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closeMama Stortini’s owners to open second restaurant
Puyallup’s Italian and Pacific Northwest restaurant begins to branch out by opening 60th Street Bistro at Windmill Gardens
Roxanne Cooke
The owners of Mama Stortini’s Ristorante and Catering will soon open a second restaurant in East Pierce County at Sumner’s Windmill Gardens.
The tentative open date is May 6, said John Spearman, executive chef of the Puyallup restaurant and operating manager for Specialty Restaurant Group, the company that owns Mama Stortini’s.
The café space at Windmill Gardens has been vacant since Oct. 15, when the Garden Café left, said Ben DeGoede, Windmill Gardens’ general manager. Mama Stortini’s was a good choice because it offers both a sit-down restaurant as well as catering services.
Windmill Gardens is a popular venue for weddings, so a catering business is a plus, DeGoede said.
“They have a very good reputation,” DeGoede said. “They’re a good fit for us.”
Owners of Mama Stortini’s decided that opening another restaurant in Sumner would be a good opportunity to start branching out, Spearman said.
“Our plan was to grow,” he said.
Mama Stortini’s relocated from University Place to Puyallup in 2004, Spearman said. Specialty Restaurant Group took over in 2006 and turned what Spearman called a “spaghetti house” into a fusion of Italian and Pacific Northwest cuisine.
“It’s not just Italian anymore,” he said.
Their new location at Windmill Gardens won’t be a repeat of what already exists in Puyallup, Spearman said. It will be called 60th Street Bistro and start out with just lunch offerings, including soups, salads, sandwiches, burgers, seafood and a selection of entrees from Wednesday through Sunday.
By mid-June, the new bistro will be open for full-scale dinners, he said.
“We’re really excited about it,” Spearman said. “I think it’s going to be a great success. We can’t wait to get it open.”
Specialty Restaurant Group is aiming to open one new incarnation of Mama Stortini’s restaurant each year, Spearman said. Each establishment will be a variation on the original, catering to each individual neighborhood or district. Currently, Specialty Restaurant Group is considering opening another restaurant in Renton in a year.
Spearman has been in the restaurant business 25 years and worked in Boston and Los Angeles before moving to Bonney Lake, where he lives with his wife and children.
Windmill Gardens has another tenant spot open and is seeking a business that would be complementary to its theme of gardening and home décor. Viewfinder Photography recently departed.