Two-thousand meatballs. That’s how many the kitchen team at Buonissimo Mobile Italian Kitchen prepared for the food truck’s first event, and that’s how many they sold.
The Italian food truck is a venture the Salustri family undertook to help them move ahead with rebuilding and reopening an iconic St. Armands Circle restaurant under a new name.
Many Longboat Key families have made indelible memories over Christmas dinners and wedding receptions hosted at one of the Circle’s institutions. Umberto Salustri opened Le Colonne Italian restaurant in 1998, and over the decades, he and his family have taken pride in feeding residents and visitors dishes inspired by their heritage from the Anzio region south of Rome.
Like many neighboring businesses, the restaurant sustained catastrophic damage from back-to-back hurricanes Helene and Milton.
As Salustri’s daughter-in-law Amber Mayner describes, the floodwaters were strong enough to completely flip over a 1,000-pound stove.
“When we first came in, the damage was just shocking,” she said. “The windows were blown out, and grease overflowed from the flooded traps. Furniture was everywhere.”
But somehow a plate of her sister-in-law’s homemade cookies survived up on a ledge.
Among other post-storm developments on St. Armands Circle, Le Colonne Restaurant is rebranding as Nōnnō Umberto Italian Seafood & Steakhouse. Simone Salustri, who has managed the food truck Buonissimo Mobile Italian Kitchen in the interim, wrote in an update that the owners have begun construction for the reopening.
Photo by Dana Kampa
The storms were a significant blow to the restaurant, which had already started investing in rebuilding by the time Milton hit less than two weeks later.
However, Mayner and Umberto’s son, Simone, decided they wouldn’t let his 86-year-old father’s legacy fall by the wayside.
They came up with a creative way to financially rebuild the brick-and-mortar location. They opened up a food truck under the name Buonissimo Mobile Italian Kitchen.
“We realized we weren’t going to reopen right away, and Simone’s whole life was here at the restaurant,” Mayner said in an interview. “We didn’t know what we were going to do. But we used to joke around about food trucks all the time.”
Amber Mayner and Simone Salustri look forward to soon opening Nōnnō Umberto, an Italian restaurant on St. Armands Circle that pays homage to his father’s original restaurant, Le Colonne.
Photo by Dana Kampa
She continued, “But then, we did have some friends who had a food truck and encouraged us to try it out.”
Longtime supporters of the business helped the family secure the food truck, and the pair jumped into the venture with both feet.
She said they prepared approximately 2,000 meatballs and countless other ingredients for their first event, the New Year’s Eve Downtown Sarasota Pineapple Drop.
“It was crazy. We were there from 7 a.m. until 3 p.m.,” she said. “We prepared for an army.”
They managed to sell out.
“It was then that we knew we were going to make it,” Mayner said, attributing the success to Simone’s skills in the kitchen.
Amber Mayner said Buonissimo Mobile Italian Kitchen prepared and sold out of 2,000 meatballs at its first event. On a regular day, patrons can order meatball hoagies, pasta and desserts including fresh cannoli.
Photo by Dana Kampa
It wasn’t necessarily an easy undertaking. But it gave them the boost they needed to move forward with renovating the previous Le Colonne location on 22 S. Boulevard of the Presidents. Rebranded as “Nōnnō Umberto,” the Italian restaurant will now focus on being a seafood and steakhouse.
Simone, who was 18 when the restaurant first opened, said he aims to keep the classic charm of the original location while incorporating a fresh look and new dishes.
“The atmosphere is always going to be family-oriented,” Simone said. “When we opened, this used to be the fine dining of Sarasota. People would fly in from New York just to eat here. We’ll always be a high-end Italian place, but we’re shifting focus to highlight the seafood and the steak and make it more contemporary.”
When the restaurant opened in 1998, it only included the center space of the three segments.
“It was a tiny restaurant, and it was always packed,” Mayner said.
Years later, it expanded to three units in total, with plenty of space for family events, neighborhood meetings and more.
Le Colonne has long been involved in community events on St. Armands Circle, including its 2016 holiday light display. Along with Christmas trees, the setup included the phrase “Natale” in lights, which mean “Christmas” in Italian.
File photo
Umberto’s sisters eventually traveled from Italy to help at the restaurant, Mayner said.
“Simone’s father was always busy making the pasta by hand,” she said, noting it was a mix of Northern and Southern Italian dishes — balancing Umberto’s favorites with what diners were willing to try at the time. Shrimp cocktail with a special sauce, veal chops, homemade lasagna and osso buco topped the list of customers’ favorites.
“Everything is still done the classic way,” she said.
Simone said Nōnnō Umberto will still feature large tables for catering to events, and that the brick oven installed by a Neapolitan master artisan years ago. Simone said it was the first such oven built in Florida.
“That will be here long after me, longer than all of us,” he said with a laugh.
But with a few torn-down walls to open up the space and a fresh coat of paint, he and Mayner anticipate the revitalized restaurant will appeal to longtime and new customers.
Although Umberto has retired, Simone said he knows his father is looking forward to the reopening day. The family is still working with contractors on the timeline, but they hope to open before Christmas so they can once again welcome longtime friends to partake in a holiday meal.
Dining and Cooking