Baltimore's Ouzo Bay and Fort Lauderdale's Louie Bossi's Ristorante Coming to Boca Raton This Year

If you love Mediterranean and Italian, you're in luck: both cuisines are coming to Boca Raton later this year with the addition of two new restaurants, Maryland-based Ouzo Bay and Big Time Restaurant Group's Louie Bossi's Ristorante.

By now it's no secret that New York's Junior's Restaurant is coming to Mizner Park, but the shopping center will also welcome a popular Maryland-based restaurant known as Ouzo Bay.

Maryland-based Atlas Restaurant Group announced it will be opening an offshoot of its Baltimore-based concept specializing in contemporary Mediterranean and Greek cuisine later this summer in the former Jazziz Nightlife located at 201 Plaza Real in Boca Raton's Mizner Park. The new 325-seat establishment has been designed to offer extensive outdoor seating, as well as a 30-seat private cigar lounge and an upscale bar atmosphere. 

The Ouzo Bay team — Atlas Restaurant Group founders Alex Smith and George Aligeorgas — opened the first Ouzo Bay in Baltimore's Harbor East in 2013, at the time a highly anticipated addition to the center's collection of upscale eateries. When it opens, the Boca Raton location will be the latest addition to the restaurant group's growing list of high-end establishments, as well as its first restaurant outside Baltimore.

Ouzo Bay's Mediterranean menu will emphasize fresh seafood that is responsibly sourced from around the world. Like its Baltimore counterpart, expect the Boca Raton Ouzo Bay menu to feature a number of luxury seafood items flown-in fresh, including Dover sole (wild-caught and flown in fresh from the Netherlands) and langoustines (a lobster from the Norwegian Sea) cooked and served with the head and tail still. Rotating daily offerings will also include everything from black sea bass and bronzino, to red snapper and dorade — a white-fleshed fish from the Mediterranean. To complement the seafood menu, Ouzo Bay will also have an extensive selection of fine-quality cuts of grass fed lamb, prime beef, and organic chicken. 

"With Ouzo Bay Boca Raton, we will continue to bring our customers the finest quality ingredients from the Mediterranean," says Smith. "We feel that Mizner Park and Boca Raton will be a perfect fit [us]."

Also coming to Boca Raton later this year will be a second location for Louie Bossi's Ristorante, the modern American-Italian concept that debuted last July in Fort Lauderdale.

"After opening Louie Bossi's in Fort Lauderdale last summer, it quickly became very apparent we had something special on our hands," said Big Time Restaurant Group partner Todd Herbst. "We knew immediately that we wanted to do a second location. We just needed to find the right location."

According to Herbst, the new 8,000-square-foot restaurant will have the same look and feel as the flagship Las Olas establishment, including a wood-burning brick oven, in-house charcuterie program and salumi bar, and an expansive 2,000-square-foot wrap-around, indoor/outdoor bar and patio area complete with a bocci ball court and lounge seating.

The Boca Raton restaurant could be open as early as September 2016, added Herbst, located at the southeast corner of Federal Highway and Palmetto Park Road as part of the new Hyatt Place building. 

"We love Boca Raton," says Herbst. "It's the perfect market for this concept, and we feel Louie Bossi's will be a great fit for the community and a compliment to all the improvements happening in the area."

Nicole Danna is a food writer covering Broward and Palm Beach counties. To get the latest in food and drink news in South Florida, follow her @SoFloNicole or find her latest food pics on the BPB New Times Food & Drink Instagram.