El Cap, St. Petersburg’s iconic 4th Road North burger joint, has been partially offered. However the juicy World Champ burgers inside its wood-paneled partitions aren’t going away.
Seed & Feed Hospitality, the group behind initiatives like Trophy Fish and Mandarin Conceal, purchased half of the shop at 3500 4th Road North. Cindy Nally, who has labored at El Cap for about twenty years, will proceed to personal the remaining 50%, she mentioned.
Nally determined to place El Cap up on the market after working associate Tara Mattiacci withdrew.
“The time has come to go the El Cap torch to a different St. Pete native who will keep on the custom for a few years to return,” Mattiacci posted on Fb in December. “The brand new companions have been born and raised in St. Pete and have all been coming to El Cap for greater than 40 years.”
“We view El Cap as an iconic establishment,” mentioned Ryan Griffin of Seed & Feed Hospitality. “I bear in mind going there once I was a child.”
Ryan Griffin, alongside together with his father, Invoice Griffin, and stepbrother, Blake Thompson, are devoted to preserving St. Petersburg’s old-school attraction. When Ryan Griffin heard that the beloved restaurant was prone to being purchased out by an actual property improvement firm, he knew he needed to act.
“It pushed me to do my responsibility and step in and do what I may in my energy to assist protect a neighborhood asset,” he mentioned.
In response to St. Pete Rising, a number of different persons are concerned in El Cap’s new possession construction, together with Tampa Bay Rays and Tampa Bay Rowdies executives Matt Silverman and Brian Auld, shopper justice legal professional Augie Ribeiro and El Cap’s longtime accountant, WG Spoor.
Ryan Griffin mentioned he is concerned with saving extra Tampa Bay gems.
/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/tbt/6ZWJHEIU5VD6VPDVA4UTNQ7QN4.jpg "El Cap Restaurant at 3500 4th St N, St. Petersburg, was operated for many years by the late Frank and Mary Jean Bonfili.")
El Cap opened within the 1960s and stays a St. Pete staple, at the same time as different classic institutions, like Munch’s and Wilson’s, have gone up on the market.
Even the native wildlife is a fan of El Cap’s meals. Representatives of the close by Wooden Stork inhabitants have been recognized to hang around within the parking zone earlier than the lunch rush, hoping to seize a chew to eat.
“They might get so daring that they’d climb on individuals’s tables and steal their burgers,” Larry Chopard, El Cap’s evening supervisor, instructed the Occasions in 2022.
Whereas the brand new possession construction might result in behind-the-scenes changes that enhance the movement of the restaurant, Nally mentioned the menu and ambiance will stay the identical.
Regulars are already joyful to listen to the information.
“It is only a new journey,” Nally mentioned. “They know I am right here for his or her greatest curiosity, the most effective curiosity of the neighborhood.”