The Nova Blossomed Through Family Dedication

In 2004 opened with 10 wine selections, a George Foreman Grill and a pizza oven. It’s since grown to a fully operational restaurant with an ever-changing menu.

"When we started we only had small appetizers and many of them were cold. We are now a full restaurant and have been producing a very eclectic and diverse menu in the last four years," manager Tyrrell Gaffer said.

Appetizers range from cheese plates to shrimp and scallop dishes, salads and pizzas. Popular entrees are salmon, filet migon, pasta and shrimp curry. The chef has free range to run a special appetizer, pasta and entrée every week, which translates to a seasonal menu changing every three months or so.

"Our most popular items have been the fig salad, our pasta of the week, walleye and the filet," Gaffer said. "My favorite has to be the Dirty Burger, which is locally produced, grass-fed beef topped with a mushroom cream sauce and must be eaten with a fork and knife."

If a customer has been to The Nova once, they can expect to return to something new and different the next time they come.

"We are an all around restaurant our customers range from 9 days old to 99 and the atmosphere is difficult to describe we have been called a bordello, a hunting lodge and most would describe us as an eclectic living room kind of feel. We have live music every Friday and Saturday," the manager said. "There are no plans to expand or change too much, you might find a new mask on the wall or another item from my grandfather’s barn on the ceiling but we love what we have going and are very satisfied where we are."

The place has come a long way since it opened in 2004 and much of the success is due to a family commitment.

"We purchased Historic Casanova Liquor the year before and had been doing some remodeling and the space that now holds The Nova was not needed anymore," Gaffer said. "We were a week away from tearing it down and turning it into a parking lot."

Gaffer said the little nook of a restaurant is a family affair and it was his mother that came to the rescue of the doomed portion of the building.

"When my mom found out that when you own a liquor store you get to taste all of the products a light bulb went off in her head. She had been a first-grade teacher for 17 years and she thought her new goal was going to try and teach as many people as she could about great wine, so she quit and opened the first wine bar in Hudson," he said.

Hudson has been a great place, he said, for The Nova as it is "like many other great local restaurants: family and locally owned and that just lets us know our customers better and helps the whole town as a whole succeed. You can stop by just about any night of the week and see someone from our family either working behind the bar, serving tables or even doing dishes."

Because the food and drink menu changes all the time, The Nova’s crowd changes, which is by design.

"We are a date night, group dinner, ladies-night-out kind of place but we love to break the stereotypes and get a group of guys sitting at the bar drinking some great beers every once in awhile," he said. "Our beer list is never the same and it can change daily which allows for people to try new things and to get back to what my mother wanted out of this whole thing was to teach people about what is out there and have people break out of their comfort zone just for a little bit."