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    Restaurant Turnover

    What's old is new: Riccardi family reclaims Compari's Italian restaurant inPlano

    Teresa Gubbins
    Oct 5, 2012 | 9:20 pm

    Compari's, the longtime Italian restaurant on Plano Parkway in Plano, was out of the hands of the Riccardi family for a few years, but that's been rectified. Cathy and Richard Riccardi bought a restaurant with family history: Richard's parents first opened it back in 1989.

    "My husband's parents, Gaetano and Marguerite Riccardi, were the original co-owners," Cathy says. "They sold their interest in the early '90s."

    When Compari's opened, it stood out from the other red-and-white-checked-tablecloth Italian places in the suburbs because it took a lighter touch, with better sauces and seafood dishes such as grilled salmon with artichokes. Over the years, the restaurant changed hands three times.

    Although there were lapses in the food, Richard's nephew Dustin Martinez stayed and worked as server, giving the restaurant some family continuity.

    "I'm one of those people who judges a restaurant by the bathrooms," says new co-owner Cathy Riccardi. "If the bathroom isn't fresh and clean, then you have to wonder what else is going on."

    "Dustin has a following — there's a huge amount of customers who love him," Cathy says. "When we got wind last year that the owner wanted to get out, we decided to purchase it."

    The couple hadn't been involved in restaurants prior to buying Compari's, but Richard and his father, Gaetano, own Food Source, a food-processing company that makes private-label frozen entrées for grocery-store chains and frozen sauces for restaurants.

    Gaetano was also behind the Italian restaurant Riccardi's in the Quadrangle, which he ran with Anita, his second wife. Riccardi's closed in 2008.

    "Compari's is more of a casual place than Riccardi's was, but we remodeled the place," Cathy says. "It was very dated looking — it looked '80s. We wanted a fresh, bright, warm environment."

    That meant a new color scheme, with golden-yellow paint on the walls and a warm brown on the woodwork, plus a total redo of the bathrooms, from new toilets and tile to snazzy bowl-style sinks.

    "I'm one of those people who judges a restaurant by the bathrooms," Cathy says. "If the bathroom isn't fresh and clean, then you have to wonder what else is going on."

    As for the menu, they've kept many of the classics, including house-made minestrone, mussels in white wine or spicy tomato sauce, chicken, and veal. Plus there are pasta bowls with choice of chicken, sausage, meatballs or shrimp and a choice of seven sauces, from carbonara to pomodoro to Alfredo.

    The Riccardis hope to restore some of Compari's original luster. "We're also doing nightly specials — that's new — and we use all fresh ingredients," Cathy says.

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    Steak & Ale News

    Local opening of Dallas chain Steak and Ale gets derailed

    Teresa Gubbins
    May 16, 2025 | 5:27 pm
    Steak and Ale
    Steak and Ale
    Steak and Ale

    The long-in-the-works return of Steak and Ale in Dallas is being shelved for now: The casual steakhouse chain which in its heyday had nearly 300 locations is no longer opening a location it planned for in Grand Prairie.

    According to a May 11 post from company owner Paul Mangiamele, the restaurant is definitely now a no-go.

    "After years of very hard and exhausting work for making the Grand Prairie side by side S&A and Bennigan’s happen, the rug has been yanked out from under us," Mangiamele said in his post.

    Often referred to as a pioneer in casual dining, Steak and Ale debuted in 1966, offering an affordable steakhouse experience with rustic Tudor design that included wooden beams and stained glass. In addition to steak and a signature salad bar, the menu featured then-fancy items such as steak Oscar, baby back ribs, and Hawaiian chicken with pineapple teriyaki sauce.

    The chain remained a buzzy destination throughout the '70s and '80s, but by 2008, the parent company filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy and the remaining locations closed.

    In 2023, businessman Paul Mangiamele, chairman and CEO of Legendary Restaurant Brands (which includes Monte Cristo sandwich purveyor Bennigan’s and Bennigan’s On The Fly, which he has also revived), launched a long-held plan to revive the Steak and Ale concept that included opening a new Steak and Ale in Burnsville, Minnesota, as well as partnering with a franchisee to open a location in Grand Prairie, side-by-side with a Bennigan's.

    The Minnesota location opened in August 2024, but Grand Prairie will not be so lucky, and according to Mangiamele, it's due to the shenanigans of the franchisee.

    "For years, we were being told by the developer and owner of the land how he was going to be our franchise partner," Mangiamele says. "He shared with me numerous times how he grew up with the brands and wanted to do his part in honoring Norman Brinker and would be a proud franchise owner. Well, after he finally (3 years later) received his money for selling some of his land, instead of being our franchise partner, he changed his tune, and wanted to instead, sell his land to us!!"

    According to Mangiamele, not only did the franchisee try to sell back the land, he tried to make a profit.

    "Our special deal was a ‘discounted’ price per foot on the land we’d need," Mangiamele says. "After a few due diligence calls, the discounted ’deal’ price was 20% higher than the comparable prices in the same area!! Simply unbelievable!"

    Mangiamele says they are still talking to other interested parties in the greater DFW area and should have more news soon.

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