El Salchichero, Chris LeVeque — with a bit of help from his organic grower parents — is deep into the renovation of the former crafts studio at the top edge of Kelly’s Ingalls empire. What will emerge, soon, is the talented meat guy’s enormous charcuterie works.
LeVeque, an emerging maestro of salume, prosciutto, bresaola, and artisanal lard as pure as the driven snow, is poised to open his retail salchicheria (house of links) next month. Let the salivating begin. . . .
And here’s the other OMG tidbit: Brad Briske told me he will be leaving Gabriella to take over the space formerly known as Theo’s. The fabled organic garden in back will fuel Briske’s creative cuisine in the charming little Soquel boutique bistro.
Meanwhile Gabriella owner Paul Cocking admitted that while he’s sorry to see his talented chef leaving, he sensed the change coming. “He’s been feeling restless for a while now,” Cocking told me. One door closes, and another one opens. Cocking reveals that he’s already auditioning some serious chefs for the Gabriella gig, chefs with hefty resumés and tons of talent. Sounds delicious.
Omg is right, that’s awesome I won’t have to drive downtown anymore to have Brad’s food! I hope the neighborhood knows who he is, that’s great for this area and it’s a beautiful restaurant too. Nice job, Main Street Garden!
Is Brad Briske going to work for the owners of the Main Street Garden restaurant which as of February was unfortunately still open in the former Theo’s space serving some of the poorest “Italian” food in the area? Or has that restaurant blessedly closed its doors?
The “space formerly known as Theo’s” has a name, and it’s Main Street Garden.
It’s really to Paul’s credit that he is handling this change so gracefully, but then being in the culinary business as long as Paul has aged him like a fine wine… #1 he is a Pro #2 He is a gentleman #3 Flexible & Adaptable are his middle names. Survivor & Thriver a couple others. For ohhhh what a loss! Brad Briske is in my humble opinion a culinary super-star. Perhaps it’s his passion for fresh EVERYthing? Perhaps it was his training in the somewhat confining & therefore refining environment of his training as a Chef being in purely Vegan restaurant, where a sauce had to do so much on it’s own. Perhaps it’s his knowledge of an passion for every aspect of the art of cooking? To me I was sold from the appetizers to dessert and every orchestrated step in between. But what took things to a whole new level is when he came out of the kitchen & started talking with incredible passion about their sources of food, from their own sausages, to the fishermen that will call Brad and say “we caught one of these today, beautiful, fresh” and to Brad there’s no way he wouldn’t find a way to incorporate it that evening into his guests options for dining that evening. Never been to Theo’s… but that is certain to change soon!
Patricia – I talked with Paul and he says that yes, Brad is going to work for the folks who replaced the wonderful Theo’s with Main Street Garden.
We’ll see what happens….
C
Lupe – I will always remember the great restaurant, Theo’s, that will continue to define that charming little house and garden on Main Street.
From the comments I’ve heard, the current pizza place has done nothing to erase people’s memories of Theo’s.
Christina