Is Borelli's Pizzeria Still Open? Kitchen Nightmares Update (Chicago, IL)

What happened after Kitchen Nightmares?

Borelli's Pizzeria is a family-owned, BYOB pizzeria and live-music event space in Chicago's Lincoln Square neighborhood, opened in 2013 by Mark and Lisa Borelli; Lisa had first opened a music school on the building's ground floor before Mark turned his home pizza recipe into the restaurant downstairs. Their daughter Elise had worked there since childhood and had grown into a server role, and Mark staffed the kitchen mostly with teenagers, including cooks as young as 18 with no formal training. By the time of the Kitchen Nightmares visit -- filmed May 2025, aired August 4, 2026 as season 10's fourth episode -- the business had accumulated roughly $750,000 in debt, threatening both the restaurant and the music school upstairs. Staff described Mark as well-liked in the community but said he had never put consistent systems in place, leaving young employees to learn on the job.

Gordon Ramsay found overpriced pizzas, frozen mozzarella sticks, and fryer oil that staff said had gone roughly two weeks without changing; the dough, made mostly by Mark, came out thick, and part of it was pre-cooked to save time. During evening service Mark spilled fryer oil before opening and appeared increasingly erratic; producers showed Ramsay footage of Mark drinking in the basement during service, which Mark initially denied. Ramsay halted service, confronted Mark with the footage, and Mark acknowledged he had been struggling with alcohol and trying to cut back amid the stress of running the business, as shown in the episode. The next day Ramsay brought him to an initial recovery-program session.

For the relaunch, Ramsay's team retrained the young staff to run the kitchen without relying on Mark, introduced a new menu, and updated the dining room and kitchen equipment. Mark took on a front-of-house role during the relaunch service while the trained staff handled the kitchen; despite an early rush of orders, the team found its rhythm and diners praised the food.

Borelli's Pizzeria's own website, current as of 2026, shows the pizzeria still operating at 2124 West Lawrence Avenue with an active events calendar, catering and private-event booking, and online ordering through Toast; the site describes Mark and Lisa continuing to run the business as an event space with recurring live-music nights. Coverage of the episode's three-months-later update reported the restaurant had continued hosting community and live-music events through 2025 and into 2026, including themed nights and a jazz celebration, and that Mark had been able to step back from day-to-day control as staff took on more responsibility, with a Google rating cited at 4.5 stars and more than 236 reviews as of that August 2026 report.