Cassano’s cuts back, but keeps what it’s known for: Italian specialties

Cassano’s isn’t closing.

But owner Carl Naccarato is cutting back. His iconic corner-store building is for sale. And he’s no longer selling fresh produce and meat or other grocery items – unless they come from Italy.

Naccarato, whose ancestors come from Calabria in southern Italy, is getting back to his roots.

Cassano’s Import Foods always has specialized in cured meats and hard cheeses, offering customers an old-world market feel along with house-made marinara and imported pasta and wine. Now, it’s sticking to those Italian favorites and keeping limited hours, while still operating a lunch counter. Naccarato also is considering moving the shop to a smaller space. He said he’s looking for “a little hole in the wall.”

“This space is just too big,” he said. “It’s 6,000 square feet.”

The Italian grocery opened in 1922 in the 1300 block of East Sprague Avenue, becoming a Spokane institution, especially for the Italian set. At some point, Naccarato said, the building that housed the store “was basically condemned,” and the owners moved the business next door

And it remained there until Naccarato moved Cassano’s to its current location at 2002 E. Mission Ave. in early 2009. The move made sense at the time, but because of it, “to a certain extent, we lost our identity,” Naccarato said.

He bought the mom-and-pop shop about 20 years ago from Elvira Rossi, whose husband, Louis Rossi, took over the store from his stepfather, Mike Cassano. In 1999, when she sold the store to Naccarato, she told The Spokesman-Review, “This place has meant a lot to me. When I went to sign the papers, I changed my mind. I cried and cried so hard. But I can’t handle it all anymore. It’s a lot of work.”

Naccarato, now approaching 70, is starting to feel the same way. But he’s not ready to throw in the soppressata, cannoli, lemon mascarpone cake or house-made take-and-bake lasagna, ravioli or manicotti.

“I’m not really looking to retire,” he said. “I really enjoy this. I really enjoy the customers. I’m just looking for a smaller place.”

He said he wants to keep running Cassano’s “as long as I can. I think it’s important to keep the name alive. It’s a tradition in this town.

“We know most everybody by name that comes in here,” Naccarato said. “On Saturdays, all the Italians come in. They like to talk and visit.”

Naccarato is one of them. He grew up in an Italian neighborhood in Priest River and remembers making special trips to Spokane to buy meats – panchetta, cappocollo, prosciutto, mortadella, salami – and cheeses – Romano pecorino, Parmigiano-Reggiano, caciocavallo, Fontinella, Asiago – at Cassano’s.

The Naccarato clan came from the same place as the Rossis; the villages from which they hailed are neighbors in southern Italy. Grimaldi and Maione sit at the top of the toe of the boot that is Italy.

Rossi, who died in April, continued to work at Cassano’s until it moved to Mission. That building, built in the 1940s, formerly housed a drug store and soda fountain. There were businesses in the basement, too, arranged in a kind of mini-mall. Their vintage storefronts remain intact on the building’s lower level. Upstairs, there are eight apartments. Naccarato keeps one of them.

Tucked behind the store is a commercial kitchen and banquet room, where Naccarato once offered dinners, operating the space as a restaurant. “The dining room did pretty well, but I’m getting too old to do that,” he said.

Cassano’s still serves Italian meals, sandwiches and other items for lunch in a small dining area in the store, but Naccarato said he hasn’t decided if this would continue at a future location.

The former general manager of Spokane’s Ridpath Hotel and Hotel Lusso as well as food and beverage director of the downtown Spokane Doubletree Hotel, Naccarato still does catering, but not as much as he used to. He put the building up for sale about six months ago and phased out the produce and other groceries about four months ago.

“We just kind of downsized,” he said. “I can’t compete, selling tomato soup and canned tuna and peanut butter. It’s getting harder and harder to be a little guy. It’s got to be a labor of love, no doubt about it. You don’t do this for the money.”