Click here for Greater Long Island newsletters. Click here to download the iPhone app.
Two new La Bottega locations are expected to open this June on Long Island, bringing the family’s LI count to six.
Opening a single restaurant on Long Island can be daunting enough.
But Giuseppe Ruta and his family are aiming to do that twice in a matter of days with the hoped-for June debuts of La Bottega Italian Gourmet outposts in Babylon and East Norwich.
“I was like, ‘OK, we’re going to do one or the other — if this one doesn’t work out, the other one will,” said Ruta, who opened the first La Bottega with wife Marisa 22 years ago in Garden City South. “And at the end, both of them worked out, so now we’re opening two restaurants at once.”
The launch of a Babylon spot at 238 Deer Park Ave. will mark the growing fast-casual Italian chain’s return to Suffolk County after nearly a decade, while another Nassau County opening is on tap for 6245 Northern Blvd. in East Norwich.
The latter’s looming arrival will follow the recent closing of a restaurant that had been around for more than a decade and a half in Roslyn.
After losing the lease there — “the landlord had different plans for the building,” Ruta said — an opportunity presented itself in Babylon, not far from the family’s home.
“It’s got such a nice village feel,” Ruta said. “When it’s a beautiful day and people walk outside, they have coffees, they have nice spots, good restaurants, good sushi, good burgers, good bars.
“It’s quaint, we belong here.”
A family-run feel with paninis, wine and warm lighting
As with La Bottega’s other Long Island locations — in Garden City, Oceanside, Rockville Centre and Glen Cove — salads, paninis, pizzas and pastas will highlight the menu of made-to-order dishes in an “Italian chic” setting.
“Even if you just come for a panino, you want to have a good glass of wine, a good environment, good lighting, good music,” Ruta said. “The experience is complete.”
The La Bottega experience is a family affair, with the couple’s two youngest children now partners in the business alongside their parents, who met as teenagers on a beach in Ispica, a city in the south of Sicily.
Daughter Melania, 29, a graduate in architecture from Roger Williams University in Rhode Island, is in charge of food operation, finding new vendors and design. Giuseppe Jr., 25, is in charge of La Bottega’s beverage department and wine list.
“It’s his world,” Ruta said of his son, a 2021 graduate of Les Roches hospitality school in Switzerland. “He loves it.”
The oldest son, Mattia, 32, is a Hofstra graduate who lives in England.
A journey from Manhattan kitchens to the heart of Long Island
The restaurant business comes naturally to the elder Ruta, whose parents owned a bar when he was growing up in Sicily.
“In Italy, a bar is more a place where you can go as a family or as an individual — It doesn’t matter if you’re 70 or if you’re 5 years old,” he said. “You can have a gelato, a coffee, a cappuccino, a granita, you can have a slice of pizza.”
That’s the type of setting the family has aimed to establish over more than two decades at La Bottega, whose first branch in Garden City South is “still kicking,” with a renovation planned for the future.
“We want people to come in and feel good about themselves sitting in a good, well-run place,” Ruta said.
La Bottega was born after Ruta had worked many years in Manhattan restaurants, including stops at high-profile Italian establishments such as Coco Pazzo and iL Buco.
“I was making good money, I was respected, I had a big job in the city,” he recalled. “But I wasn’t happy, I didn’t know what the heck was wrong with me.”
The solution, he said, was to go back to the dining room and “to be involved with the customers.”
“I just needed to have my own place, no matter how big,” Ruta said.
The count will be up to six of them once the Babylon and East Norwich restaurants open, with plans also in place for a La Bottega food truck and even more expansion.
Ruta said that working alongside his wife and kids brings great fulfillment to the family.
“I really don’t know what else to do, honestly,” he said with a laugh. “I don’t even think I could do anything else.”
Top: Giuseppe Ruta and his family (L-R, clockwise): Giuseppe, daughter Melania, 29, wife Marisa, son Mattia, 32, and son Giuseppe Jr., 25. (courtesy photo)
