On April 30 Café Revò unveiled its new spring menu which includes fresh fish, and risottos and other items to go with fresh vegetables in season. The restaurant, just south of the West Seattle Bridge on Avalon Way, has been open for 14 months.

“We still have all of our old favorites specific to Revò, in Northern Italy where my family is from,” said owner Sofia Zadra Goff. “And my husband, Sean, who opened the restaurant, all of his recipes are still on the menu, too. Half the menu has new items on it. The fresh halibut is in season now and is very Italian.”

As many Revò fans and other area residents know, Sofia’s husband Sean Goff passed away last September 17 at age 43. He was stricken with a fatal cerebral hemorrhage. There was an enormous outpouring of warmth for the beloved chef from the community.

"We are definitely carrying on with what my husband and I originally wanted for the restaurant,” Sofia said. “He got very sick just three months after we opened. He realized his dream before he died, the legacy of what we created together. The tables, drywall we laid, everything in this space we did together so I will always have that, and my children will too.”

Their two children. Maya, 10, and Forrest, 16, attend school in West Seattle.

“They’re doing better,” Sofia said. “They have this place that they know their dad was very proud of, and our staff has been great with them, too.

“With my husband’s death it was a hard period of time and it kind of became a survival mode just getting through that, but now I feel we’re getting back on track with what the whole original plan for this restaurant was.”

She said she is grateful to have a staff that she said “shares the same vision she and Sean did 14 months ago." That includes Matt Melzer, there from the beginning and now the general manger, and new chef, Jennifer Meyer.

“She has been on board for six weeks,” said Sofia. “We took a long time to find someone to be that right fit. Jennifer was chef two years at Bellevue Country Club, and her cooking is a very specific Northern Italian style, keeping the spirit of what my husband wanted in the restaurant. Her fiancé, Adam Spear, is a top chef at Tutta Bella Columbia City. It’s a good family fit.”

Café Revò seats 88 with the bar, and offers a lot of room to do big parties of 50, and they can close the whole restaurant for one large event. Most of the canvas photographs of people and scenery decorating the walls were taken by Sofia, who is also a professional portrait photographer. The food of Revò, Italy has Austrian influences as it is only two hours south of Austria. Café Revò features wines from Northern Italy and Washington and serves Italian frittatas on weekends.

“It’s been a pleasure to have the restaurant next door, and we really look forward to seeing her every time we go in,” said Christina Chew, manager of Ola Salon, one door south, referring to her staff.

“Sofia has always been warm and lovely, and has been a trooper through everything , and we look forward to being next door neighbors for years to come,” Chew said.

“My dad’s mother was from Italy,” said Sofia. “She always set an extra chair at the table in case someone showed up. She just treated them like a cousin, like family, no matter who they were.

“We have customers who come in who feel like family and they have been very supported,” she said. “My dad refers to West Seattle as ‘our little Revò.’ I feel that same devotion to West Seattle. Sean lived in West Seattle for 24 years so he didn’t want to put the restaurant anywhere else but here.”
You can reach Cafe Revo at (206) 938-0592.