Paesanos Gives Birth to a New Child and Names it Mangia!

Words & Photos by Natalie Basurto

The original Paesanos in Midtown has a new neighbor, and it’s a part of the family. Opened Sept. 14 of this year, new sandwich joint Mangia! (1800 Capitol Avenue) has joined the six other locations owned by Paesanos’ David Virga and Mark Scribner that span Sacramento and its outlying areas like Davis and Elk Grove, including eateries Pronto and Uncle Vito’s.

Paesanos’ director of operations, Dana Scarpulla, said that when Java City, previous leasers of the space, were leaving, they jumped at the chance to open a new establishment in such close proximity to the original restaurant. Conveniently located right next door to the original Paesanos, old meets new in the historical building that once housed a grocery store and then a pharmacy.

Mangia!’s menu centers around their hot sandwich selection, all thought up by Executive Chef Jason Sondgroth. He’s not only responsible for the food at Mangia!, he’s the residential “food guy” at all of the locations.

He began planning the Mangia! menu with 30 sandwiches in mind and even brought in focus groups to narrow down the selection to the best and most popular.

“We took that opportunity to hone in…and we bought a $5000 smoker,” Sondgroth said. “It was a new toy so we pretty much experimented with everything under the sun and we came up with those two items that we liked the best and we ran with it.”

The two he’s talking about are the beloved specialty house smoked barbecue beef brisket, present in the Capitol Grinder sandwich and the house cured pastrami, which is offered in both the Hot House Pastrami and Hail Mary! sandwiches.

If you’re steering clear of carbs, you can have a sandwich’s contents served over a bowl of lettuce. Gluten-free bread and plenty of vegetarian options are also available.

“We have always tried to offer people with special needs diet options. We spent a lot of time last year creating a gluten free menu and gluten free pizza crust next door at Paesanos… It’s really important for us to have options for those people,” Scarpulla explained.

Other diet friendly options include the entree salads they offer, including Scarpulla’s favorite seasonal salad, the Fall Harvest. It includes roasted beets, green apples, candied walnuts, marinated carrots, dried cranberries and goat cheese on top of mixed greens with a honey-dijon vinaigrette.

“I can’t stop eating it,” she said.

Walk into the open-floor planned restaurant and right away friendly faces greet you, eager to take your order. Mangia! has a two-step ordering system that has been designed to streamline the order, Scarpulla said.

First, you will be greeted by a hostess. She will take your order, which will then reach the kitchen on colorful karabiners attached to a taut wire. Next, you pay at the register and receive a buzzer that vibrates when your meal is ready.

“In many cases by the time the customer actually finishes paying, the food is either done or near done,” Scarpulla said.

This system is a way of expediting the customer’s order, making it a quick spot to grab lunch when you need to head back to the office in a hurry.

Besides their wide selection of meat and vegetarian sandwiches, they also feature great breakfast options like their bagels stuffed with either veggies or smoked salmon, rightfully named the “loaded bagel” for their generous portions. Or, opt for the Mangia! Mia Breakfast Panini that starts with scrambled eggs and ends with your choice of toppings.

Eight ounce cups of a selection of deli salads are only $2.75 and their new creamy tomato basil and white bean minestrone soups are offered at $2.25, perfect for rounding out your sandwich enjoying experience.

Maintaining a low price point has always been an important staple throughout Paesanos’ restaurants.

“We want to be the kind of places that people can visit several times a month instead of just once. Keeping prices friendly for consumers is really important to us,” Scarpulla said.

Sondgroth explained that offering quality affordable food is “second-nature” to him. Making everything from scratch is also something he finds imperative to creating excellent dishes.

“We make everything in-house; everything except the mayonnaise and mustard,” Sondgroth said.

On two occasions I had the pleasure of dining there. Both times my meals were piping hot, fresh and flavorful. The first time, my friend and I grabbed brunch there. I ordered the Veggie Fire! loaded bagel, which was filled to the brim with fresh veggies. But diners beware: this is not first date food. I had sandwich fillings falling onto my plate and fingers, which I then gladly finished off, savoring every last piece.

I envied my brunch companion who had the smarts to order the smoked salmon loaded bagel. Luckily she let me have a bite, and for a moment I was in heaven. The salmon was incredibly flavorful and was complemented with cream cheese and salty capers. For $5.95, the strong temptation to go back for more doesn’t leave me feeling guilty for my wallet.

On my second trip to Mangia!, I enjoyed the Pesto Panini, which was brimming with grilled veggies and cheeses; it was so hot it almost burnt my tongue! I could have easily split the sandwich with a friend it was so big, but luckily no one was around to steal the other half. I looked forward to every bite.

I also enjoyed a vanilla latte an employee suggested to me. He said it was his favorite, and I’m glad I took his word for it. I was very impressed with the balance of espresso and vanilla flavoring as well as the creamy foam that topped it.

Since Java City sat at this spot for so many years, Scarpulla said they wanted to fill the coffee shop void. By offering delicious hand-crafted espresso drinks and drip coffee, they do just that.

The space hasn’t changed much from the previous inhabitants. Scarpulla said they didn’t have to do much more than cosmetic changes. They added a food production line and a space for the deli case and not much more to transform the former coffee shop into a grab and go dining experience.

The exposed brick wall on the far side of the restaurant is adorned with paintings by local artist Ted Weldon. They feature three of Sacramento’s iconic landmarks: The clock at Cesar Chavez Park, Memorial Auditorium and the Capitol. Weldon is also responsible for the large mural on the Uncle Vito’s in Davis as well as the one on the back of Jack’s Urban Eats.

No matter what you’re in the mood for, be it lunch, brunch, or coffee and a muffin, Mangia! has it covered. And when the prices are this low, it can’t hurt to try it out. Mangia! means simply “eat!” in Italian. Follow those instructions and you won’t be disappointed.

Blackbird Kitchen and Bar
1015 9th Street – Sacramento

Words by Adam Saake | Photos by Nicholas Wray

The first week of April saw the opening of the frequently discussed and much anticipated Blackbird Kitchen and Bar. Owner and Chef Carina Lampkin nested inside the 1015 9th Street location, where she and company set to work on changing the downtown space into a tastefully designed restaurant and bar with a laidback, European feel. Stairs lead up to the second-floor mezzanine, which overlooks the front half of the restaurant, giving guests a bird’s eye view. Upon my visit, the 7 o’clock hour brought a setting sun that tore through the glass front doors and illuminated the bar, the top of which is a gorgeous plank of solid redwood. To put it bluntly, this bird is pretty. And Lampkin accomplished this by putting her DIY attitude to work with little capital.

“I had a vision of taking this dilapidated building and transforming it into something beautiful. I didn’t have a lot of money. So it was me, and my friends and my mom chipping paint and learning how to plaster,” says Lampkin.

The concept for Blackbird began on a bicycle trip from San Francisco, where Lampkin was living and cooking at the time, to Los Angeles. The bike trip was her pilgrimage to overcome the personal trauma of losing one of her close friends in a car accident in 2006. Lampkin was in that same car, and the accident put her in a coma for 30 days.

“When I woke up, the song was going through my head,” remembers Lampkin.

This was the first of other signs that Lampkin felt was her friend trying to communicate with her. Her mother recounts hearing a crow cawing loudly during her memorial service when her loved ones were speaking of her infectious laugh.

“She felt that her spirit was in that crow,” says Lampkin.

And so on that bike trip, with time to think and talk, the idea was hatched by her friend.

“My friend Christian said to me, ‘Carina, you love helping people so much. Why don’t you move to Sacramento and open a business with your family?’ So that’s what I did,” says Lampkin.

Now let’s talk seafood. When you hear the name Blackbird, it’s not necessarily the first thing that comes to mind, but Lampkin wasn’t about to call the place the Clam Shack. However, there are clams on the menu. Applewood-smoked clams, to be exact, in a seafood chowder that is absolutely divine. It’s one of those things where you look over your shoulder to make sure no one is watching you lick the bottom of the bowl clean. Resident wine buff Tyler Stacy paired this with a Domaine Delaye Chardonnay that nicely complemented the rich chowder. It’s great for business that Stacy is on board at Blackbird. He’s a young, up and coming guy in the local wine scene, and he knows his stuff. When you dine at Blackbird, he’ll steer you in the right direction with pairings. And with him around, glassware will be proper, no doubt.

There are many memorable dishes on the small, 15-item menu that Lampkin and Chef de Cuisine Kevin O’Connor (you may remember him when we covered his Tree House Dinners) have assembled. The menu is sort of an homage to San Francisco’s Bar Crudo, where Lampkin worked under the talented Mike Selvera, her “favorite chef.” His approach to menu size, raw bar and ambiance certainly was an influence when setting the groundwork for Blackbird, and that’s a very good thing.

“Mike Selvera was never competitive in the kitchen, was always cool and never mad if you forgot something on an order. Jameson came out around 8 o’clock every night as we were listening to punk rock music,” recalls Lampkin.

Lampkin borrowed some of her best menu items, slightly tweaked of course, from Bar Crudo including the aforementioned chowder. The Maine lobster and roasted beet salad with burrata cheese, Banyuls vinaigrette and upland crest was bright, stunning and delicious. Stacy supplied a beautiful German Pinot/Trollinger, and I was happy as a clam. The raw bar, which is tucked a bit further back in the restaurant, has seating for guests to get right up close to the shucking action. Choose from Miyagi, Beausoleil, Kumamoto or Shigoku oysters on the half shell and stuff yourself silly during happy hour when the Miyagis are $1 apiece. And when it comes to oysters, there isn’t much to say about the chef’s preparation unless we’re talking sauces. It’s just about quality and freshness, and Blackbird’s oysters have just that. Stacy knocked it out of the park with a bright and mineral-y Muscadet from Gilbert Chon to sip while I slurped.

Other options from the raw bar are a nod to Japanese cuisine like the Kona Kampachi with citrus, cucumber, Thai aromatics and purple shiso; or the Arctic Char with housemade kimchi (awesome), honey-soy reduction, micro cilantro and black lava salt. All of these dishes were beautifully plated and garnished by O’Connor, and the colors and creativity are singing on this menu. This creative energy is something that Lampkin made sure that her general manager Dona Bridges sought out when selecting the staff.

“During the interview process, I asked if anyone’s a career restaurant person, that’s who we want to work with and please make sure that they also have a background in art. Because not only do I want this to be a restaurant, but I want it to be a creative powerhouse,” says Lampkin.

The winner from the raw bar was the Dayboat scallops dish that, before and after I had eaten it, servers and bartenders were asking me, “Have you tried the scallops yet?” It’s a good sign when your entire staff is raving about a dish. Presented on a green pea puree that was stellar all on its own, shaved asparagus, pink peppercorns and lemon oil and paired with a lovely German Riesling, the scallops were all they were cracked up to be. But to tell you the truth, even through dishes like the squid ink fettucine with grilled Monterey squid, dino kale, chorizo and preserved Meyer lemon, I saved just enough appetite for the main event: whole roasted Passmore Ranch trout. Passamore Ranch just has a killer product. The preparation of this dish makes me weak in the knees–I’m still remembering breaking into the skin as the steam rose from the perfectly cooked flesh. Sinful. Served with fava beans, spring onion, sous-vide fennel and sweet herbs, it’s all about the trout at Blackbird.

Just as Blackbird’s kitchen speaks volumes, as does its bar. Patrick O’Neill’s many years of bar experience have culminated here and his passion for the craft is evident when you order a drink from him. He’s got classics on the list like the Blood and Sand or the Moscow Mule (served in a bronze mug) and mixes up intrigue with the wildly colorful Purple Haze. The bar reminds me of a kitchen counter lined with glass jars filled with fresh herbs like mint, basil and rosemary; and citrus fruits like oranges, cumquats, lemons and limes. The liquor selection is a bartender’s playground, and the list is still changing and evolving. It’ll be nice to see what the Blackbird bar comes up with once they’re completely settled in.

Blackbird is a whole defined by its parts; a restaurant of young talents converging in one space and taking ownership, each of them a brush stroke in helping to paint the larger picture. Lampkin has taken them under her wing and is guiding them toward perfection by showing them that focusing on the details makes the difference.

“The difference between a great restaurant and an awesome restaurant is attention to detail,” says Lampkin.

Lampkin attributes her own success to what she calls “amazing grace.” She teaches her kitchen about meditation and the power that their thoughts or mood may have on the cooking.

“If you’re angry and you’re cooking, that anger goes into your food. Because when you have a thought, there’s an electrical release and that travels through your hand into the food. If you’re upset, that guest is going leave with anxiety in their stomach. But if you’re joyful and meditating happy thoughts, they’ll leave with that,” explains Lampkin.

You’ll be sure to leave Blackbird with happy thoughts.