New Tacoma restaurant offers homestyle cooking
The Urban Elk is now open at Allenmore Golf Course. The restaurant is located inside a clubhouse operated by the Elks Lodge No. 174.
The restaurant Smoke + Cedar operated at the course from March 2014 to October, but the course has been without a restaurant since that closure.
The Urban Elk is operated by a longtime South Sound restaurateur. Giuseppe Nappo will run the restaurant with son-in-law and daughter, George and Bianca Filiss.
Nappo also is the owner of Cliff House in Northeast Tacoma and Verrazano’s in Federal Way. He operates Al Lago in Lake Tapps with his daughter and son-in-law.
Nappo previously operated other restaurants in Tacoma, Auburn and Federal Way, including a golf course restaurant for seven years at the Copper Falls course in Auburn. He closed that restaurant in 2015.
The restaurant was turnkey and looks unchanged — save for a few accent paint changes — from its previous design, which was created by Seattle’s McVey Oakley Design Studio.
The L-shaped dining room, outfitted in red and black, houses a bar near the entry. A spacious patio provides a view of the course, as do most of the restaurant’s seats.
The menu appeared just as Nappo described with “home cooking, family style, familiar foods, all homemade, as we do in our other restaurants.”
Lunch and dinner, on the same menu, come with modest pricing. The menu lists a dozen sandwiches and burgers ($7.95-$16.95). Entrees include two steak ($19.95 top sirloin, $23.95 ribeye); two fish ($12.95-$18.95) and four pasta/Italian entrees ($9.95-$19.95).
The one-page breakfast menu has all the usual suspects: corned beef hash ($11.95); steak and eggs ($15.95); biscuits and gravy ($9.95); eggs Benedict ($12.95); Belgian waffles ($9.95) and French toast ($10.95). There’s also four omelettes ($7.95-$11.95).
The restaurant serves beer, wine and cocktails.
Sue Kidd: 253-597-8270, @tntdiner
Urban Elk
Where: 2013 S. Cedar St., Tacoma; 253-272-1117; facebook.com/urbanelktacoma.
Hours: Breakfast, lunch and dinner served daily. 7 a.m.-10 p.m. Sundays-Thursdays; 7 a.m.-11 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays. Happy hour is daily 3-6 p.m.
Membership: No membership to the Elks is required. The course and restaurant are open to the public.
This story was originally published July 18, 2016 at 12:33 PM with the headline "New Tacoma restaurant offers homestyle cooking."