Restaurant Dei Frati

Dei Frati is, as you can tell from the Italian name, a restaurant opened by two brothers from Brasov who, at the time, had spent more than ten years in the kitchens of the peninsula. The two returned home in 2015 to open a small family business, a restaurant focused on Italian-style pasta dishes, which grew beyond their expectations.

“We opened Dei Frati restaurant in 2015. I had already been working in Italy for 10 years, and my brother for 13. His current wife was working with us and we decided to return home and open a small business together with what we learned in the kitchens in Italy and which would ensure our income without the need to work away from home, because none of us wanted to settle abroad”, stated Alex Năpar, co-founder of Dei Frati .

He says that his parents also worked their entire lives in the HoReCa field in Brasov, at a very high level, which provided them with important help in their project.

One of the biggest difficulties for the two restaurant bosses was the question of funds. Alex Năpar had to stay in Italy for a while and send money to his older brother, who was in charge of opening the business in Brașov. So the beginning was not easy at all, and the family faced, among other problems, discouragement from relatives, friends who insisted on the idea that such a small restaurant, as Dei Frați was at the beginning, would not be enough for to ensure the financial needs of the whole family.
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But the food that the two Romanians were preparing “caught on”, especially since it was something new and, little by little, the restaurant began to grow, and the next step for the founders of Dei Frati was to return to Italy. This time not to work, but to do more specialization courses.

The small business, which started with family members and a few employees, has become a big business, even if it was not originally intended. Compared to 2015, the restaurant currently has 40 employees.

“We were very involved in making the business work, actually sitting in the restaurant all day. Me and my brother in the kitchen, and the wives in the hall, at reception and serving. This was probably also the advantage, the fact that I was always close to the guests and could directly receive their opinions, both positive and critical. We were able to learn from them and from their direct requests, related to what ingredients to add and what to modify,” said Năpar.