State Fare Columnist Steve Doyle: Italian Restaurant Lucia Lives Up to the Buzz

(photos by Robert Bostick)

The food blogs have recently been preoccupied with David and Jennifer Uygur’s Lucia, their first foray as restaurant owners. Lucia opened for business yesterday in the Bishop Arts area of Dallas and the Uygurs are accepting reservations at the tiny 38-seat restaurant next door to Dude, Sweet Chocolate.

Chef David Uygur, formerly of Lola, spent the past year gearing up for the new restaurant that features honest Italian cuisine and house-made salumis, pastas and breads. Uygur labored the summer in preparation by canning vegetables and developing recipes while working many of the local charity events such as 48 Nights and the Slow Food long table event last October. Uygur also popped up at Jimmy’s Food Store in East Dallas to participate in many of their wine tastings where he paired various varietals of Italian wines with many of the items he planned serving at the new restaurant.

“I want to keep the restaurant intimate and reflect the neighborhood.” said Uygur.  “We plan on changing the menu often, as well as the beer and wine. We want to keep this fresh and inventive.”

The Bishop Arts area has experienced some major growth that may have started with the addition of restaurant Bolsa and spread quickly with other unique restaurants in the Oak Cliff area such as Hatties, Enos’s and the revamping of Tillman’s Roadhouse.

Rob Shearer of the Oak Cliff Chamber of Commerce is excited to see the new restaurant open. “Lucia is just one more addition to Bishop Arts that makes it an important restaurant destination for Dallas,” said Shearer. “The traffic count is way up over the past year and this will bring that many more people to us.”

Steve Doyle writes about the Dallas food scene for EscapeHatchDallas.