Guzzardo's Italian Villa

Category: Food Drink

Get your fill of classic Italian fare and great steaks at family-owned Guzzardo’s Italian Villa in Lincoln.

Located downtown on the south side of the square, The Villa has been a Lincoln mainstay for more than 50 years—and still serves many of the same dishes that graced the menu when the restaurant opened in 1957.

The History
After Italian immigrants Dominic (Doc) and Rose Guzzardo moved from the Chicago area to Lincoln in 1947, they dreamed of opening an Italian restaurant. Ten years after they arrived in town, that dream became a reality.

At the time, the site of the restaurant was just a storage building with 2x12s, a dirt floor, and no upstairs. Once construction was completed, the new upstairs area seated 24 people, who could look down through the middle of the restaurant to see who was coming in the door. The restaurant grew quickly after that—the family added the second room in 1962 and the two smaller rooms in the late 1960s.

Doc and Rose’s son John was only 11 at the time the restaurant opened and regularly helped his father, mother, and sister (who was 16 at the time). “I worked here from the day it opened and started making pizzas extremely early. I always loved when my dad and I worked in the kitchen together,” John recalls.

They served a menu much like today: pizza, pasta, steak, even broiled lobster back then. But their biggest seller was the pizza. “At the time, we sold the only pizza in town. People didn’t even know what pizza was,” John recalls. They started delivering their Italian pies in the early 1960s when Ed Madigan (the late secretary of agriculture under George H.W. Bush) owned a cab company in Lincoln and would pick up food in his cab to drop off at people’s homes.

Madigan’s deliveries are one of John’s many fond memories from the early years at the restaurant. “I got to meet so many different people—the Harlem Globetrotters used to come to Lincoln and eat at the restaurant, friends of my dad would come visit, different people were always coming up to eat,” John says. As he grew up, at one time or the other, most of his close friends worked at The Villa with him. “We still carry those memories even today about how hard we used to work,” John recalls.

And then one day a new employee came to town. Frankie Hallett arrived from Cleveland, looking for a job in Lincoln so her parents would let her attend Lincoln Christian College in the fall. John’s dad said if she came back in September and asked for Rose, they’d put her to work.

So Frankie did, and the rest, as they so often say, is history. Frankie and John fell in love, married, and continue to work together at the restaurant today. “Frankie came to school on the advice of my dad telling her to show up and become a waitress, and 47 years later here we are,” John says with a grin.

John worked at the restaurant all through high school and college, then he was drafted. “When I was drafted I really didn’t know if I was going to come back to the business or not,” John says. But when he got out of the service, John and Frankie married and decided to move back to Lincoln to help his parents run the business. In 1978, Doc and Rose decided to retire, so John and Frankie bought the restaurant and took over.

Soon thereafter, it was time for a new generation to start working. John and Frankie’s kids—Shelly, Janelle, and Nick—all helped out in the restaurant, just like their father did, while still in elementary school and all the way through their junior high and high school years. After getting married, however, Shelly and Janelle moved away.

Nick continued to work part-time at the restaurant while he attended Lincoln College. And then, his second year at the college, something clicked and he realized the restaurant business was his calling, just as it had been his father’s. “Nick decided he wanted to do it,” John says. “I never thought he’d want to be in the restaurant business, but if you look at him today he’s a spitting image of me when I was 32 years old.”

Theirs is more of a buddy or brother relationship than a father-son one, John admits. “He’s my best friend. We get along extremely well.”

John and Frankie think the world of their daughter-in-law, Shelly, too. She could have gotten a teaching job in the area once she married Nick, but instead she chose to go into the restaurant business with her husband. “If it weren’t for Nick and Shelly, we wouldn’t have this restaurant today,” Frankie says. Now Shelly runs the upstairs and Nick runs the kitchen, just like Frankie and John did for so many years. Although Frankie and John still work at the restaurant (officially, it’s a family corporation), now Nick and Shelly are in charge.

And, one day, their son J.T., now 7 years old, may take over. “I’m going to run the restaurant and take this baby over,” says J.T. who, along with his younger sister Julia, often spends time at the restaurant with their parents and grandparents. When he runs the place, J.T. says with a grin like his grandfather’s, he’ll swap a few pictures on the wall and add an egg sandwich to the menu (it’s his favorite thing to cook), but otherwise leave the place as it is today.

“They say only 7 percent of third-generation businesses and restaurants survive—we’re a rare commodity,” John says.

“And we’re looking forward to the fourth,” Frankie adds, nodding to her grandchildren.

The Restaurant
It should come as no surprise that the walls in The Villa are adorned with family photos and newspaper clippings collected over the years. Portions of the restaurant are devoted to snapshots of employees, family, work at the State Fair (where the Guzzardo family is involved in the Food-A-Rama each year), Lincoln Railer basketball, and more.

Warm hues, Italy-inspired murals on the walls, ornate lighting, and intimate seating areas impart an old-world feel. It’s all designed to imbue each meal with a sense of the Guzzardo family history—and make guests—whether they’re regulars or not—feel at home.

“As you travel, there are so many chains that dominate these communities,” John says. “We’ve been very fortunate to build a clientele and have people come from out of town.” He estimates that on Friday and Saturday nights, about 50 percent of their business comes from out of town and 50 percent of diners are visiting for their first time.

“Most of it is word of mouth. We do very little advertising,” Frankie says.

Frankie thinks so many people talk about the restaurant and keep coming back—some from long distances and over the span of 50-plus years—because of its intimate, welcoming ambience. “You walk through the dining room and people call you over and say hi. I think people like that camaraderie, that small-town feeling with the big-town food.”

The Food
Most of the fare served at The Villa is the same as it was 52 years ago—for instance, the thousand island dressing is homemade using the same recipe Doc and Rose started out with. “Dad was a dreamer and was always putting recipes together,” John recalls. Plus, a lot of the mainstays on the menu originated from John’s grandmothers. The tomato sauce and pizza dough served at the restaurant are still made using one of his grandmother’s recipes.

It only takes one visit to The Villa to learn that you’d better come with an empty stomach—and be prepared to take home leftovers anyway. The restaurant is known for its salad bar, which is complimentary with all entrees and includes a fresh selection of salad toppings, plus French onion soup, fresh-baked bread, and crispies (another of Doc’s recipes, they’re deep-fried pizza dough squares covered in cinnamon and sugar—a crowd favorite).

If you make it past the salad bar to the main course, the Italian food and pizza are two favorites. And the steaks draw people from miles around. “If you ever go on the weekends, people say there’s no better prime rib anywhere,” John says. Nick and John cut the steaks themselves each morning and slow-cook them with the bone in so the beef is fresh and nearly melts in your mouth.

There are plenty of other menu options aside from Italian fare and steaks too, including a selection of sandwiches (try the schnitzel), burgers, massive hand-breaded chicken strips, fish and shrimp, and sides including giant twice-baked potatoes.

In other words, there’s something for everyone on the menu. And that’s just the way Doc and Rose Guzzardo wanted it.

Get There
509 Pulaski St
.
Lincoln, IL 62656
217.732.6370

The Villa dining room is open Tuesday through Saturday from 4:30 to 9 p.m. Delivery service is available Tuesday through Sunday from 4:30 to 9:30 p.m. Reservations are recommended, particularly on the weekend.

* Please note that The Villa does not serve alcoholic beverages.

Tags: Food & Drink | Guzzardo's Italian Villa | Lincoln | Restaurants |

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