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Benvenuti Gourmet Food in a Hours: Call to Reserve Our Private Party Room We Make Our Homemade Dough Try It, You'll Love It! |
Outdoor & indoor Seating For Fast Pickup Service, Please call: (856) 840-0998 13 West Main Street Free Parking in the Rear | ||||||||||||
|
Benvenuti Gourmet Food in a Hours: Call to Reserve Our Private Party Room We Make Our Homemade Dough Try It, You'll Love It! |
Outdoor & indoor Seating For Fast Pickup Service, Please call: (856) 840-0998 13 West Main Street Free Parking in the Rear | ||||||||||||
MOORESTOWN - Pasquale Passariello says his family opened its restaurant, Passariello Pavilion, downtown because he is in love with this town. And the 250 customers who buy food at his Main Street bistro daily feed his adoration.
"I spend the money, the town will come in here and make me happy," he said. "They are a very, very nice community. I really love the people here."
And the people - including other business owners - appreciate his presence downtown.
Customers arriving at or leaving the restaurant, at 13 W. Main St., often stop in at Signature Designs, a craft shop two doors away on Main Street, which is dominated by law and real estate offices. "They come in with leftovers," Signature Designs owner Diane Ambrosino said. "Or garlic on their breath."
Passariello, 30, of Evesham, who came to United States from Italy 16 years ago with an uncle and owned his own pizza shop within a decade, does not sit still. He flailed his hands as he told his family's story in a booth in the restaurant, and he broke off mid-sentence to rush to the counter and explain to a customer that the French dressing is fat free.
He, his father and four siblings also own four Scotto's Pizza franchises in Burlington County as well as Clemente's Steak & Subs in Burlington City. Now, they're looking to take their authentic Italian fast-food concept, launched with the Moorestown restaurant, to other communities.
The concept is a mall-style food court. Four separate glass-covered counters that stretch along a side of the restaurant feature separate categories of food - pizza, pasta, sandwiches and salads. Under the glass there are bright-colored lasagnas and strombolis, pizzas, sauces and chopped vegetables.
Each counter has its own cash register and drinks. A typical meal costs around $7.
The fast-food market concept, Passariello said, sets the restaurant apart. "I don't want to be like the restaurant you go to every day. I don't want to be like the pizza place you go to every day," he said.
But Passariello doesn't mind that since it opened in the fall, his restaurant has been getting repeat customers.
Jerry Wright brought coworkers from his business in Cherry Hill to the shop on consecutive days recently. "This is not the first time we've been here," he said.
Cooks put together meals at the counter just a few feet from the pizza ovens and stoves. The Passariellos often work those counters themselves. The six co-owners, like many of their 20 or so employees, split time among the six restaurants.
The Moorestown site, with its jars of olives and roasted red peppers on display for both practical and decorative reasons, is their favorite. "Even if I open 100 stores," Passariello said, "I don't franchise this one."
Pending Zoning Board approval, the Passariellos plan to enclose a deck and add two more counters- one for coffee and one for Italian rice dishes.
The Passariellos entered the restaurant business long before Pasquale Passariello bought his first Scotto's in 1991. For years, the family ran a cantina in Monte Di Procida, a town about the size of Moorestown outside of Naples, in Southern Italy.
The cantina is closed now, as its owners have, one by one, joined Passariello in New Jersey.
Passariello's family - father Clemente, sister Marianna, 32, and brothers Vincenzo, 28, Giovanni, 25 and Sakaris, 21 - makes its expansion decisions by majority vote.
Pasquale Passariello said the family has been asked to open an outlet in a new Voorhees shopping center, an option the Passariellos are weighing. Whether it's Voorhees or elsewhere, though, they plan to expand.