Barbouni At Baba, Red Mesa, OLIVIA, Sea Grapes: Restaurant News

ST. PETERSBURG, FL — Here's the latest restaurant and bar news in the St. Petersburg area:

Baba On Central Launches New Raw Bar Concept, Closes Bakery

With little fanfare, the popular Baba on Central held the soft launch of its new concept, Barbouni at Baba, on Saturday evening.

With a simple Instagram post, the restaurant introduced diners to its new raw bar — serving everything from oysters on a half shell and shrimp cocktails to chilled Maine hard shell lobsters — to diners.

“We just left the door open. We didn’t say much. Just a quick social media posts and we saw several dozen guests, more than we thought,” Andrew Duncan, chef de cuisine, told Patch. “Everybody seemed to have a really great time.”

Baba, which opened in 2019, closed its bakery to make way for Barbouni.

“We loved the concept (of the bakery;) we thought it was beautiful, but to be honest it just wasn’t pulling its weight, unfortunately,” he said. “We decided to rebrand and try something new, and asked ourselves, ‘What isn’t being offered in St. Pete?’ At the same time, what fits our ethos and cuisines while we’re also doing something dynamic and new.”

$190K in Back Wages Recouped from St. Pete Restaurants

More than $190,000 in back wages were recovered after federal investigators found that St. Petersburg restaurants withheld wages to cover operating costs, according to a U.S. Department of Labor news release.

Investigators with the agency’s Wage and Hour Division found that Red Mesa Inc., operating as Red Mesa Restaurant at 4912 4th Street N., and Veytia Ventures LLC, operating as Red Mesa Cantina at 128 3rd Street S., violated several provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act, including forcing workers to cover the cost of customer walkouts.

When customers skipped out on their bills, the restaurants withheld tips earned by bartenders and servers to pay for these orders, the department said. The amount withheld ranged from $10 to $175 daily.

Chef Ponte Opening Downtown St. Pete Restaurant

The restaurateur behind Café Ponte, now closed in Clearwater, is expanding his newest concept to downtown St. Petersburg.

Three years later, following other new ventures, Chris Ponte is opening OLIVIA, an Italian restaurant, at 225 1st Ave. N., according to St. Pete Rising.

The brand debuted in Tampa in 2019.

Sea Grapes Opening on St. Pete Beach

Those behind Sea Grapes Wine Lounge and Lolita’s have joined forces to reopen Sea Grapes Eatery and Wine Lounge at 6390 Gulf Blvd. in St. Pete Beach.

Chef Alex Rodriguez with Lolita’s and Sophia’s Cucina + Enoteca has curate the menu, which focuses on Latin and Caribbean fare, according to the Tampa Bay Times.