Some additional details have emerged from Donato Scotti (Donato Restaurant Group), who is opening CENTO OSTERIA this May in the former Caputo in South Beach (at Brannan and the Embarcadero). This will be his first SF restaurant—he is also behind Donato Enoteca and CRU in Redwood City and Donato & Co. in Berkeley, which he opened in 2017 with Gianluca Guglielmi, who is now executive chef for the Donato Restaurant Group.
The menu is going to be osteria style, which will include wood-fired pizza, housemade pasta, and grilled meats and seafood (grilled over live fire!), with about six items per section. And here’s where you’ll get to do a little taste travel through Italian regions: each item will be associated with a particular Italian city or province. There will also be small plates to pair with wine and cocktails, and housemade salumi and ricotta will be in the mix, plus housemade desserts (one of Guglielmi’s specialties).
Wine lovers will be able to choose from 15-20 wines by the glass, with many Italian wines from small-production wineries on the bottle list. There will also be 8-10 cocktails and plenty of grappa and amari to choose from. There’s will be a wraparound patio opening this summer, so start envisioning yourself out there with a spritz for apericena (Italian-style predinner appetizers) beginning at 3pm. The spacious restaurant, outfitted with dark wood accents, will have room for up to 110 diners, including 30 in the bar area. Lunch will come this spring after the early May opening.
And here’s another thing to note: I’m going to be hosting a tablehopper preopening event on Thursday May 3rd—details in tablehopper next week! Get ready to apericena!
100 Brannan St. at Embarcadero.
Cento Osteria will feature plenty of refreshing cocktails. Photo: Nadia Andreini.
