Beloved 121-year-old NYC Italian restaurant Ferdinando’s Focacceria finds new owner — one month after sudden closure: ‘It’s an honor’
The red sauce will keep flowing at Ferdinando’s.
Ferdinando’s Focacceria in Carroll Gardens will reopen under a new owner — a familiar face in the neighborhood food scene — after the 121-year-old Sicilian restaurant abruptly closed its doors last month, The Post has learned.
Owner Frank Buffa selected Sal Lamboglia, who helms Brooklyn spots Cafe Spaghetti, Swoony’s and Sal Tang’s, to take over the old-school eatery on Union Street, a rep for Lamboglia said. The lease was signed late last week.
“To me, it’s an honor to be handed the keys to a Brooklyn institution like Ferdinando’s,” Lamboglia said in a statement shared with The Post.
“As everyone knows all of my restaurants are in close proximity,” he added. “I look forward to honoring the legacy of Ferdinando’s Focacceria and expanding the restaurant group we are building here in Carroll Gardens.”
The news comes after several buyers pitched themselves for the location — including a Brooklyn pizzeria owner and a Michelin-rated chef, according to Buffa.
“I think he’s able to continue Ferdinando’s with a new style,” Buffa told The Post, confirming that Lamboglia will keep the eatery’s name.
“I like his ideas. It’s a modern style,” Buffa added. “He’ll put a signature drink [on the menu] and make it for the new generation, but also maybe he’ll keep some old Sicilian recipes.”
The longtime Ferdinando’s owner said he’s even offered to share his recipes with Lamboglia, including those for his famous panelle sandwiches.
Buffa contends “a lot of things inside will look 99% the same” when the location reopens in a few months, including the decades-old photos on the walls. Upgrades will include fixing the kitchen and backyard garden.
“He’s the only guy able to do it … I went over with many people to review [their business plan] and it’s not a matter of [who paid more] money,” Buffa said.
Ferdinando’s quietly closed its doors in February due to Buffa’s health issues and lasting financial impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, which permanently shifted customers’ dining habits to eating out less, he said.
The Sicilian joint was known for its classics like rice balls and panelles and drawing famous clientele such as Leonardo DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese — the latter of whom used Ferdinando’s for a scene in 2006’s “The Departed,” which nabbed best picture and best director Oscars the following year.
Buffa, who emigrated to New York City in 1971 and took over Ferdinando’s from his wife’s family after her father died in 1975, “never took a sick day” in the five decades since, he said.
“Ferdinando’s is beloved by everybody in Brooklyn,” Manhattan resident Andrew DiMaria, whose father owns a building on the same block, told The Post.
“On any given day, you can walk by and see Frank in the window, making the famous panelle special, greeting everybody walking by.”
Ferdinando’s changing of the guard is “a nice fit.”
“He’s a famous guy, and I like how he did it with Cafe Spaghetti.
“He will continue [Ferdinando’s] in his way.”
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