How a Kansas City family keeps this ‘cherished culinary tradition’ going after 70 years
“My sole purpose in life,” Jimmy Cascone said one afternoon last week, “is putting people in chairs.”
He was seated in a chair himself, at a table in the corner of the bar area at Cascone’s Italian Restaurant, which members of his family have operated since 1954. Jimmy was drinking ice water. Sinatra was crooning over the speakers. The dinner rush was a few hours off.
The iconic Northland restaurant (3733 N. Oak Trafficway) had recently been recognized by the Kansas City Council for 70 years in business.
Cascone’s, the council declared in a September resolution, is a “cherished culinary institution … that has not only stood the test of time but also evolved to meet the tastes of Kansas City natives while preserving its rich traditions.”
“(Councilman) Crispin Rea got part of North Oak Trafficway renamed ‘Cascone’s Way’ due to how long we’ve been here,” Jimmy said. “There’s three signs posted along maybe a quarter-mile outside the restaurant. And then they gave us another sign to put in the restaurant.”
These days, Cascone’s is run primarily by three third-generation Cascones: Jimmy, Frank and Lucille.
Frank handles the kitchen. Lucille does the books and accounting. Jimmy is front of house. He touches tables, charms the guests. He sorts out complicated reservations. He’ll deploy what he terms a “phantom wait” — telling a party it’ll be 15 minutes even though the table is ready — if he can see one of his servers is in need of a breather.
“It does no good to seat somebody right away if they’re not going to get waited on properly,” Jimmy said.
Jimmy is nearly exactly as old as the restaurant where he spends his days. “Dad bought the original building up here in May 1954,” he said. “I was born that July.”
But the Cascone’s story dates back even further than that. Using family recipes — the Cascones trace their roots to the southern Italy city of Ragusa — George Cascone started selling Italian steak sandwiches and other dishes near Fifth and Gillis streets in Columbus Park in 1932.
His son, John, took over in the late 1940s after returning from World War II. He renamed the restaurant Cascone’s Band Box and moved it to the River Market. Then John bought the old roadhouse on North Oak Trafficway with his brother Leroy; another brother, Sam, took over in the River Market.
Both John and Leroy died young in the early 1960s. That’s when Frank started running the place up north. Eventually Jimmy, Lucille and some of John’s other children who have since died joined him.
Johnny Cascone’s in Overland Park is run by their deceased brother Larry’s son, John, but is no longer affiliated with the Northland restaurant; Cascone’s Grill, run by Sam’s son George, closed in 2019 in the River Market.
Cascone’s is a red-sauce joint through and through. The kitchen cranks out 40 gallons of sugo every day — they slow-cook the sauce in pork neck bones, a Sicilian tradition. (A marinara sauce, made with chopped tomatoes, garlic and seasoning, is available for vegetarians.) The baked lasagna, chicken limonata and fried chicken are longtime hits on the menu.
“We do just about everything in-house,” Jimmy said. “We have someone who does nothing but make ravioli andcannelloni. We have ladies who come in and make our meatballs. There are very few items that aren’t prepared here.”
The restaurant — a Northland destination for special occasions like rehearsal dinners, bridal showers and anniversary dinners — has a reputation for low turnover among staff. The general manager has been there for 26 years, and several of the original cooks, hired in 1954, worked at Cascone’s till the day they died.
“We take care of our people,” Jimmy said. “If I brought everybody in and asked them how long they’ve been working here, 80% are at least five years, 50% are 10 years and probably 25% are 20 years or more.”
With Frank nearly 80, Jimmy turning 70, and Lucille not far behind, is it getting to be time for Cascone’s to pass the torch to a new generation?
“Frank and Lu and I have played with some ideas,” Jimmy said. “But I don’t like taking much more than a week off. I need to have my finger on the pulse of things. So for now it’s just day-to-day. I tell people I’m doing ‘five to life’ here. But actually I love it. I think we all do. If you don’t love it, you’ve got no business doing this.”
This story was originally published October 3, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
