A new downtown SLC restaurant promises Italian food for ‘everyone’

This article is excerpted from the Utah Eats newsletter. To get the full newsletter every Wednesday, subscribe at sltrib.com/newsletters.

Hello, Eaters! If you frequent downtown Salt Lake City, you may have noticed a sign for a new restaurant on the building that once housed US Bank, at the northwest corner of Main Street and 200 South.

That’s Galeano’s Ristorante Italiano, at 170 S. Main, which had its soft opening on May 29. It’s owned by restaurateur and chef Allan Galeano, who owns multiple restaurants in Park City, Utah County and Salt Lake City. He said he’ll be opening another location of Galeano’s in Heber in September.

Galeano was born in Uruguay to an Italian father and German mother, he said. As a child, he moved around to the United States, Uruguay and Italy.

He said he first learned how to cook in Italy with his grandmother. He started in the restaurant industry when he was 16, he said, and began cooking professionally in Germany. Galeano didn’t receive any formal schooling for cooking, and instead learned hands-on in kitchens, he said.

In 1986, Galeano moved to New York City, where he worked in restaurants like the famous Trattoria Dell’Arte, which is still open today across from Carnegie Hall.

In 1992, he opened his first restaurant on his own, an Italian place called Buona Vita in Hermosa Beach, Calif. He moved to Park City in 1998, opening the nightclub Harry O’s (now closed) and another location of Buona Vita (there’s also a location with a slightly different spelling, Bona Vita, in Lehi).

When it came time to open Galeano’s downtown, he said it took a year to transform the empty bank space into a restaurant, a process he described as a “nightmare.”

But, he added, “if you have restaurants, you deal with whatever comes your way. It makes the rest of your life look very simple if you deal with restaurants.”

To create the menu for his new restaurant, Galeano collaborated with executive chef Sebastian Gutierrez, who has worked at New York City’s Casa Dani, owned by Michelin-starred chef Dani Garcia. The two of them came up with a menu that Galeano said leans toward more traditional Italian, featuring a mix of cuisines from around the country. The creamier dishes are from the north of Italy, Galeano said, and the more veggie-forward dishes are from the south.

He and Gutierrez said some of the restaurant’s specialties are the bolognese (meat ragu) and osso buco with saffron risotto. Galeano said they make all of their food, even their pasta, fresh in-house.

While other restaurant owners might raise an eyebrow at someone who asks for cheese on their lobster ravioli, for example, Galeano said he doesn’t care how people eat his food. “I just want to make good food for people to enjoy,” he said.

One section of the lunch menu you may notice is the “executive menu,” which is a two-course lunch menu for $20 that comes with salad, pasta and a beverage. Galeano said he wanted to offer this option so “everyone” can enjoy his food. He said the “executive menu” is based on the “menu del dia,” a common lunch in Spain that includes gazpacho or another light dish and a second course, with a soda or glass of wine, for an affordable price.

When you dine at Galeano’s, watch for the collages of photographs on the large posts and along the wall. These are photos of the owner’s family in Italy, as well as family members of friends and colleagues.

General manager Joe Mascaro — who has been in the restaurant industry for 44 years — said they plan to open a permanent patio in front of the restaurant, as well as offer coffee drinks once they get an espresso machine set up.

To read about my favorite dish at Galeano’s, scroll down to the “Dish of the Week” section of this newsletter.

Note: Gluten-free pasta is available at Galeano’s, and there are a couple of vegan dishes on the menu.

Galeano’s is open Monday-Thursday from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Friday from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.; and Saturday from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m.

Live deliciously,

Kolbie

Food News

Closings:

• Este Pizza, an NYC-style pizzeria in downtown Salt Lake City, closed permanently without much explanation on June 21, according to an Instagram post. “Thank you to all our patrons for making our days special,” the post said. The Este locations in Sugar House (at 2148 S. 900 East) and Park City (at 1781 Sidewinder Drive, Suite 1) appear to still be open.

• Chinese and Vietnamese restaurant Shanghai Cafe, which opened in 1992, is closing on July 27, according to manager Super Liu. He said the complex the restaurant is located in, at State Street and 1300 South, is being replaced with apartments, although we didn’t find any building permits currently on file with the city for that location.

Dish of the Week

At Galeano’s Ristorante Italiano, I tried the lasagna and the osso buco, which were both really good, but the burrata with heirloom tomatoes ($16, part of the antipasti section of the menu) really perked up my taste buds. So colorful, so vibrant, so harmonious, this beautiful dish featured fresh, fresh, fresh burrata, sliced tomatoes, pumpkin seeds, pickled cabbage and arugula, drizzled with olive oil and a fig balsamic reduction. It was creamy and tart, and such a lovely start to a meal.