Journal

We are open in Montauk for a season, taking over the restaurant space of Donna's lifelong friends Fernando Trocca & Martin Pittaluga who will be staying in Santa Teresita this summer.  With Chef Justin Smillie at the helm, Donna brings her passion for relaxed and unstudied fine dining to il Buco at Mostrador Marram, offering abundant counter service of savory meats, local seafood, local vegetables, and housemade bread and pastries from il Buco Alimentari. 

From the Wall Street Journal: 

"What is particularly remarkable is how the restaurants have established operations in the East End so quickly, signing lease deals or working out other arrangements just weeks ago.

'It was totally crazy. It was just like, ‘Let’s do this,’ said Donna Lennard, owner of Il Buco and Il Buco Alimentari, who formed a partnership with the Marram hotel in Montauk to bring her Italian-influenced dining concept there this summer. Ms. Lennard said she didn’t even start talking with the property about the idea until late May."

You can read the full article here. See you on the beach! 

Photo Credit: Paul Brissman 

il Buco Alimentari is reopening for pick up and delivery, with an emphasis on our market and Executive Chef Justin Smillie at the helm. Donna is thrilled to be collaborating once again with Justin and adapting the Alimentari model to continue serving the needs of the community.

"At Alimentari, Smillie isn’t looking to reinvent the menu, as many chefs do when they take over a kitchen. Instead, he’ll continue to serve the spit-roasted, peppercorn-rubbed short ribs and bucatini cacio e pepe that put the place on the map." Read the full piece from Kate Krader on Bloomberg here.

Shop our housemade bread, ancient grain pizza, selection of pastas and sauces, wine, cocktails, fully prepared dinner boxes & Mediterranean pantry provisions on Caviar. 

“At il Buco everyone takes it for granted that there will be 10 Sagrantinos on the list...the only other place you see that is Montefalco.”

Our beloved Wine Director Roberto Paris speaks about his relationship with the Caprai Vineyard, and the history and cultivation of the tannic Sagrantino grape that (among others) sets il Buco's wine program apart. See the full article on Forbes.

Every year, GQ food critic, Brett Martin, gives a lot of shine to the best new restaurants in America. But this time he turns his attention to the places that have been our go-tos for a couple of decades now. They are too old to be new, too new to be institutions. In other words, eat here now and forever. 

Be sure to read about il Buco, "the sleeping tigre of rustic, regional Italian food" in the full. 

In honor of all things Umbrian, il Buco and il Buco Alimentari will host a week of dinners featuring our favorite wine maker and Sagrantino di Montefalco pioneer, Arnaldo Caprai, as well as friend and chef, Salvatore Denaro. 

il Buco, 47 Bond Street - Wednesday, October 2nd through Sunday, October 6thil Buco Alimentari - Friday, October 4th & Saturday, October 5th

The Grub Street Diet: Il Buco’s Donna Lennard Takes Her Drinks to Go

By Chris Crowley 

Donna Lennard’s Bond Street antique store turned restaurant Il Buco is celebrating its 25th birthday this year. That kind of longevity is rare for any restaurant, and nobody is more surprised than Lennard. “It wasn’t what we were setting out to do,” she says. “You just set out to do something that you love and it takes on a life of its own, with your somewhat leadership.” You can see why it worked out for Lennard, who clearly has a firm grasp on how to live the good life: popping by her former Il Buco chef Ignacio Mattos’s restaurant Estela for scallop crudo and chocolate cake, getting a soft serve and margarita to go in the Hamptons, and pairing Pulp Fiction with “meringue extravaganzas” for movie night with her son...

Read the full story on The Grub Street Diet.

Matta in Sag Harbor will showcase the il Buco Vita collection for one week. Shop the newest handmade ceramics, linens, and antiques in a range of styles and colors, the perfect addition to your summer home.

il Buco Vita Pop Up at Matta
Wednesday, June 28th - Thursday, July 4th
82 Main Street
Sag Harbor, New York
Sunday-Thursday: 10am to 6pm
Friday & Saturday: 10am to 7pm

For the third installment of il Buco’s 25^th anniversary dinner series, Donna Lennard and il Buco Alimentari Executive Chef Preston Madson will host restaurateur Jonathan Waxman, chef Ginger Pierce of Jams, and Alimentari alumni Justin Smillie. Honoring Waxman’s recently closed West Village staple, Barbuto, the chefs will serve a family style featuring hit dishes from both restaurants. Here’s your chance to get JW Chicken one last time!

25th Anniversary Dinner with Jonathan Waxman, Justin Smillie, and Ginger Pierce

When: Tuesday, June 11th

Where: il Buco Alimentari & Vineria, 53 Great Jones Street, NY NY

Food: 5-course prix fixe dinner, $125 per person. Tax and gratuity not included. 

Wine: $75 optional wine pairing.

Book a reservation online or over the phone at (212) 837-2622

il Buco’s very own Founder and Mother, Donna Lennard, spoke to NY Mag about balancing Motherhood and work,"My own philosophy as a busy mom and restaurateur has been to incorporate my motherhood into my work life — Joaquin was quickly at home at the restaurant and found a built-in extended family that’s always ready to greet him." Read the full NYMag article here.

Join us for the second installment of il Buco's 25th anniversary dinner series! Acclaimed chef and il Buco alumna, Sara Jenkins will step into the kitchen for one special evening alongside Executive Chef Roger Martinez. Known for her East Village projects Porchetta and Porsena, Sara has recently returned to her roots with Nina June, a Mediterranean-style restaurant located in her home town of Rockport, Maine. Book a table while there is still space!

Acclaimed chef and author Alice Waters, along with David Tanis — former Executive Chef of Chez Panisse and NYTimes columnist — will team up with il Buco Alimentari Executive Chef Preston Madson to kick off il Buco’s 25th anniversary dinner series.  We look forward to having you join us for this celebratory evening.  Book a table while there is still space!

il Buco Alimentari e Vineria in Manhattan is an Italian specialty store and restaurant that has recently developed its own leavened innovation. This ancient grain focaccia is made entirely from ancient Sicilian organic triticum durum whole wheat timilia flour that is specially milled for il Buco by a single producer. Danny Rubin, il Buco's Retail Operations Manager, is the reason it happened, "Two years ago I was in Sicily meeting with our producers, and we met this guy who's using this flour... it grows in these gigantic fields, really, really high... basically when [wheat production] changed and became a chemically processed production, homogenized, the flour deformed and got smaller... all the variation is where flavor comes from in the grain."   

Read the full Forbes article here!

Donna Lennard recommends her favorite restaurant in Rome to Bloomberg.  

The neighborhood of Trastevere is stocked with historic churches and houses with pastel-painted shutters that line narrow streets. It’s also got a reputation for classic trattorias such as da Enzo, which has a handful of plastic-cloth-topped tables in a compact space. “It’s tiny and not pretty, and tourists have discovered it, but still it’s a guilty pleasure of many of my friends that live in the neighborhood.”

The New York Times announced our new Executive Chef, Preston Madson, as well as il Buco Alimentari's new  focaccia program.  Working with Marco Riggi — a purveyor of some ancient strains of triticum wheat in Caltanissetta, Sicily — the restaurant is importing stone-ground organic timilia flour, also known as tumminia, for focaccia. Read more about about Chef Preston and the focaccia at the New York Times.

Donna Lennard and Danny Rubin taste test Instagrammable olive oil alongside chef Jeremiah Stone from Wildair and Contra; Curtis Cord, an olive-oil expert and editor of Olive Oil Times; New York Magazine's restaurant critic Adam Platt.  Read the entire story at New York Magazine, Grub Street.

Find us in Zagat's roundup of the best places to treat yourself to lunch here.

Read about il Buco Alimentari's in house batteria and 20 year aged balsamic in Jimmy Im's review for CNBC here.

Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop has named our handmade Bevagna serveware as the perfect housewarming gift—"any cheese board setup or dinner entrée looks infinitely better when served on Italian glazed terra-cotta."

Read the full gift guide here.

Join us this season to "enjoy a rustic Italian dinner out on [our] lush romantic patio, which practically defines al fresco dining."

Read the full article here.

Acclaimed James Beard Chef Naomi Pomeroy is teaming up with Garrison Price of il Buco Alimentari for one special evening. Join us in welcoming the long awaited Spring with their celebratory five-course menu.

Monday, April 30th
5 Courses, $95.00 per person

Call or email to book your table
reservations@ilbuco.com 
(212) 837 - 2622

MENU:
Fluke & Japanese Scallop Crudo
herb marinated artichokes with olio nuovo

Asparagus & Morel Salad
shaved turnip, sesame aioli, toasted arborio rice powder

Wild Shrimp Ravioli
tomato conserva, meyer lemon butter, mint

Columbia River Sturgeon
wild watercress, ramp butter
or
Snake River American Wagyu
oregon new potatoes, green garlic salmoriglio

Heirloom Carrot Cake
rum raisin gelato, candied carrots 

Read about il Buco's Wine Director, Roberto Paris, in Forbes online.

It’s his fondness for “odd characters,” for wines wrongly disregarded elsewhere but thankfully found here, for the kind of conversations launched by a first sip of something you didn’t know existed just a minute ago. “I love the catch of the day, things that fall into your net while you’re fishing for something else,” he says. Helpfully, to those of us with unquenchable curiosity, Paris makes some of those catches especially handy: on his list there is an extensive selection of Italian wines poured one glass at a time.