Vello's Owner Offers Fun, Not Fancy Dining

This is part of an on-going series profiling local chefs and sharing their favorite summer recipes.

Victor Servello may have a marketing degree under his belt, but his real passion is in food.

"I think it was the initial just working in restaurants," said Servello, 33, owner of Vello's Restaurant at 679 High St. "Getting bit by the restaurant bug and loving it, and wanting to be around it all the time."

Servello, a Westwood native and Allston resident, was fueled with motivation to run his own restaurant early on, after working as a cook for years in the Boston area.

"Basically, I had been working in restaurants, cooking in restaurants in Boston, nothing fine dining or anything, but just cooking in pubs and bar-kind of places that served bar food," Servello said. "And I really, really liked it. And I was at that point in my career where I had a job where I could have either taken more money or gone off and done my own thing."

At the time he opened Vello's in June 2002, Servello had been working at the Double Rainbow Café in Boston's Copley Mall, where he worked for nearly five years before becoming a managing partner for a year and a half.

Prior to that, Servello worked as a cook at Woody's Grill & Tap, and later Bukowski's Tavern, both Boston restaurants.

While he earned a marketing degree from UMass Boston, Servello's plan was to eventually use his business knowledge to his advantage and open his own place.

"Knowing I wanted to do my own restaurant, I would be able to do my own marketing if I had too," he said.

On the business end of things, Vello's was able to withstand the recession rather easily, Servello said. In fact, a second Vello's had been running for nearly five years at the Dedham Health and Athletic Complex, before Servello decided to sell it last year due to conflicts with building owners, and also to pursue interests outside of the restaurant business.

At the Westwood location, he operates as more than just the owner, but as a jack-of-all-trades.

"I'm kind of the roamer," he said. "Meaning that I help everyone do everything. I help the waitresses wait tables, I help the cooks get the food out, I'm just kind of the helper."

The restaurant sees customers from a variety of nearby towns, he added, from Norwood to Dedham to Needham.

"It's a mixed bag, really," he said. "Our mission statement is 'Fun Dining,' versus 'Fine Dining.'"

Vello's serves breakfast, lunch and dinner, and is open six days a week. Patrons can find a variety of items on the menu, including sandwiches, pasta and seafood. The restaurant has also been featured by Phantom Gourmet in 2008 and 2009.

One of Servello's favorite dishes on the menu has a simple recipe, and is a great meal for the summer months.

"This time of year I like pulled pork, because it's summer time and it's a great recipe for the summer," he said. "We consistently make it the same. It's a fairly easy recipe to make."

Below, Servello has offered the recipe for the dish . . .

Pulled Pork

Ingredients:

• Shoulder-less pork butt
• Herbs and spices (can be varied to taste)
• Ground peeled tomato, canned
• White cooking wine

Directions:

• In three separate hotel pans, evenly distribute shoulder-less butt pork
• Add herbs and spices to taste, mix with pork butt
• Add two cans of ground peeled tomato (blended)
• Add white cooking wine to task
• Put dish in oven at 350 degrees Farenheit for approximately five to six hours
• Add water or wine every couple of hours
• Let sit at room temperature over night

Next Day:

• Break pork into small parts
• Add one cup of traditional barbeque sauce per hotel pan (three pans in total)
• Keep in storage container and refrigerate
• Make sure to properly rotate all stock and label with name and date.

Vello's is located at 679 High St., Westwood, MA 02090. The restaurant serves lunch and dinner Tuesdays through Sundays from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m., and breakfast on Saturdays and Sundays from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. A catering menu is also available.

For more information, call 617-909-1538.