Italian experience
By Casey Gillis on Jan. 31, 2008
At La Villa Da Toto Pasta Grill, the menu is always negotiable.
“The rules of the house are this: you choose what you want to eat. You don’t even have to look at the menu,” says Michele Diogiovanni, who owns the Timberlake Road establishment with his wife, Rebecca.
“I tell my customers, ‘We have a menu just to remind you what’s in it, but you really don’t have to look at the menu. Tell me what you want to eat.’
“This is the place where you will make your own dish.”
He says customers who have traveled abroad sometimes come into La Villa in search of a dish they had in Italy, and he’s happy to re-create it for them.
“This is a real Italian restaurant, where we really speak Italian, and we’ve got family in Italy.”
Born and raised in Naples, Diogiovanni says his upbringing influences everything from the way he serves the food to how he treats the
customers.
“You bring everything you have to the table every time,” he says.
In the kitchen, Diogiovanni and his staff whip up your basic Italian staples — like spaghetti and meatballs, chicken parmesan, fettuccini Alfredo and pizza — as well as specials like Penne Al Granchio, penne pasta tossed with a rosy cream sauce and crabmeat, and chicken stuffed with spinach and shrimp.
One thing he and Rebecca are particularly proud of is their rosy cream sauce: an Alfredo sauce mixed with a hint of tomato sauce.
They also emphasize freshness in their ingredients.
“We do a lot of prep here throughout the day because there’s so many fresh and so many homemade (ingredients),” says Rebecca Diogiovanni.
The Diogiovannis say they love testing out new recipes to add to the menu.
“We will not cook anything we will not eat,” Michele Diogiovanni says. “Some people just cook as a job, 8 to 5, and that’s it. For us, it’s something we love to do.”
And when it comes to portion size, nobody in the kitchen is stingy.
“In Italy, that’s how it is,” he says. “When you go somewhere, the portions are big. You decide when to stop, not us.”
The couple say their top priority is to offer a family atmosphere that makes customers feel welcome.
“We treat our customers just like we would treat our family,” Rebecca Diogiovanni says.
The Diogiovannis’ own family began when Michele moved from Naples to Delaware in 1981 at the urging of his younger brother.
“He told me about this place like it was a fantasy land,” Michele Diogiovanni says. “He said, ‘Mike, you have to see for your own eyes.’”
His first job in the U.S. was as head chef at an Italian restaurant in Delaware, where he met Rebecca. They’ve now been married for 13 years and have three children.
Before moving to Lynchburg in 2004, the Diogiovannis owned four restaurants in Delaware.
They wound up here because several of their relatives live in Virginia. Michele Diogiovanni’s brother owns a restaurant in Manassas, and a cousin owns one in Martinsville. He and Rebecca drove through Lynchburg often on their way to visit them and liked what they saw.
“Something really caught our attention,” he says. “It was different than any other town.”
They moved here in 2004 and opened La Villa the same year.
“We just really liked the building and the location on this road,” Rebecca Diogiovanni says. “We just knew this was the place for us.”
Today, both say they’re thankful to have jobs they love so much.
Rebecca Diogiovanni says she loves “being out there, talking to different people very day. It’s always something different here. You always get to meet new people. It’s probably the greatest part about this job.”
Her husband seconds that.
“How many people can go to a job, work with their wife and bring their kids?” he says. “This is our living room.”
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