Chef and restaurateur Michael Gulotta is all about new beginnings and his newest concept Tana and actually one of his old concepts that’s finally getting a brick-and-mortar location in Old Metairie.
After Hurricane Katrina, Gulotta returned to New Orleans from working in Europe to help his former employer Restaurant August rebuild and reopen its award-winning kitchen. In 2014, Gulotta finally struck out on his own to open MoPho, a Louisiana-Southeast Asian restaurant, with his brother Jeff Gulotta. Two years later, Michael Gulotta opened an Italian-Cajun-Asian restaurant called Maypop, and Food & Wine magazine named him as one of its Best New Chefs for 2016.
That same year, Gulotta also debuted a pop-up serving Sicilian food called Tana. Located in the now-defunct Mid City bar Trèo, the pop-up was popular for serving up pasta and Mediterranean flavors until it closed in 2019.
Once again, Gulotta is embarking on a new beginning by reincarnating Tana in Old Metairie, located in Jefferson Parish, along with his MoPho owner-operator group of Jeff Gulotta and Jeffrey Bybee. The 5,000-square-foot restaurant is a significant departure from the old Trèo space. One of the restaurant’s signature features will be a fresh pasta rolling station that’s visible to passers-by on the street.
However, fans of the old Tana should expect the same influence; the cooking of Gulotta’s grandmother Tana. At a recent two-week Tana pop-up event in Maypop, the menu included a cobia crudo with Calabrian chili and trout caviar; four-cheese ravioli with truffle cream; pappardelle in a spicy lamb ragu; and a veal chop parmesan with capelli di angelo.
Clearly, Gulotta and company are swinging for the fences once again with Tana. Perhaps this concept will get him over the hump when it comes to national recognition. He was a finalist for the James Beard Awards Best Chef South in 2020, the farthest he’s ever made it in that selection process.
“Tana will be one of the better restaurants in this area and similar to something you’d find in Miami, Chicago or New York,” co-owner-operator Bybee says in a press release, “but with Old Metairie ambiance.”
The space is currently being built out and the Tana Instagram says we should expect an opening in 2023.
