Business & Tech
New Restaurant Featuring Local Catch To Open in Hampton Bays
Hampton Bays' newest restaurant will be by the Ponquogue Bridge.
In late February, Chef Tom Rutyna signed the lease on his first restaurant. Having turned the page on 50, Rutyna said TR Restaurant is a dream, long deferred, now realized.
After cheffing in East End eateries for decades, Rutyna is no stranger to the food trade. With his restaurant venture heading for its grand opening in mid-May, the self-taught chef lacks the jitters which can beset culinary young guns.
“I’m the calmest I have ever been in my life,” he said with swagger.
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TR Restaurant, behind Tully’s Seafood Market in Hampton Bays, will not only showcase Rutyna’s cooking talent, but also his lifelong love of the sea. Like a gastronomic purist, Rutyna said the menu’s focus is on simple and delicious seafood.
“I proudly serve Hamptonian cuisine,” said Rutyna, a Hampton Bays native who has also worked in the off-seasons as a commercial fisherman.
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"For a regional cuisine you need great agriculture, wine and seafood, and we have all of those things here on Long Island,” he said.
And for Rutyna, the East End’s long farming and fishing history is central to his love of cooking.
“Clamming and fishing are a long tradition in my family,” said the chef, whose past stints include Southampton’s The Coast Grill. "My aunts, uncles and grandparents would all get together and spend the day catching clams, crabs and lobsters. We would roll out the newspapers on the dock or go to a house and eat the day’s catch. I cherish those memories and it’s what drives the way I cook today.”
Over the last two months, Rutyna has put in long hours refurbishing the restaurant's interior, transforming the once dreary and out-dated décor into a cleanly lighted and classic space.
The dining room now features dark wood floors, white wainscoted walls and nautically themed sconces that make it feel like the inside of a lighthouse.
While refinishing the wood floors and replacing the fixtures, the chef has had time to reflect on his career and the inspiration behind the new business. He said the first dollar he ever made was by catching fish with his grandfather, who was a bayman.
After selling that first catch, he rushed off to the local tackle shop and bought his own fishing rod — It was the start of his lifelong love of fishing.
A descendant of baymen and farmers, Rutyna said he was born with an affinity for the farm and sea.
Aiming to keep TR’s food fresh and local, the menu will change seasonally, barring a few favorites like clam chowder and steamed mussels.
“If all that’s available is fluke and flounder, then I will serve fluke and flounder, but it will be fresh and delicious," he said.
In addition, he said, an occasional wild salmon or swordfish dish will be on the menu.
"But, let's put it this way… there won't be any Chilean sea bass," he said.
A key element in the chef’s cooking arsenal is his grilling technique. Not partial to plopping assorted crustaceans in boiling water, Rutyna said he prefers to cook his lobsters and oysters on a wood burning grill to give them the perfect smoky flavor.
With his liquor license expected in the next two weeks, Rutyna hopes to host the restaurant’s soft opening by mid-May and be in full swing for Memorial Day.