Dear Editor,

My name is Birgit, I live on Morgan Junction in West Seattle.

In a nutshell: Here is the reason for my email to you:

Rosanna and Francesco came to West Seattle from Napoli/Italy in 2001 to join the Italian owner of ABBONDANZA pizzeria at 6503 California Avenue to work. Rosanna worked in the restaurant, her husband Francesco was the chef. The owner of the restaurant was deaf. Rosanne and Francesco came with almost "no knowledge of the English language" so they not only had to learn English but also sign language in order to communicate with their boss. They worked in the restaurant until 2003 and business was great with Francesco in the kitchen and Rosanna in the service. Then there was a fall out between the owner and Rosanna and Francesco. They left the restaurant and worked both in downtown in restaurants as employees. In 2013, the deaf owner made them an offer to purchase the restaurant, which they did.

They took over the ownership of Abbondanza in June 2013 and have been running the restaurant AGAIN.
The name of the restaurant DID NOT change (too costly) so basically the two of them are running their old stomping grounds again with the same kind of dedication and passion and great food BUT the public might not be aware of this fact.

Since I know the restaurant business inside and out, I know how difficult it can be if you are taking over a place that has not had a great reputation from the previous owner and the name did not change.

Rosanna and Francesco now have 2 little kids age 2-4, Rosanna's father in Italy passed away 2 weeks ago and she brought her mother and brother over from Italy.

I would love to help in any way to spread the word in the local community that they are BACK so people hopefully flock back and frequent this lovely little cozy old world charm Italian eatery.

I guess educating the West Seattle community how hard working they are, even learning sign language would make a neat story. If you do some research on tripadvisor or similar sites it is IMPORTANT to sort the reviews by DATE... the time span from 2001- 2003 and from June 2013 to present is under the helm of both of them. Some of the negative reviews were under the OLD owner.

Thanks,

Birgit Mitchell