Tapping Nostalgia, Striking Gold

Posted by estiator at 10 February, at 06 : 34 AM Print

COVER STORY

Once you’ve opened a hugely popular Greek restaurant and a smash-hit Italian spot, what’s your next act? If you’re Peter Valis, the Connecticut nightlife impresario turned restaurateur, you go back to the future.

Valis, who co-owns Kouzina and Tomato Tomato in Stamford, unveiled his new concept, The Americano, in December. The vibe is 1920s speakeasy; the offerings include craft cocktails and an “elevated American” menu.

With Instagram as his sole promotional platform, Valis drove fever-pitch anticipation for The Americano months before its opening. “The response has been crazy,” he tells Estiator. “We’d planned to open soft, but the response was nuts, from day one. We’re open six days a week, but every night is like a weekend night.”

Crowds are coming for retro-cool classics like chilled shrimp cocktail, beef “Tartare l’ Americaine,” and filet mignon, along with hip fare like truffle fries, shrimp wonton, and charcuterie boards. Burgers, pastas, and salads round out the menu, topped off with desserts like brioche bread pudding and almond tiramisu.

Among the craft cocktail offerings: the namesake Americano, with Campari, vermouth, and club soda; the Martin Margarita, named for the original occupants of The Americano’s historic building; the comforting Berries and Spice; and the citrusy Miss Americana.

While the restaurant is new, the seed for The Americano was planted five years ago, when Valis and his business partners—brother Frank Vavoulidis and four of their cousins—checked out the space as a possible location for Kouzina.“The room was too big for our Greek concept, but we loved the space,” he says. “It’s an ideal corner location with high visibility, with a big patio and a big sidewalk.”

Though the partners ended up opening Kouzina in a more manageable space on the same block, they kept their eyes on the larger site, watching tenants “come and go,” Valis says. “This was the only concept where we worked backward from the location. We’d have these great ideas—concepts that would complement our restaurants, but also complement the restaurant scene here. We have the UN of restaurants in Stamford, but no contemporary American. The speakeasy vibe had not been done. We always thought The Americano was a great idea, with a great concept, and a big draw, and would benefit our area.”

Once the team signed the lease on the 3,500-square-foot space, the real work started.

“It was double the money and time to develop this place compared to our other restaurants,” Valis says. “Five years prior—say, just before Covid—it would have cost half the money and time. From lease-signing to opening took 15 months, with 11 of those months on construction alone.”

First, “we did a full gut job, just keeping the core stuff in the kitchen and plumbing,” Valis says. “We gutted to the floorboards and 2x4s. Just the hoods and electrical stayed in the same place.”

Then came “the most challenging part,” Valis says: Designing the room. “A Greek concept is fairly easy,” he says. “I go to Greece every summer, and I know what that should look and feel like. There was much more research involved to create The Americano.”

To capture “the 1920s-30s-40svibe,” Valis went online, researching period-appropriate tile, wallpaper, and lighting. “I gathered a scrapbook of what things looked like back then,” he recalls. “What was the clothing like at the time? The building was built in the1890s and once housed a men’s clothing store called Frank Martin & Son. We thought about incorporating some of that history.”

The Americano’s room combines those elements into a beautiful space with 110 seats, including 25 stools around a horseshoe-shaped bar. Vintage-style globe chandeliers, and vintage pendant lights over the bar, cast a warm light on the space. Wall sconces in vintage glass throw off soft amber lighting as well.

For the menu, “my brother and I put together a list of core items, making sure that what we have works with the concept and with the kitchen we designed. Once we hired an executive chef, Eduardo Gonzales, we also took his advice and“` he put his twist on the menu.” Valis and his team “try to stay local with our meat and produce purveyors. And our coffee program was created with BonJo, a Stamford roaster.”

Valis’s story starts not in Connecticut but in Katerini, where he was born Panagiotis Vavoulidis. Raised in Stamford, he started DJing in his teens, then opened the hugely popular Stamford nightclub Lava Lounge in 2000. “I was hosting private parties at 14, 15 years old,” he recalls. “Later, I started doing Greek nights at clubs in New York City.” After many successful years in nightlife and music production, Valis made the shift to food and hospitality in2013, when he and his partners opened Tomato Tomato.

“We were very green. We didn’t know much about full-service dining, though my partners had experience in food and bar service,” he says. With their cousins, Valis’s brother had owned four Dunkin’ franchises in the region.“You learn as you go. If I were to open today with a better budget, I would have redesigned the entire space. We had taken over an existing restaurant that was doing $500,000 a year in sales and was on the verge of shutting down. We did a cosmetic renovation but had to leave some things as is because of budget concerns. Our main priority, and what made us successful, was customer service.”

The first two years of Tomato Tomato “were difficult. We weren’t profitable. All the partners worked all day, every day. But because we went in on the green side, we went over and above with customer service. What we lacked in kitchen experience, we made up by hiring professionals in the kitchen. Whatever mistakes we made, at least we knew the food would come out great.” Valis, who describes himself as a “front-of-house guy», would answer every customer email personally.

Then, when Tomato Tomato hit the two-year mark, “something clicked. It turned into another restaurant. Sales doubled. I still don’t know what happened, but it transformed.”

That gave the partners confidence to open Kouzina in 2019, “months before the pandemic,” Valis says. Family recipes were the basis for the menu. “We’re all first-generation restaurateurs,” he says. “My parents, and my cousins’ parents, came over together from Greece. Some went to work in warehouses. My uncle worked as a butcher in a supermarket. My cousins and I were raised by our grandmothers, Yiayia Sofia and Yiayia Eleni. They were always in the kitchen preparing dinner. It’s part of our culture.”

To create Kouzina, the team made “dramatic” changes to a former Bobby Valentine’s Sports Bar, adding flourishes inspired by Santorini and Mykonos. “We added white walls, blue doors, bamboo lighting, and other elements that made it feel like a Greek island experience. We’re also one of the few Greek restaurants in the area that doesn’t mix generic Mediterranean items into the menu—there’s no pasta.”Their approach turned Kouzina into an instant—and lasting—hit. In November, in fact, the restaurant was spot-lighted on the Food Network’s “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” with Guy Fieri.

The restaurant also serves as much Greek wine as Valis can get his hands on, “but Greek wines have no distributor in Connecticut,” he said. “We’re probably the largest restaurant consumer of Greek wine products in the state, but whoever owns the license for them won’t sell in Connecticut.”Still, all of Kouzina’s wine pours are Greek, including a Nine Muses red and Agiorgitiko and Assyrtiko whites.

Now that Valis and his partners have made The Americano a reality, the focus will shift to growth and expansion for their three brands. “We don’t plan on starting new concepts,” he says. “When you have one that works, it’s much easier to expand on it and grow that way.” The team of partners, which calls itself Sauce Restaurant Group, has its eye on growth in the tri-state area, for starters.

But all eyes are on The Americano, and Valis says its brand of indulgent, sensual dining is what customers want right now. “People are coming back to having the out-of-home experience,” he says. “Takeout at our other restaurants is still popular. But we’re not doing that yet at The Americano. We want people to enjoy the environment, savor the food right out of the kitchen, and really enjoy the moment.”

HOME PAGE Cover Story, Michael Kaminer, The Americano