Courtney Metsch, Manager, Anders Tallberg, Co-owner with Kit Paschal, the Other Co-owner, of Roustabout This Afternoon.

Erik Hanks, Chef Tournant, of Roustabout.

By Carol McCracken  (Post # 2,455)

Roustabout, the latest major restaurant to open on Munjoy Hill, is expected to open within the next week said Kit Paschal, a co-owner of the Italian-American restaurant on 59 Washington Avenue, this afternoon.  Before that will happen, though the owners will put on a mock services meal of spaghetti for the  workers who have constructed the place from scratch.

The menu will be Italian-American with a beer, wine and cocktail beverage menu.  The restaurant will seat seventy-five people with seating for eighteen at the bar.   “We really hope to pack them in,” said Paschal this afternoon.  Paschal who is from Cape Cod says he has always wanted to own his own restaurant.  Formerly he was a bartender at Hunt & Alpine Club. His business partner Anders Tallberg, was a sous chef at Hugo’s.  The two have been working on this project for eighteen months now.

Erik Hanks, an Eastern Promenade resident, is the chef tournant, at Roustabout. He was formerly at the Inn at Shelbourne Farms.  More recently he was a cook at Central Provisions, having left that position last month for this new position.  “It’s important to stay sharp by working with different people,” Hanks said of his recent move to Roustabout, in the former J. J. Nissan Bakery building.

“We hope that Roustabout will bring more foot traffic to this area and bring more night life and energy here,” said Paschal.  It’s hard to believe that it won’t.