Catello's Italian Art Cuisine
Sitting Down with Catello Avagnale By Matthew Hume
Catello's fresh take on Old World cuisine surpasses all expectations.
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Take one look at Catello’s antipasto selections, and it will come as no surprise that Catello Avagnale, owner and head chef at Catello’s two locations (Indianapolis and Pendleton), is the son of a cheesemaker. Everything at Catello’s is made fresh, including their mozzarella and burrata cheeses. But make your way down the menu—and I warn you, it’s easy to get lost in it—and you will find dishes with names you may or may not understand, and ingredients that will make your mouth start to water. As it was with one Yelp reviewer, you might find yourself getting “emotional” over the food. And that’s before you even taste it.
Catello’s Italian Art Cuisine’s Indianapolis location lies in your average retail strip on the south side of the street about a mile east of Keystone at the Crossing. But step just inside, and any thought of 82nd Street vanishes into the lush ambience of linen-dressed tables and a striking Demilune bar at the back of the main room that stretches elegantly from one side to the other. Each night, live piano music provides a comfortable backdrop for conversations with friends and loved ones over your choice of Catello’s impressive selection of wines and Old World Italian dishes, brought to glorious and authentic life in the culinary artistry of Catello Avagnale and his team. |
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Catello Avagnale grew up south of Naples, in the community of Castellammare di Stabia, where he learned the roots of Italian cuisine from his own family. His father was a cheesemaker, and his family ran a hotel restaurant business. Having attended university in Bologna, in the North, Catello knows firsthand the wide variety of ingredients and preparations that one finds in different parts of Italy. When asked, though, what regions his menu at Catello’s is based on, he explains that he doesn’t design the menu by region, but by availability of ingredients locally. The culinary trip your tongue will take around Italy at Catello’s, then, doesn’t depend as much on the whim of the chef, as much as it does on what’s available by season here in central Indiana.
So why did Catello Avagnale leave his homeland to start anew in Pendleton? He says it was at the urging of his best friend Matteo, founder and original owner of Matteo’s Ristorante Italiano in Noblesville. “We grew up next door to each other, and it just felt like the right thing to do at the time,” Catello tells me. And so, Catello’s Mozzarella Bar opened in Pendleton in 2016, offering a selection of house-made mozzarellas, along with salads, paninis, pastas, and fresh pasta-to-go.
The eventual transition to Catello’s Italian Art Cuisine brought not only the fresh house-made cheeses, paninis and pastas that customers were used to, but a full menu of spectacularly prepared dishes of pastas, cheeses, meats and fish. Among the chef-featured items on the menu, you’ll find la favetta, rigatoni with fava bean sauce, speck ham, shallots, aromatic herbs, extra virgin olive oil, salt and black pepper. There’s also the spigola and ceci, linguine cooked with seabass in a white wine sauce, with sun-dried tomato, garlic, parsley, and herbs, on a bed of garbanzo sauce. (Like I said, you might not recognize the words, but oh, what lies beneath the words.) |
Coming soon, Catello’s looks forward to inaugurating their Italian wine and movie nights at the 82nd Street location. “We’ll show a movie and serve dinner, paired with wines—and we’ll be making our cheeses right there in front of you, in real-time.”
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Visit their website, and you’ll find a review that declares Catello’s as the “best Italian food ever,” and admitting that the reviewer “gets emotional when eating their food.” And this is from a born-and-raised Italian, no less. I asked Catello how he feels about reviews like this. “They’re so gratifying to hear,” he says, “but they make me want to make my food and the experience even better.”
The experience—that’s what Catello Avagnale is going after, not only with his food, but with the art on the walls, the music in the air, the touch of white linen tablecloths. Catello wants each and every one of his guests to enjoy his culinary creations, and to let time and conversation pass in the Old World way, in their own, unhurried time. “I want our guests to come and enjoy everything we have to offer, to enjoy the ambience, and the wine, and the food—I want them to love their time here at my restaurant.”
The experience—that’s what Catello Avagnale is going after, not only with his food, but with the art on the walls, the music in the air, the touch of white linen tablecloths. Catello wants each and every one of his guests to enjoy his culinary creations, and to let time and conversation pass in the Old World way, in their own, unhurried time. “I want our guests to come and enjoy everything we have to offer, to enjoy the ambience, and the wine, and the food—I want them to love their time here at my restaurant.”