The pace of new restaurants and bars around Capitol Hill has, unsurprisingly, slowed. A pandemic and a cooling economy will do that. Previous heights were also tough to sustain — 38 new joints opened on the Hill in 2015, many of them new buildouts in a wave of new construction around the neighborhood.
The rate has dropped seven years later. And many of the new spaces are smaller, more efficient, simpler, and recycled — we like Korn Dog as the perfect representation of the wonderful and teensy tinier new world of Capitol Hill food and drink.
New on 12th Ave, MariPili dips its toes into both worlds, recycling the space of a departed Capitol Hill classic while scaling up to some of the loftier heights of restaurant ambitions. We’ve told you how first time restaurateur chef Grayson Pilar Corrales has shaped her menu of Galician tapas with the spirit of her family’s recipes. Here is how she is trying to reach 2015 Hill-era ambitions in 2022.
“We have had a challenging time finding staff,” Corrales said, talking with CHS a few weeks back. “Just getting anyone in for an interview can be an ordeal. Getting people who can be experienced and positive who will meld well with the team has been key.”
Re-toned in the blues and whites of northwestern Spain and overhauled with a new ceiling, new floors, and natural wood, Cafe Presse’s old bar was reborn in May, now a full-fledged tapas bar.
Currently keeping Thursday through Sunday, 5 PM to “close” hours, Corrales is one of the few food and drink entrepreneurs to take on launching a fully staffed, fine dining establishment in these uncertain and challenging times.
Her first goal at MariPili, she said, was to build “a small amazing core crew.”
Building on her own experience in Seattle kitchens, Corrales said building a “positive culture” and “making sure my employed people have what they need” is more important than overextending for extra days or hours of business.
She said being bold enough to open when others are staying on the sidelines also has given MariPili an advantage. Being one of the few bright lights has drawn some of the best available talent in the neighborhood and the city, Corrales said.
She has also been intentional in giving the people drawn to MariPili good roles. An experienced pastry chef, Corrales said she could have “written a pastry menu and told them to do it.” Instead, she hired a more expensive but talented pastry chef for the restaurant.
“They crush everything they do,” Corrales said.
The rare opportunity to be part of MariPili also helps young chef/owner with her hiring philosophy — it’s better to scale back plans and pass on someone who might not work out than add somebody who isn’t a perfect fit.
“We do run into the people who aren’t committed to the culture or who are thinking it is just a job, she said. “We’d rather hold back capacity.”
Holding back and keeping more limited hours to start is also enabled by MariPili’s budgeting. Corrales said she planned for a more limited opening and held back money and financing to help make sure the new restaurant’s opening not only didn’t break the bank — it didn’t break her and her crew.
Still, the excitement of the launch has been exhausting. “Everyone is at a brand new job right now,” Corrales said.
Part of making MariPili work has also included a key secret ingredient: Corrales has also been busy in the kitchen. For the starting weeks, Corrales took on the job of “expo” or expeditor, a key intermediate role that organizes finished dishes, trays them up, and makes sure they make it to the right table at the right time.
It hasn’t given her much time to float around the kitchen or the rest of MariPili.
Exhausted with the rest of the crew, she knows things are working when she hears her servers talking about “a dining room full of happy people.”
MariPili is open at 1117 12th Ave. Learn more at maripili-tapas-bar.com.
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