a part of this orphanage into a culinary institute where these young individuals can learn the art of pizza-making. But this isn’t just about pizza; it’s about teaching them valuable culinary skills that open doors to opportunities in pasta making, sauces, sandwiches and even specialties like mozzarella, prosciutto and gelato.”
To further that goal, Lacco has entered Forbes‘ Entrepreneur of Impact competition. The grand prize includes $25,000 for his project as well as an appearance in Forbes magazine. Lacco plans to apply the $25,000 “toward training programs for the orphans, purchasing equipment, and creating a sustainable workspace where they can learn, work and grow. It would also help us provide housing solutions for those turning 18, ensuring they have a safe place to live while building their futures. This investment would create a replicable model to empower more communities across Latin America.”
Click here to vote for Alessio Lacco in the Entrepreneur of Impact competition.
The Pizza Festival With Intention
To promote and raise money for the project, Latinos en Pizza will also host an event, called The Pizza Festival With Intention, on February 2 in Quito, featuring Ecuador’s soccer team, local dignitaries and all-you-can-eat pizza for $10 ($5 for children). “The kids are going to make the pizza,” Lacco said. “Of course, I’ll be there to help them,” he added, along with a pizza consultant, Daniele Gagliotta, who works in Latin America. “We’re going to have games, a freestyle pizza acrobatics show, and some doctors will be there to check the kids for free. The soccer team is donating a jersey [for a raffle].”
Lacco has hired a PR firm to help promote the festival and has been doing media interviews and working with local influencers as well. In fact, they’ve already scored a media coverage hit: La Nota en Linea, a digital newspaper that covers all 24 Ecuadorian provinces, published a Spanish-language piece about the festival on January 17. The article describes Lacco’s endeavor as “a revolutionary project with profound social impact.”
But Lacco and Arango are just getting warmed up. “We’ve really started to think about how [the Casa Hogar project] can be replicated in cities everywhere, not just Ecuador,” Lacco said. That could include other Latin America countries, the U.S., and Europe, for starters.
“I really want to replicate this,” he said. “Sofia and I have our limits. But if somebody with another organization, somebody in the pizza world or anywhere else, wants to get involved, we can help put it together. But for now, my job is to use my contacts as best I can and say, ‘This is what we’re doing. Is anyone else interested?’ And if not, it’s OK, because I’m still going to do it anyway.”

Best of all? As the project moves forward, younger children in the orphanage will likely take notice and recognize that they, too, could have a future in pizza.
“We don’t want to push it on them,” Lacco said. “You don’t want to be, like, everybody needs to be a pizza maker [for life]. But when they get involved, they’re at least going to start making some money for themselves at the end of every week. They can buy a phone with that money or something else they want. It will start to move them and give them hope.”
And the best-case scenario for some of the kids will be highly useful job training, learning a skill that can turn into a career. “I feel like they wake up every day, and it’s like a time bomb is ticking,” Lacco said. “They think, ‘I’m gonna be 18, and I’m gonna be screwed.’ So at least we can give them an opportunity. Maybe then they’ll think, ‘I’m gonna be 18, I know how to make pizza, and I’m gonna start there.’”
“Sometimes you’re a spark, sometimes you’re a flame,” Lacco added. “What we’re giving, through Latinos en Pizza, is a little spark that can turn into a flame. We’re all working together in the name of pizza.”