Moving into the space that housed PrepKitchen Del Mar for nearly a decade is Villaggio Ristorante, an East Coast-style Italian restaurant from a fourth generation New England restaurateur.
Since 1938, Chef John (Jay) Bartolomei's family, who immigrated to the United States from Lucca Italy in the early 1900s, has owned and operated numerous Italian restaurants around Massachusetts. In 2005, Chef Jay opened his first Villaggio restaurant in Falmouth, MA and has relocated twice to larger locations within the Cape Cod area and has now has added Del Mar as a new landing spot for his creation
Chef Jay has recently partnered with Solana Beach resident business owner Troy Nuñez for the opening of Villaggio Ristorante, a scratch-made Italian restaurant currently moving into the base floor unit on Camino Del Mar that long housed the original PrepKitchen location. The menu at Villaggio will offer a variety of homemade traditional Italian dishes, such as chicken parmigiana, veal and chicken piccata, a lobster burrito, lobster fra diavolo, and chef's signature seafood Zingarella with lobster meat, jumbo shrimp and sea scallops sautéed with asparagus, artichoke hearts and sun-dried tomatoes, simmered in a Sambuca cream sauce served over pasta. The restaurant will also house a full raw bar and serve a variety of craft beer, cocktails and a curated wine list with California and Italian vintages.
Villaggio Ristorante will open at 1201 Camino Del Mar in San Diego's North County town of Del Mar as early as this fall. For more information, visit villaggiodelmar.com.
