Tickled Purple

By Naperville Magazine
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The Purple Pig is coming to Oak Brook

By Phil Vettel

One of the most eagerly anticipated restaurants of the year—well, it will be, now that you’re hearing about it for the first time—is the upcoming opening of The Purple Pig in Oak Brook.

You will wait months for this opening. It will be worth it. For the uninitiated, Purple Pig made its debut on Chicago’s Michigan Avenue back in 2009, by partners Jimmy and Jimmy Jr. Bannos and Tony Mantuano (of four-star Spiaggia fame). Featuring small and medium plates, heavy on proteins (charcuterie included) but offering plenty of seafood and vegetable dishes, Purple Pig became an instant popular and critical hit and is still doing gangbuster business more than 15 years later.

The Bannos boys are long gone, but Mantuano, after several years down in Nashville, is back, consulting on the Michigan Avenue restaurant while working on the new location. “We signed the lease,” Mantuano says. “We’ll be opening hopefully by the end of the year. It’s really challenging now lining up the right designer, the right subcontractors—and ordering furniture, when tariffs raise the costs 15 to 20 percent.” 

Purple Pig has taken over the Oakbrook Center space previously home to the Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams furniture showroom. The kitchen, Mantuano says, is complete, but considerable electric and plumbing work will be needed to make the space restaurant-compliant.

But Mantuano likes the space. “It’s 11,000 square feet,” he says, “so it’ll be a two-in-one, with the restaurant in back and a Purple Pig Market, you walk through, in front. The Market will have coffee, pastries, pizza by the slice, and gelato. There will be seating in the market, and an outdoor patio. It’s something that’s never been done in this area.”

Foodies of a certain age might remember Bar Toma, Mantuano’s casual pizza-and-gelato space on Pearson Street. What Mantuano is planning is essentially a Bar Toma in front, Purple Pig in back (though he won’t use the Bar Toma name).

“It should be a lot of fun,” Mantuano says. “We’re bringing in a lot of talent and already getting inquiries from other people. I hope to get Noelle Marchetti [the pastry chef at Yolan, Mantuano’s Nashville restaurant] to set up our pastries. Cathy [writer and wine expert, and also Tony’s wife] will handle the wine and service training.”

Can’t wait. But you’ll have to.

Photo: Courtesy of The Purple Pig