Crugnale Bakery’s Rumford & Providence Stores Closed - Opened in 1917

Crugnale Bakery’s Rumford & Providence Stores Closed - Opened in 1917

Crugnale Bakery has closed its Rumford and Providence locations. 

The bakery, which first opened in 1917, was best known for its pizza strips.

On Monday, a message at the bakery’s Providence location on 11 Newark Avenue off of Atwells Avenue said it was “permanently closed” — and directed customers to fill bread orders through Duva Distributors in Worcester.

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The location at 237 Newman Avenue had a sign in the window on Monday stating, “Closed, thank you for your business.” The number at that original location is now out of service. 

At one time, Crugnale’s had five locations - including Cranston, Cumberland, and North Providence.  Numbers listed for those locations back in 2018 are similarly out of service. 

Crugnale's had not posted to Facebook since May 2020, when it announced it was reopening the Rumford location after being closed during the first part of the pandemic. 

Efforts to reach owners were not successful at the time of publication. 

 

RI Italian Tradition

One Yelp reviewer — “Evan V.” — gave it 5 stars in 2014, writing the following:

AN ITALIAN TRADITION SINCE 1917... JUST DON'T CALL IT "CRUGG-NAIL'S"

Growing up in Providence, everyone had their favorite bakery - D Palmieri's, Scialo Bros., DeLuise, P Guadagni's (RIP)... In our family, it was Crugnale's (say it with me now, Crewn-yah-lay).

Led by her incessantly pastry-craving sweet tooth, my grandmother would escort us from the third floor, down the steep descent that was Cambridge, through Academy, until finally we reached our destination at the corner of Newark and Valley. It was a mighty troop for my converse-clad four-year old peds, but to be greeted by the aroma of freshly baked, well-done Sicilian loaves made it all worthwhile.

When gazed upon under the proper conditions, translucent spirals seemingly leapt from the dense cell structure of each slice - standing metaphor for the steadfast dedication to hard work and unwavering familial bond, whom their exclusively blue-collar clientele gratefully savored these nice, crusty pagnotta with. Plus they had these pepper sticks to chomp on, making the trek back that much less dreadful.

Ok, so perhaps in retrospect Crugnale's Bakery may have not been the most renowned (compared to those on the "authentic" side of Atwells Ave), but as was just outlined, they certainly were the closest.