El Cerrito Mayor Lisa Motoyama and Dulanthi "Dolly" Batathota at the grand opening of Dolly's Tavern, a new Italian wine bar in El Cerrito. (Courtesy Suragani Batathota)
Fifteen years after moving to the U.S. from Sri Lanka, Dulanthi Batathota — known to friends and family as Dolly — recently opened her own business: Dolly’s Tavern, an Italian wine and beer bar in El Cerrito. The new hot spot also offers appetizers, desserts and heartier fare like meatballs.
Batathota moved to the U.S. in 2008 from Sri Lanka and first started working at Milano, an Italian restaurant in Tiburon. Milano’s restaurant owner mentored her as she worked her way up from wait staff to bartender and ultimately the restaurant manager.
“Everything I know is from Milano’s,” she says.
Dolly’s Tavern offers a wide selection of wine, plus a menu that ranges from salads to charcuterie, limoncello sorbet and chocolate mousse. Many items are imported from Italy, and she hopes to add pasta to the menu soon, she says.
Over the past year or so she’s spent working to open the restaurant, she says, she’s received widespread support from community members, her former Milano coworkers and family.
“El Cerrito is a little gem,” she says, “hidden close to San Francisco Bay.”
Details: Open daily from 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. at 10172 San Pablo Ave. in El Cerrito; dollystavern.com.
Originally published at Kate Bradshaw