Pasta House owner Alex Dziuba said he is waiting for important kitchen equipment to be delivered and installed before he can reopen the Arnold restaurant.
The restaurant, 921 Arnold Commons Drive, has been closed since March 14, 2025, when it was nearly destroyed by a tornado.
“I really can’t tell you a date,” Dziuba said on Jan. 7 about reopening. “The piece of equipment we are waiting on is being fabricated in north St. Louis. They said they are going to throw overtime at it, but I don’t know how much overtime that means.
“Hopefully, we may reopen in February, but I am just guessing,” he said.
The equipment needed to reopen is the cooks’ service line, which Dziuba described as the heart of the kitchen.
“It has 12 refrigerated drawers, and the heat lamps to keep the food hot after the food is prepared,” he said. “It is a lot of work to build it, and I don’t have a clue where they are at.”
Dziuba said it may take up to two weeks to install the service line after it is delivered because of all the plumbing, electric and refrigeration that must be hooked up.
“It is connected to compressors on the roof,” he said. “There is a lot of electrical that goes into it. It is a lot of work and a lot of stuff. If it was already sitting in the kitchen, it would be a lot easier for me to tell you when we are opening. This is a big unknown, and there is nothing we can do until it is installed.”
The tornado that went through Jefferson County last year was one of 12 detected from late afternoon March 14 through just after midnight on March 15 in the greater St. Louis area, according to the National Weather Service.
Dziuba said the restaurant closed early March 14, and no customers were in the building when the tornado came through Arnold. However, he said a manager and four employees were unable to leave until after the tornado left the area.
He said the building had to be completely gutted, about 90 percent of the equipment had to be replaced, and new walls and flooring had to be put into the building.
Dziuba said the restaurant restoration work looks good, and he is eager to open again.
“The tornado hit us on March 14, and if you would have asked back then if it would take this long to reopen, I would never had guessed it,” he said. “When you are in the restaurant business, you get tired of looking at construction all of the time. That is not our business.
“Everyone wants to get back to the work that we know, serving customers. You miss that type of work, where you get to say hi to people and you have certain customers who you see all the time.”
Dziuba said he also is waiting for booths to be delivered for the dining area. However, he said if the kitchen is completed before the booths arrive, the restaurant could reopen before the booths are ready.
“We can use regular chairs for the tables where the booths would normally be,” he said. “We will open somehow as long as the kitchen is ready to go. We have our fingers crossed.”