When Tommy Kanaras and his brother, Chris, decided to open a pizzeria, they already knew restaurants from the ground up. Their father, George Kanaras, had made sure of it.
“My father taught us from the beginning,” Tommy Kanaras said. “He had us cleaning bathrooms and washing floors. He wanted us knowing everything about this business.”
The brothers grew up in the restaurant industry, learning not only how to prepare and serve food, but how much work happens before a customer ever sits down at the table. When they decided they were ready to start their own business, their father took them to the bank for a loan.
“What happened was we took a gamble, and we came to Box Hill and the restaurant took off from there,” Kanaras said.
That gamble became Box Hill Pizzeria & Crab Cakes, which has been part of the Harford County community since 1984. More than four decades later, the family business has grown well beyond the neighborhood pizzeria the brothers originally opened, but Kanaras still credits much of its staying power to lessons learned from his parents.
His father, now 94, emphasized quality and consistency. His late mother, Dee Kanaras, worked alongside the family at the restaurant for 30 years. “She taught us a lot,” Kanaras said. “She knew how to run a business, she had that ethic, and that was instilled in us.”
Over the years, the restaurant became particularly well known for its crab cakes, eventually creating an opportunity the family hadn’t originally anticipated. Customers began asking if Box Hill could send crab cakes to friends and family who lived elsewhere. The Kanaras family listened.
“A lot of customers would ask if we could ship them some crab cakes,” Kanaras said. “It was a whole new venture for us. We did our homework and learned the ins and outs. We were local, then we became regional, and then we became nationwide.”
Another expansion came from the next generation. Kanaras’ son Nico, now a partner in the business, suggested taking Box Hill on the road with a food truck. “I didn’t want to rain on his parade, so I said, okay, let’s go for it,” Kanaras said.
The family invested in the truck, and the venture quickly grew. Today, it brings Box Hill to community events, schools, farmers markets, businesses and other gatherings throughout the region.
For Kanaras, both the shipping business and food truck reflect something that has been true throughout Box Hill’s history: growth requires planning, but it also requires being willing to take a chance. What hasn’t changed is the standard behind it.
“We’ve evolved by staying quality. Quality, quality, quality,” Kanaras said. “My father always taught us that. Be consistent. If you were to eat here today and then come back in 20 years, that crab cake better taste the same.”
That commitment has been tested through changing economies, rising food costs, and an evolving restaurant workforce. Kanaras said Box Hill has weathered recessions and other challenges without compromising what goes onto the plate.
“With what’s going on in the economy today, we’ve never cut back on the quality,” he said. “For us, it’s very simple. Give people quality, keep a clean place, and take care of your customers.”
After decades in the same community, customers are the heart and soul of the restaurant, and Kanaras wants them to walk away knowing the important role they play. “We want them to feel like they’re a part of the family,” Kanaras said. “We grew with this neighborhood. The neighborhood built us, the customers built us, and through that we hope they take away a good experience.”
For the future, as Kanaras approaches retirement, he sees his son, Nico, helping shape what comes next. “He’s got a passion for this business,” Kanaras said. “He’s got all the qualities you need. He’s got ideas. He’s got a lot of ideas he’s [already] brought to the place. My son is to be commended. He does a great job.”
From the early days of George’s help and Dee’s work at the business to Tommy and Chris and now Nico, Box Hill has evolved across generations without straying far from the principles that built it. “We’ve survived recessions over [the decades],” Kanaras said. “We’ve had a lot of things that could go wrong, and they didn’t, and we managed to come out on top, but it took hard work.”