Westchesterites find piece of Italy at Tuscan Oven

Nation's Restaurant News, March 22, 1993 by Peter O. Keegan

MT. KISCO, N.Y. -- Tuscan Oven is heating up the dining scene in Upper Westchester, an area rich with commuters who bring their New York City palates home every night on the train.

"This area is known for expensive, inn-type restaurants," opined Anthony Pirraglia, who, along with his wife, Karen, turned a love of food and a knowledge of wine into their new trattoria. "And Westchester is a wide-open territory," he said, adding that an influx of Italian and other national dinner-house chains have not reached the high-rent district, which is located an hour north of Manhattan.

A former wine liquor retailer who remains a wine consultant, Pirraglia decided to switch to a new field when he noticed alcohol sales continued declining. "I saw a dip coming and wanted a new direction in my career," he said. "And the need up here for something good was something I saw many years ago."

With a personal flair for home entertaining and both parents hailing from Italy, Pirraglia and his wife met up with French-trained Westchester chef Jim Duffelmeyer and put together an authentic Tuscan trattoria, complete with wood-burning brick oven.

"We wanted to serve great food at the right prices, and there's practically no competition; everything else around here is much more Continental," Pirraglia said. "It came together very quickly."

Located in the Mount Kisco Square Shopping Center, Tuscan Oven has 19 tables and 40 seats, with 20 additional outside seats when the weather allows. The response by Westchesterites has been so positive that the Pirraglias may even expand into a retail space next door, and they are already looking at other Westchester sites for expansion.

Executive chef Duffelmeyer prepares thin-crusted pizzas, pastas, grilled meats, salads and polenta in the open kitchen, the centerpiece of the restaurant.

A recent sampling included brick-oven-roasted organic chicken, braised rabbit with mushrooms, garlic and white wine over pasta, a tomato casing stuffed with roasted eggplant and garlic, pizza Toscana with grilled sausage, fresh mozzarella, plum tomatoes, fennel seed, chopped Italian parsley and grated parmigiano as well as other inventive offerings.

"We let our imaginations run wild with all sorts of combinations," Duffelmeyer said. "The background is nouvelle, working with all sorts of colors and flavors."

Other dishes on the menu include an appetizer of stuffed radicchio with goat cheese wrapped in pancetta, grilled and served with a basil sauce; penne forno with penne, chicken, roasted peppers, fresh herbs and broccoli in a pink tomato basil sauce; radicchio leaf stuffed with goat cheese, pancetta and ham, grilled and served in a tomato basil sauce; stuffed mussels with wild mushrooms, sun-dried tomatoes and sausage; and a baked bread stuffed with grilled peppers, zucchini, onion, tomato, mushrooms, fresh herbs, fontina cheese and served with balsamic vinegar.

"This is not a place to get lasagne," Duffelmeyer explained. "I wanted to take a whole, new route, from appetizers to desserts."

Duffelmeyer's background includes chef stints at Fritz's in Somers, N.Y.; Bistro 22 in Bedford, N.Y.; and Maximes in Granite Springs, N.Y.

Duffelmeyer said he hasn't changed the menu since opening in August. "When you jump around too much, you lose focus," said the French-trained chef. "I did lots of experimenting in the beginning, creating my own style."

With freshness a key ingredient in the success of the concept, many things are made on premises, such as soups, sauces and roasted peppers. Dried pastas and espresso for the tiramisu are imported from Italy.

"We designed the menu to be moderately priced," said Pirraglia, adding that average per-person tickets are $12 to $14 at lunch and $20 to $25 at dinner, with wine. Entrees are $6.95 to $13.95, and pizzas are around $9 for a medium and approximately $7 for a small, with 75 cents additional to add more than 25 toppings. Pirraglia said Tuscan Oven does 100 covers at lunch and 200 at dinner.

The whole menu is available for takeout, which is currently running 5 percent of sales, and the restaurant does a brisk business on the weekends.

The couple, who have four children, have an eye for detail and keep the staff in top form. "He enjoys talking to people, making him perfect for the job," Karen Pirraglia said of her husband. "He treats them [customers] as if he were entertaining in his own home." When the waiting time piles up, Pirraglia gives out free wine and appetizers and checks tables personally.

Wife Karen takes care of the business angle, crunching numbers, and also oversaw the architecture and design of the restaurant, from its tin ceiling to terracotta floor.

"It's such a small place I have sight of most of the restaurant," Pirraglia said. "So if there's a problem, I catch it right away."

With all the traveling to Italy, the two wanted to create a trattoria, open-kitchen type of feeling. In addition to the open kitchen, the informal restaurant stores items like eggs, breadsticks, wine, olive oil and fruit, which also serve as decoration.