Veteran chef opening Middletown restaurants
MIDDLETOWN – For the last 15 years, Patrick D'Amico has viewed his hometown as a dining frontier, ripe for exploration and settlement.
While the Longmeadow resident has made his name as a chef at several well-established Wilmington restaurants, including Eclipse Bistro, the Hotel du Pont's Green Room, and, most recently, Harry's Savoy Grill, he always knew he wanted to feed his Middletown neighbors.
Opening soon is one of three Middletown restaurants D'Amico is planning as a partner in the newly formed RM Hospitality Group.
First up is Metro Pub & Grill, a new "gastropub" near the Peachtree Station complex at 17 Wood St., just off West Main Street. It should open daily for lunch and dinner by Halloween or early November.
In January 2016, D'Amico hopes to welcome diners to a 100-seat fine-dining establishment tentatively called "The Bank." Renovations are currently underway on the site, a long vacant, bank building at West Main and North Broad streets.
"It's going to be over the top," he says, standing in the gutted space of the former Delaware Trust building, a structure built about 1918, that has been vacant for about 14 years.
Plans calls for dining on two floors – connected by a grand "floating" staircase – as well as cozy seating near fireplaces and a rooftop terrace.
A third Middletown culinary operation from RM Hospitality also is in the works. But, for now, D'Amico isn't ready to share details on the concept.
Hanging his own shingle is a big step for the 49-year-old, who has worked with and mentored some of the state's best known cooks.
D'Amico made his reputation in the early 1990s at the former Positano, a tiny but highly praised Wilmington Italian restaurant in The Devon Condominum on Pennsylvania Avenue. (It's now home to Sugarfoot.)
When Platinum Dining Group founder Carl Georigi was seeking a chef for his flagship eatery, Eclipse Bistro, he chose D'Amico to run the kitchen when the Union Street eatery opened in 1996.
D'Amico's food earned critical acclaim along with notice from the James Beard Foundation. The prestigious culinary organization named him a semifinalist for its Best MidAtlantic Chef Award.
D'Amico, a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York, worked at Eclipse for eight years before joining the Hotel du Pont in 2005. D'Amico left du Pont in 2011 to become chef de cuisine at Harry's Savoy Grill in Brandywine Hundred. He held the position until departing in August to form the RM Hospitality Group.
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Harry's owner Xavier Teixido, who has known D'Amico since the 1980s, calls him a hard worker.
"I enjoyed working with him. He's very passionate about food, very creative. I loved the stuff he prepared. His food was always well-received," Teixido says. "He is a very talented chef, very curious, always looking to do the next thing."
Texidio says he is glad D'Amico is getting the chance to serve food in his home market.
"There seems to be an opportunity there [in Middletown], particularly at night and the weekend time. I have to believe people are tired of making that trek up to Wilmington to eat. And it seems to be underserved in the perspective of chef-driven restaurants."
D'Amico says he picked up leadership skills and knowledge at each job, but his longtime goal has always to been to run his own restaurant. He compares his strategy to being a patient, yet persistent, card player.
"You go to culinary school, and you always have your dream. You start collecting your cards. I've always held the four aces, the jokers and all the instructions," the chef says. "I've just been waiting, and now I'm ready."
D'Amico isn't going it alone. RM Hospitality Group includes Middletown developer Rick Clark of Clark Construction and Adam Cofield, a former colleague D'Amico worked with at the Hotel du Pont and Du Pont Country Club.
Clark is renovating the buildings. D'Amico is in charge of culinary operations. And Cofield, who most recently worked in DuPont Co. public relations, will serve as general manager of the restaurants.
D'Amico says he and Clark, whom he met through mutual friends, "hit it off right off the bat." And he never considered doing a project without Cofield.
"I always wanted Adam to run the front-of-the-house operations on anything that I was going to do," D'Amico says.
Keeping the circle even more tight-knit, D'Amico is bringing aboard friend and chef Andrew Feeley. The Wilmington native and graduate of Philadelphia's The Restaurant School at Walnut Hill College has worked at high-end Rehoboth Beach restaurants Nage and Eden before moving on to the Peninsula on the Indian River Bay.
"Andy was part of my crew at the Hotel [du Pont]," D'Amico says. "We had some really great guys there – Bill Hoffman (now of Hockessin's House of William and Merry), Rob Jester (chef at Stone Balloon Alehouse in Newark) and Dan Sheridan (an owner of Wilmington's Locale BBQ Post)."
Feeley will eventually be running the Metro kitchen, and D'Amico says, "The Bank will be my home base."
If you build it, will they come?
Standing amid the sawdust and ongoing construction at a former Shone Lumber showroom, D'Amico and Cofield look around at the open space and soaring ceiling and explain within the next month or so it will be become the home of Metro Pub & Grill.
The 4,200-square-foot casual eatery will have 150 seats indoors and an additional 30 outside. Banquet facilities and private dining areas should be finished by early 2016.
There wasn't much in the way of dining in Middletown before a McDonald's opened in 1999, and the most consistent independent restaurant has been Immediato's Bistro on Main Street, which opened as a deli in 2005, and has since expanded its offerings. Sully's Irish Pub and Dogtown, a hot dog eatery, both on Main Street, also are feeding diners.
D'Amico isn't worried about finding enough customers to fill seats at three more eateries, including an upscale restaurant. The town has about 20,000 residents, a number that has nearly quadrupled since D'Amico moved there 15 years ago. New development projects, retail and residential, are in the works.
"People say, 'Will Middletown support a fine-dining restaurant? Is fine-dining dead?' " D'Amico asks. "Well, you know what? People do want it, and we're going to provide it."
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Middletown, about 24 miles south of Wilmington, and nearby Odessa are forecast to be Delaware's largest metropolitan area by 2030. It is New Castle County's fastest-growing region, according to the Delaware Population Consortium.
Peachtree Station, a brand-new 25,000-square-foot retail center on the southeast corner of West Lake and Wood streets, which stands across from Metro Pub & Grill, is ready for tenants.
Cofield says the area, located just east of U.S. 301, is well-traveled. "So many people drive by this road," he says. "Every day, someone pulls over or comes in and says, 'Oh my gosh, what's going on here?' "
As soon as the Metro Pub & Grill sign went up, Cofield says, "the response was outstanding. It's really a cohesive community."
The restaurant's name, Metro, comes from nearby train tracks. D'Amico says he envisions the gastropub as casual and "a little sister of a fine-dining restaurant, but still chef-driven."
Appetizers will run from $3 to $12, and entrees about $15 to $28. There will be local craft beers on tap and about 15 beers available by the bottle.
D'Amico, an avid fisherman, will be offering fresh oysters on the half shell along with dishes like seared ahi tuna with cantaloupe-chili emulsion, avocado and almond tuile; Faroe Island salmon with succotash, sunchoke rosti and chermoula; and shrimp fritters served with remoulade sauce.
A focus on land will include a burger with artisanal bacon and hand-cut fries, whole duck wings with Hawaiian barbecue sauce and "Pork Two Ways" (braised pork belly and cheeks) with cauliflower puree, preserved cherry jus and fried polenta.
Game will be represented with venison chili and a wild boar sloppy Joe. Desserts include "Peach Pie in a Jar" and D'Amico's version of "Coffee & Donuts," vanilla bean doughnut holes with orange zest, espresso granules, coffee gelato and Bailey's Irish Cream sauce.
He is planning an even more ambitious contemporary American menu at the upcoming "Bank" restaurant.
"We're going to have pasta, seafood, meats, game. It's going to be me at my finest," D'Amico says.
There are plans to keep some of the building's integrity, including its arched windows, brick walls and columns. A former bank vault will become a wine cellar and tasting room. To create the second-floor loft, a new support beam has to be installed in the space. Clark is planning on adding a dumbwaiter so food can easily be brought to the second floor.
A rooftop terrace is already causing excitement, Cofield says. Residents have asked if they can reserve tables there to watch Middletown's annual Fourth of July fireworks.
D'Amico says he has long been enamored with the West Main Street bank building to create a restaurant. "I just fell in love with it," he says. Over the years, he has put in bids to buy the building, which was last home to a Wacovia branch, but was turned down.
He has patiently waited for the right opportunity. When Clark told D'Amico he was planning on developing the site, D'Amico knew his moment had arrived.
"He said, 'I'm going to do it – with or without you.' " I said, 'You're doing it with me!' " D'Amico says.
"My wife says, 'God has a purpose, and he'll tell you when.' It's when. I'm 49 now, about to be 50. I'm so into this. I'm a 100 percent ready to go."
Spoken like someone ready to explore a new frontier.
News Journal reporter William H. McMichael contributed to this story.
Contact Patricia Talorico at (302) 324-2861 orptalorico@delawareonline.com and on Twitter@pattytalorico Read her blog atwww.delawareonline.com/blog/secondhelpings.
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