Bits & Bites: A new generation takes over at La Tavola in Little Italy

In the past few weeks, Baltimore has had to bid farewell to some beloved local restaurants.

Bertha’s Mussels shut down at the end of October after more than 50 years in Fells Point. The Local Oyster closed both its locations in early November. By the end of the year, Joe Squared and Charmington’s will have served their last customers, too.

Despite those gloomy headlines, it seems there’s another, quieter, trend happening in the city. And this one has a happier outcome.

Across Baltimore, long-standing bars and restaurants are finding new owners. The changing of hands usually happens behind the scenes, and casual diners are often none the wiser.

I have the story of one such passing of the torch today. I also have word of a local restaurateur who was featured in Bon Appetit.

La Tavola’s next chapter

Carlo Vignotto moved across the Atlantic Ocean nearly 25 years ago for a job as a chef in Little Italy.

Vignotto was in his early twenties and working at an Italian restaurant in Riga, Latvia, when a customer there approached him with a business proposal: Come lead the kitchen at La Tavola, a new restaurant opening in Baltimore.

A year later, he became La Tavola’s chef.

“He offered to make the (immigration) paperwork for me,” Vignotto said of Sam Azoulay, his eventual business partner at the Little Italy restaurant.

This week, Vignotto moved back to Europe, where he plans to retire and split his time between Riga and Venice, Italy. He recently sold the restaurant to a group of investors, who partnered with a new restaurateur to keep La Tavola running.

Though he’s leaving Baltimore behind, Vignotto will be taking more than two decades of memories with him.

When he first started working at La Tavola in 2000, the chef insisted on making everything from scratch, from the gnocchi, to the focaccia, to the chicken and fish stock. He ruffled a few feathers by refusing to serve pasta with meatballs — an Italian-American staple, but not an authentic Italian dish.

“People were screaming at me because we didn’t have meatballs,” Vignotto recalls. “I said: We don’t eat meatballs in Italy. I just don’t want to have people come here and think that’s Italian.”

Vignotto’s back-to-the-basics approach won him a following who appreciated the restaurant’s fresh, classic Italian offerings. A 2010 review in The Baltimore Sun praised La Tavola’s housemade pasta and the chef’s straightforward attitude toward cooking: “On the surface, it’s a modest selection of typical fare,” a reviewer wrote of the appetizer selection. “But when these dishes arrive at the table, you begin to understand the modest approach La Tavola takes with its cuisine: Do it simply, do it fresh and do it right.”

Those regulars became family to Vignotto, who at 50 years old has spent nearly half his Christmases across the ocean from his blood relatives. “There’s a lot of memories,” he said. “We were lucky.”

But when the opportunity arose to sell La Tavola, the chef decided he was ready to return home.

“Time flies — if I want to still have the energy to do something, I’ve got to do it now,” he said. “I didn’t want to stay another 10 years and drag the restaurant.”

He and his wife built a house in Riga, and he plans to spend six months out of the year in Venice helping a friend restore old houses. He’s also not ruling out a return to the kitchen: Vignotto said he’s planning to collaborate on an Italian dinner with a fellow chef back in Latvia once he’s settled in.

Vignotto’s successor at La Tavola is another Italian native.

Luca Useli was born and raised in Sardinia, and came to Baltimore 12 years ago at the urging of Daniela Useli, his aunt and the owner of Daniela Pasta & Pastries in Hampden.

He started out as a dishwasher, then worked his way up to front-of-house and managing roles at restaurants in the city. He was cooking up a solo project when the opportunity to run La Tavola arose. Luca Useli met with the restaurant’s landlords, an investment group led by Dave and Lorrie Richards, and signed an agreement to take over the restaurant.

“I want to bring Little Italy back to what it used to be,” he said.

At 29, he isn’t much older than La Tavola, and Useli says he doesn’t want to change the fundamentals of the restaurant. He’s keeping the same staff, many of whom have worked there for more than a decade, and the same meat and produce distributors. Other than a few tweaks to the menu — lowering the price of a few salads, and re-envisioning some appetizers — Useli said he wants to keep the restaurant largely the same through the holidays, to smooth the transition for employees and regulars.

Eventually, Useli has some updates in mind. Aesthetics will come first: He plans to renovate the restaurant’s flooring and acoustic-tile ceiling that harken to the 1990s. Aluminum tiles behind the bar will be replaced by a mirror. A red, white and green mural that says “Ciao” will be painted over.

Useli intends to add some Sardinian specialties to the menu, as well as happy hour deals and brunch.

Though much has been made of the changes in Little Italy as decades-old restaurants close and loyal diners age, the young restaurateur sees reason for optimism. He’s encouraged by planned development nearby, including a 32-story apartment building proposed for the parking lot a block from La Tavola.

“There’s a lot of people who are putting money and work into this area,” he said. “I think this is going to be a very hot spot in Baltimore, hopefully within the next five years.”

Though he has his own ideas for La Tavola’s future, Useli shares Vignotto’s foundational belief in simplicity when it comes to cooking.

“It’s still going to feel like you’ll walk into your grandmother’s house and have the best Italian food you’ve had in your life,” he said. “But Grandma got a designer.”

More restaurants changing hands

Keep an eye out for more ownership changes on the horizon.

This year, beloved establishments like One-Eyed Mike’s and the Annabel Lee Tavern have changed hands. Bolton Hill’s beloved ‘dirt church,’ the Mount Royal Tavern, was acquired by an ownership group that includes local artist Dan Deacon. And Tamber’s Restaurant, a Charles Village staple, was recently purchased by a longtime employee.

Bon Appetit pays Lane Harlan a visit

Culinary magazine Bon Appetit takes a peek this month into the home kitchen of Lane Harlan, the restaurateur behind some of the city’s buzziest spots: taqueria Clavel, speakeasy W.C. Harlan, beer garden/natural wine bar Fadensonnen and, most recently, The Coral Wig, a tropical bar adjacent to the Hotel Ulysses.

“If each of these focused concepts is a different expression of her character, home is where all of Harlan’s idiosyncratic interests coexist,” contributor Amiel Stanek writes.

As part of the spread, Harlan shares recipes for smoked salmon tartare, pork shank garbure, kuri squash with salsa verde and boquerones, Filipino turon and a mezcal martini — of course. You can find some of the recipes on the magazine’s website.