Rye NY: New Mediterranean restaurant Antique Garage opens
Watch video of Antique Garage, a new Mediterranean restaurant in Rye April 15, 2025.
Antique Garage is set to open in Rye April 24.Antique Garage specializes in Aegean cuisine, with fish flown in daily from Greece and Turkey.Details abound at Antique Garage, with décor that combines style from several decades that look like they could have come from your grandmother’s house.
Utku Cinel is proud of his cooking but believes you can be the best chef with the best food, but if you don’t know how to serve and plate it, along with offering a great ambiance with great music, you won’t have a successful restaurant.
Which is why a lot of carefully curated components — think olive trees imported from the Mediterranean, a marble bar from Italy and an assortment of Victorian chandeliers — are part of the décor at Antique Garage in Rye, Cinel’s third dining establishment, which opens April 24.
With a seating capacity for 120, a sunroom with a retractable roof, a front patio and a back garden complete with a fire pit, this is the chef’s largest spot— and his first in Westchester. The avid antiques collector owns two Antique Garages in downtown Manhattan, specifically Soho, which opened in 2003 (in an old mechanic’s shop, hence the “garage” name) and Tribeca, which opened in 2016. All of them are decorated in the same eclectic style with mix-matched plates — Cinel likes patterns from the 1920s, ’40s and ’50s — as well as a medley of mirrors, artwork, crystal decanters and dressers that look like they could have come from your grandmother’s house.
The restaurant also boasts Persian and Turkish rugs.
Making his places homey is a big part of the restaurant’s charm. “I like to give people something to talk about,” said Cinel. “You may have people meeting for the first time and not have that much to say when they come here. But when they’re admiring the décor, it may spur conversation.”
All three places also sport a communal table, another aspect that’s important to Cinel who grew up in Turkey, where such tables are common.
Cinel, who runs the restaurants with his wife, Evrim, a former ballerina who’s also from Istanbul, pride themselves on welcoming guests as if they were dining in their home. The two value creativity, art and hospitality and work hard to keep that focus center stage.
Just as important: the food’s freshness and high quality ingredients.
Mediterranean influence
With a deep passion for seafood, particularly the flavors of fish from the Aegean region, Cinel has fish flown in daily from Greece and Turkey. Items are displayed in a cooler by the front door where guests can pick their own. Also displayed near the front: a display case featuring mezze.
Cinel, who studied at the French Culinary Institute but has been cooking since he was six, describes his food as Aegean fusion with cross-cultural flavors that span the Mediterranean. “My mom is Greek and my father is Turkish so I grew up between these two worlds,” he said.
His food is “Mediterranean diet friendly” with lots of fish and kebabs. While the menu is similar to what exists at his Manhattan spots, the Rye location has more seafood options. Among those: Whole Grilled Branzino for two (you can also get for a single portion), Seafood Pasta and Seafood Begendi (sautéed shrimp, octopus, calamari tomato, and hot green pepper over smoked eggplant purée).
Other items include Adana Kebab (spicy hand-chopped skewered grilled lamb served on top of pita bread and onion salad); Chicken Shish Kebab, Salmon Shish Kebab, Steak Frites, mezes and salads.
Why Westchester?
Opening close to where he lives was one reason Cinel wanted to open in Rye (the family moved to Fairfield County, Connecticut two years ago). The other was the influx he noticed post-pandemic of Manhattanites moving to the suburbs.
“I saw the need for a Mediterranean in the area and figured this would be the perfect place,” said Cinel.
He’s also hoping to bring more action to Rye by mixing it up with a lively special event nights and late hours music, offering people a place to go that doesn’t just include dinner. “We plan on moving these tables out in front and get people up and dancing,” he said of the space in front of the bar.
“Everything in life can be so stressful; we want this to be a place people can come relax.”
If you go
Address: 100 Purchase St., 914-249-9993, antiquegaragesoho.com.
Hours: noon to 10 p.m. daily; weekend brunch 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. with dinner from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m.
Good to know: There will be live jazz most nights as well as for brunch in addition to (eventually) special events such as belly-dancing. There’s also outdoor patio dining and a fire pit.
Jeanne Muchnick covers food and dining. Click here for her most recent articles and follow her latest dining adventures on Instagram @jeannemuchnick or via the lohudfood newsletter.