Major Food Group’s Upcoming Nolita Restaurant is a Nod to Torrisi Italian Specialties

Major Food Group is plotting a new Nolita restaurant

Six years after closing Nolita’s Torrisi Italian Specialties, Major Food Group is looking to open a version of the deli and restaurant just a block away from the original spot, the New York Times reports.

The new restaurant will open at 275 Mulberry Street, the former home of the chef pop-up concept Chefs Club. The new restaurant doesn’t have a name or an opening date yet, but Rich Torrisi — one of the three partners at MFG along with Mario Carbone and Jeff Zalaznick — tells the Times that “You can expect a deli and restaurant, highlighting our approach to cuisine.”

When it opened in 2009, Torrisi Italian Specialties developed a reputation for its Italian-American fare including lunch items like turkey heroes and chicken parm, and a changing dinner menu. The restaurant closed in 2015, and MFG eventually started hosting private charity dinners there with the money going to the non-profit Robin Hood. MFG plans to host more of these fundraising dinners at the new restaurant as well, according to the Times. At present, only a handful of MFG’s restaurants are open including Carbone, Sadelle’s, and Parm.

In other news

— The Battery Park Conservancy and the city’s parks department have launched a request for proposals (RFP) to bring two new food kiosks to the Bosque Gardens area of Battery Park.

— The New York Japanese Restaurant Association is currently in the midst of the 2021 Japanese Restaurant Cherry Blossom Week. Participating restaurants include the East Village’s Shabu Tatsu and Bushwick’s Momo Sushi Shack, among dozens of others. The event runs till March 21.

— Bloomberg’s Kate Krader looks at how fine dining chefs and restaurateurs, including several in New York City, are jumping on the ghost kitchen bandwagon.

— San Francisco-based juice and tea bar Beloved Cafe is plotting a Lower East Side outpost.

— Workers were spotted doing some interior demolition work on the historic dining room of Chinatown’s Jing Fong after its closure this past Sunday.

— New York attorney general Letitia James has filed a lawsuit against the owner of an upstate ice cream shop for allegedly using racist taunts against protestors outside his shop.

— East Village institution Little Poland is gearing up to reopen its dining room now that indoor dining is returning at half capacity on March 19.

— Can relate: