Patrick Colombo has been in the restaurant business for nearly three decades. He spent nine years as senior vice president and co-founder of the 21-store national Italian restaurant, Sfuzzi, Inc.; he was executive director of food & beverage operations at Mansion on Turtle Creek Hotel; and he co-founded Nick & Sam’s, and is currently president and CEO of Restaurant Works, Inc., the hospitality management company that developed Cru, Ferre Ristorante e Bar, Victory Tavern City Grille and Steel Restaurant & Lounge.
So when the Colombo family took a culinary tour of Italy, eating their way through Venice, Tuscany, Florence and the Amalfi Coast, Colombo was inspired to bring another Tuscan dining operation to Dallas.
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JonesBaker designed princi | italia to reflect a limestone Tuscan farmhouse with warm and modern elements added. The interior includes a vaulted-beamed ceiling, distressed wood basket chandeliers, Venetian-plastered stone walls, abundant natural light and white-washed wood beams. The restaurant will also feature a large garden patio shaded by two historic live oak trees, steel and wood arbors, fans and built-in heaters for those guests who prefer to dine outdoors at any time of the year.
Executive chef Kevin Ascolese, who has 35 years of restaurant experience all over the nation, and pastry chef David Brawley, who has spent three years teaching at the Art Institute and Le Cordon Bleu and was executive chef at N9NE Steakhouse and Nove, join the team in the kitchen.
The kitchen will offer homemade pastas, seasonal vegetables, light and lemony salads, and Napolitano-style pizzas in the restaurant’s oak wood-burning pizza oven. Menu stand-outs include tortollini fonduta with black truffle and butter sauce; Italian wedding soup with chicken meatballs, pastina, and gremolata; fava bean alla Toscana bruschette; and quattro formaggio “bianco” pizza with mozzarella, parmesan, gorgonzola and goat cheese.
princi | italia will serve only dinner for the month of September. Hours will be from Sunday through Thursday, 4 to 10 p.m. and Friday and Saturday 4 to 11 p.m. Beginning October 4, the restaurant plans to open for lunch from Monday through Saturday beginning at 11:30 a.m. and Sunday brunch beginning at 10:30 a.m.
