A new Italian restaurant with an emphasis on fresh pasta, pizza and cocktails is reviving Orinda’s Theatre Square.
Brothers Public Kitchen is a family venture, owned and operated by brothers Jason and Blair Bagneschi, who grew up in the Bay Area, graduated from De La Salle High School and fell in love with seasonal cooking from watching their Italian immigrant parents and grandparents.
Both have degrees related to restaurants: Blair is a graduate of Northern Arizona University’s W.A. Franke School of Business in Hotel and Restaurant Management. Jason attended culinary school at Diablo Valley College’s Hotel and Restaurant Management Program. Together they have combined experience at some of the Bay Area’s top restaurants, including Quince and Wayfare Tavern in San Francisco and Va De Vi and Walnut Creek Yacht Club in Walnut Creek.
The restaurant’s menu is a reflection of their of the Sunday roasts, family picnics and Italian social club gatherings of their youth. Everything is seasonal; pasta and pizza dough are made fresh daily. Starters include beef meatballs with cape gooseberry escabeche, fava bean-pumpkin-seed-mint pesto ($14). Look for three classic pastas, like squid ink linguini and Manila clams with spring onion and white wine ($20) plus five pizzas, including a pepperoni, a housemade sausage and mushroom, and a spring pie made with smoked green garlic, ricotta, asparagus, pickled fresno chiles, provolone, arugula and rhubarb ($18).
Mains are unfussy and include a house-ground Chuck burger and braised beef short ribs. The wine list is small and focused on Italian and California producers. A glass of pinot grigio will run you $9; a super Tuscan from Montepulciano, $14. Cocktails include both classic and craft specialities like the Beet Down featuring beet-infused gin, cocchi americano, lime and coriander.
The Bagneschis aquired the space at 2 Theatre Square, Suite 144, back in September 2019 but did not open the restaurant until February 11 of this year. “Covid really did a number on us,” Blair said via email.
Brother Public Kitchen is open from 3 p.m. Tuesday-Sunday, with happy hour from 3 to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Friday.
