Agostino Gabriele
Vincenzo’s
Louisville KY
http://www.vincenzositalianrestaurant.com
Agostino Gabriele encountered his passion for the restaurant business at an impressionable age. In 1963, at 14, he was hired as kitchen help at Rosticceria Domore in Patermo, Sicily. Gabriele´s intense desire to learn took him to train at five restaurants over the next four years, including the internationally renowned Le Caprice under Chef Cascino.
At 18, with his brother Rosario — who already had years of restaurant experience — Agostino operated Desire, a resort restaurant, for a season. In 1969 he came to the U.S. to work at his uncle´s restaurant in St. Louis. By 1972 he was back in Europe, in Dusseldorf, Germany, working at Park Hotel and then at The Secondo Matteo restaurant in Milan, Italy.
Returning to St. Louis, he sought an opportunity to bring everything together in his own restaurant. Instead he worked at his brother Giovanni´s restaurant, Giovanni´s on the Hill. In 1975 he opened a tiny restaurant, Agostino´s Little Place, with Rosario. From a start with nine tables, the ‚“little place‚” exploded in popularity, with lines out the door in freezing temperatures. Agostino´s Little Place moved and got bigger. Agostino´s was voted in the top six restaurants yearly and received the Best Restaurant Award for eight consecutive years. Then Gabriele was on the move again, this time to Louisville, Kentucky, where he opened Vincenzo´s with his brother Vincenzo Gabriele. Agostino has won the Gold Award from the American Academy of Restaurant and Hospitality Sciences. The restaurant is a DiRoNA award winner, Wine Spectator Award of Excellence winner, James Beard winner, Five Star Diamond Award winner, and Best of Louisville winner. And at least 16 other distinguished awards and citations.
