60 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM {food coloring} Che Fico Mercato defies all your grocery store expectations as soon as you step through the entrance. At this newly-opened Italian market in Menlo Park, a gleaming chandelier with blown glass fruit dazzles in the doorway, while a Pompeiistyle mosaic spreads across the floor, its tiny tiles depicting seasonal ingredients from pigs to pomegranates. Italian goods line shelves painted in a cheery tomato red, and are accompanied by a deli with killer sandwiches, a fridge full of domestic and imported cheeses, a top-tier wine aisle and a butcher counter offering quality cuts. Outside, a line of people have surrendered to the siren song of the gelato window. There’s another reason this market is one-of-a-kind: It’s an offshoot of a thriving Italian restaurant. Why might Che Fico, a brand known for its upscale Italian words by JOHANNA HARLOW• photography by PAULETTE PHLIPOT DEL I Z IOSO magnifico mercato ABOVE: David Nayfield is Che Fico’s chef and co-owner. dining, expand into the cutthroat grocery business? For a start, the owners have already established trust with Californian farmers and ranchers, developing a reputation as devotees of fresh, local ingredients. “Those relationships have been built over years of running the restaurants,” explains David Nayfeld, Che Fico’s chef and one of its co-owners. “We work with so many farms here—whether it’s getting basil from Lou Vue Farm, whether it’s Kashiwase stone fruit or Star Route lettuce.” He leans his arm on a crate of blushing peaches. “You’ve never seen summer produce like some of the stuff that Full Belly Farm produces. Whether it’s melons, peppers, squash, tomatoes, eggplant.” That relational bent extends to the Mercato’s customers. “We’re trying to harken back to an older and a different time of shopping where you would have a relationship with your butcher. You would have a relationship with the person who makes the sandwich. They know you,” he says. David can walk from Che Fico Parco Menlo (the restaurant’s new Menlo Park location) to the market in less than a minute. The sister kitchens are used in tandem. “We’re making our gelato base here at the market—and
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