Marco Venditti has vivid memories of spending time with his mother and grandmother as a child in Sora, Italy, watching them make fresh pasta and dipping homemade bread into a pot of simmering tomato sauce. He carried that love of food and cooking with him as an adult, opening restaurants with his brother, who still owns a trattoria, Da Giuliano, in Sora.

But he decided to come to the United States as a young man, looking for more opportunities. As a husband and father, he decided not to pursue the restaurant route right away, knowing it would be difficult to handle the long, late hours while raising a family.