Photo by Jennifer Silverberg
Located in a suburban shopping center affectionately described as “humble,” Paul Manno’s Cafe is one of the most popular restaurants in St. Louis, Italian or otherwise. SLM asked owner Paul Manno Jr. why his flagship restaurant remains decidedly, emphatically old-school.
A lot of chefs spend time doing celebrity events, but you don’t. Do you think you’re missing out by not doing so?
I might be, but a lot of those events are on our busiest nights, Friday and Saturday. I’m so hands-on, I have to be at the restaurant all the time, even though my crew does a phenomenal job. I’m not a celebrity chef. I’m an average guy who just wants to take care of people. My mom taught me the inside of the kitchen, and my dad taught me the outside. I’m there for the people who are used to seeing me. Last night, I took my first night off in over two months, and I couldn’t get to sleep until 12:30 a.m. because I was wondering how it was going at the restaurant. It’s hard to turn that off.
Yours is one of the few restaurants that still practices tableside preparation. Why?
It’s a lost art. It’s what I grew up doing. It began as a way to get the food from the line to the table as fast as possible, so we could do more turns. But it’s also a little show and allows us to take care of you—a sense of nostalgia, especially for the older customers. We’re conventional, old-school. We just got the Internet in the restaurant last year, but we don’t have a website, won’t ever get one. All reservations come in by phone. The art of communicating with people is fading. The guys from OpenTable came to make a pitch, and while they were in the restaurant, the phone was ringing, and I was answering it. They said, “If you have our service, you won’t have to do that.” I said, “Why wouldn’t I want to do that?”
Why haven’t you expanded more?
I don’t want to. We expanded last year and added seven to eight tables to the dining room. That’s it. I’m happy with the size. People have approached me with ideas for a piano bar, a nightclub, a pizza place, and I said no. My plate is perfectly full right now, with the kitchen running at full capacity. Too much expansion would mean that I can no longer take care of customers. I like small places that are full all the time, with a buzz in the air. Keep things tight, with butterflies every night.
