Restaurant taking 'breather' due to construction

A Mexican restaurant that has struggled to establish an identity since it opened in 2006 announced Friday that it will close for the summer.

Sol Latino, at 65 Public Square, will close Sunday with a reopening date to be determined.

Restaurant bookkeeper Brian W. Gorman said the decision to close was based, as least in part, on the loss of customers due to a slow summer season, sagging economy and the ongoing reconstruction project outside.

The location is owned by Army Lt. Col. Vonnette T. Monteith, who is stationed in Washington, D.C., and could not be reached for comment.

Mr. Gorman said the restaurant, which specializes in Mexican and Latin food, will not reopen until the Public Square reconstruction work has been "substantially completed."

Sol Latino has relied heavily on the dinner crowd, and Mr. Gorman said the evening trade had been dampened by the streetscape project.

"If I want to take my family out for a nice meal, I'm not going to do it and endure a fairly substantial hassle," he said.

Mr. Gorman set a tentative reopening date for this fall, when new traffic patterns are established in the road outside and "the public sees the light at the end of the tunnel."

"Do we want to see the streetscape completed? Yes," he said. "We have to do what we can to manage our current situation and that's what we're doing."

Although he attributed the temporary closure in large part to the construction work, Mr. Gorman said the restaurant staff and owner had been "supportive of what's going on downtown" and called the reconstruction "a necessary evil."

He said other factors — the general economy, the cost of food and needed interior repairs — also contributed to the decision to close temporarily.

In the downtime, Mr. Gorman said, Sol Latino will undergo cosmetic changes, including new paint inside, minor work in the kitchen and equipment maintenance.

By the time the restaurant reopens, the menu also will be reworked to include more healthy options, an expanded list of side dishes and better salads, he said.

Mr. Gorman said the Sol Latino staff of 12 had committed to returning to work once the restaurant is ready to reopen.

This is not the first time the location has undergone a drastic change or had to overcome setbacks.

Before being purchased by Mrs. Monteith in October 2005 for $255,000, the location was known as Kegler's Lounge & Restaurant.

Four months after she purchased the space, Mrs. Monteith opened 65 Public Square as the Mexican restaurant Casa de Flor.

But her position with the Army took her away from Watertown, so Mrs. Monteith was joined in 2007 by business partner Vera Mitchell. Shortly after she arrived, Ms. Mitchell changed the name of the eatery to VV's Rosa Violeta and shifted the focus of the menu to more authentic Mexican food.

Last fall, the restaurant was one of 20 businesses that took advantage of a low-interest loan program created by the Watertown Local Development Corp. to help downtown businesses through the travails of city road construction.

A $10,000 loan also went to Mrs. Monteith's Court Street business, Just Because/Olde World Pottery.

In January, the partnership with Ms. Mitchell dissolved. Following a contest to find a new name for the location, the restaurant was redubbed Sol Latino.

Mr. Gorman said the menu also was shifted away from authentic Mexican offerings in an attempt to make the eatery more broadly inclusive.

Earlier this month, the state Department of Health fined the restaurant $250 under the name Casa de Flor. The eatery paid three $50 fines for allowing cooked rice to get too cool, for unplugging the refrigerated preparation unit when the air temperature was too warm and for not operating the mechanical dishwasher properly.

The restaurant also paid four $25 fines for issues that included broken food tiles in the walk-in cooler and for allowing grease and food particles to accumulate on the floor around the grill and steam table.

Mr. Gorman said the upcoming summer break will be a good time to review the future direction of the restaurant.

"It's a good opportunity to really just do some stock-taking, strategize, lay out the year ahead and put some goals in place," he said. "We'll get a little breather. It's been busy."