Restaurant Business

Pietro "Pete" Rugolo, the popular owner of Jerry's Belvedere Tavern on York Road in Govans, died May 8 at Gilchrist Hospice Care of pancreatic cancer. The Lutherville resident was 75. Mr. Rugolo grew up in Enna, Sicily, where he stopped attending school after the fifth grade. In 1965 he fell in love with Beatrice Varelli, a woman he had known since childhood; she had returned to Sicily after living a while in America. The two married in 1966 and moved to Baltimore the next year. She worked as a seamstress at Lebow Brothers and Jos. A. Bank Clothiers Inc. He worked as a heavy equipment mechanic at Marocco Construction in Towson.

Pietro "Pete" Rugolo, the popular owner of Jerry's Belvedere Tavern on York Road in Govans, died May 8 at Gilchrist Hospice Care of pancreatic cancer. The Lutherville resident was 75. Mr. Rugolo grew up in Enna, Sicily, where he stopped attending school after the fifth grade. In 1965 he fell in love with Beatrice Varelli, a woman he had known since childhood; she had returned to Sicily after living a while in America. The two married in 1966 and moved to Baltimore the next year. She worked as a seamstress at Lebow Brothers and Jos. A. Bank Clothiers Inc. He worked as a heavy equipment mechanic at Marocco Construction in Towson.

Joe Flacco's Hail Mary pass in Saturday's division game may have saved the Ravens' season, but it appears to have emptied the tables in Baltimore restaurants. Baltimore bars did clean-up business on Saturday, but restaurants lost customers, as patrons called in to cancel reservations, according to anecdotal conversations with local restaurant owners. Blame it on bad timing. The division game began at 4:30 p.m., which was perfect, in theory, for planning a Saturday night restaurant dinner -- if the game had ended in regulation.

In reading Dan Rodricks ' column on the Dogwood Restaurant's closing last week, I felt compelled to write and thank him for bringing to light the restaurant and the good deeds that have come to an end ("Dogwood made a difference in lives," March 21). It's not just about Baltimore losing yet another business. Being the office manager and working with owners Galen and Bridget Sampson over the last short year has been the greatest job I've ever held. They are two of the most honorable people I have had the pleasure of knowing.

Beth Chapple, one of the original Pasta Mill partners and founder of 2 Feathers Bar & Grill in Wichita, didn't struggle in the restaurant business because she is a woman.A former employee at Pizza Hut's product-development division, Chapple opened the Pasta Mill in 1988 with co-owner Gary Streepy. She sold her interest in the venture before opening 2 Feathers, a downtown restaurant and bar featuring Southwestern-style cuisine. She sold 2 Feathers to her manager earlier this year.Ms. Chapple, who now has a consulting and food-related service company, says the restaurant world has virtually unlimited opportunities for women and minorities -- from employment to management and ownership.

NEW YORK -- In a move that had been anticipated, PepsiCo Inc. said yesterday that it will spin off its restaurants and possibly sell its restaurant supply company to focus on its more profitable and promising soft drinks and snacks.Pepsi will shed its biggest line of business -- KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut -- which it has assembled over two decades, because it has dragged down earnings and chewed through much-needed capital. It didn't give the terms of the spinoff, though it expects to complete it by year-end.

Sure, not everyone wants to celebrate Valentine's Day. It's not so hard to sit it out. But imagine if you and your sweetheart worked together in the Valentine's Day industry, catering to romance but, come dinnertime on Feb. 14, never able to experience it yourselves. That's the situation facing couples who work together in restaurants. Picture them: One is firing up a filet mignons, the other is clambering over boxes of sparkling wine in the walk-in. All the while, customers are glowing dreamily in the candlelight, clasping hands under the table and feeding each other succulent bites of lobster Thermidor.

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Otto E. Schellhase, last owner of the landmark Schellhase's Restaurant, where Baltimore's notables dined for more than half a century, died Thursday at Anne Arundel Medical Center of complications from abdominal surgery. The Annapolis resident was 88. Mr. Schellhase joined the family restaurant business in 1935 when it moved from Franklin Street to a larger space on Howard Street. Its distinctive German decor and menu drew a famed clientele, including stage actors, film stars and writers.

Bouncing paychecks have former employees of Dominique's losing their Christmas cheer and regarding the restaurant's owners as a couple of Scrooges.The executive chef, manager and several other former employees recounted problems with attempts to cash checks issued Dec. 12 by Dominique's, the bankrupt restaurant-turned-catering operation in the Brokerage.Those checks, drawn on Maryland National Bank, cannot be cashed because of insufficient funds in the Dominique's account, they said."I'm owed $961," said former manager Julia Kalthof, 30, who stopped working at Dominique's a week ago after it shut down its failing restaurant business and decided to focus exclusively on catering parties.

Sure, not everyone wants to celebrate Valentine's Day. It's not so hard to sit it out. But imagine if you and your sweetheart worked together in the Valentine's Day industry, catering to romance but, come dinnertime on Feb. 14, never able to experience it yourselves. That's the situation facing couples who work together in restaurants. Picture them: One is firing up a filet mignons, the other is clambering over boxes of sparkling wine in the walk-in. All the while, customers are glowing dreamily in the candlelight, clasping hands under the table and feeding each other succulent bites of lobster Thermidor.

Having the Ravens in the post-season has been great for bars and taverns but not always for restaurants. The Jan. 16 divisional game against Denver, for instance, took a bite out of Saturday-night profits when it went into overtime. A Sunday night playoff game, like last week's conference championship, doesn't hurt as much. Restaurant business is traditionally slower on Sunday night, and there are places like Peter's Inn and Henninger's , both in Fells Point, that close every Sunday night.

Joe Flacco's Hail Mary pass in Saturday's division game may have saved the Ravens' season, but it appears to have emptied the tables in Baltimore restaurants. Baltimore bars did clean-up business on Saturday, but restaurants lost customers, as patrons called in to cancel reservations, according to anecdotal conversations with local restaurant owners. Blame it on bad timing. The division game began at 4:30 p.m., which was perfect, in theory, for planning a Saturday night restaurant dinner -- if the game had ended in regulation.

Myles Julian Feldman, a founder of a restaurant equipment business, died of complications from Alzheimer's disease Dec. 15 at Pinecrest Delray Hospice in Florida. The Boca Raton, Fla., resident had previously lived in Stevenson. Mr. Feldman was 82. Born in Atlantic City, N.J., he was the son of Samuel Feldman, a restaurant supplies salesman, and Frieda Feldman, his office manager. The family moved to Baltimore, where Mr. Feldman was a 1946 graduate of Forest Park High School.

The Baltimore Grand Prix's effect on restaurant business was as unpredictable as a tornado. I spoke with restaurant owners who told me they had their best Labor Day weekend ever. But business was off elsewhere, sometimes way off. Business was off in Canton, Fells Point and Little Italy, some of whose restaurant owners will be meeting with race organizers next week to discuss what can be done next year and beyond to bring more business east of President Street. Pedicabs and other shuttles sound like a good idea.

"I thought I had had it with the restaurant business," Qayum Karzai says. He has not formally retired, but with the daily operations of his restaurants Helmand, Tapas Teatro and B in capable hands, Karzai has been increasingly able during the past eight years to pursue his other passions, particularly for organic farming. And he was definitely not looking to be challenged again in the restaurant business. But retired prizefighters can be coaxed back into the ring, Karzai admits.

Richard McClure got his start in the restaurant business 30 years ago as a busboy at a Howard Johnson in Annapolis. Next month the 46-year-old general manager of Carrol's Creek Restaurant will become the president of the Restaurant Association of Maryland, with more than 2,300 members.Mr. McClure has served in the association for seven years and held every elected office. He also was a representative to the Maryland Tourism Development Board, a delegate to the White House Conference on Travel and Tourism and a board member of the Annapolis & Anne Arundel County Conference and Visitors Bureau.

Wayne Brokke, retired restaurateur, self-described micro-manager, cookbook author and now budding actor, no longer dreams of purveyors or errant wait staff. "I used to wake up shaking at midnight, wondering if I had ordered the next day's chicken or if one of my waiters would call in sick, but no longer," said Brokke, 58. He first started dishing up soup in 1978 at the The Soup Kitchen Ltd., his Federal Hill restaurant, and became one of Harborplace's original tenants when he relocated there in 1980.

SALARY: $13,300 AGE: 43 YEARS ON JOB: 2 1/2 How she got started: : Carla Lucente grew up in the restaurant business, helping her parents run their Italian restaurant. After high school she went to work as a loan officer for six years and then worked for her family's home construction business. At the age of 36 she quit work and began culinary school at the Baltimore International College. After graduating, she opened her own catering business and worked part-time at Trader Joe's in Annapolis.

Ask your friends how this economic mess is affecting them, and I bet the first thing they say is that they are eating out less often - or maybe not at all. At a time when you can't cut back on your mortgage payment or your car payment or just about any other payment, dining out is one expense you can reduce. That, and shopping for clothes. While it makes me feel sensible and thrifty and virtuous to give up clothes shopping, putting an end to dinner out with my husband or my daughter or my friend Betsy just makes me feel sad. It isn't the food and wine I am giving up. It's the people.