Tag archives: Mollie Ahlstrand
After nearly 30 years, the mudslide of 2018 put an end to her elegant Trattoria Mollie on Coast Village Road. She opened a new Mollie’s next to the Granada on State Street, but COVID-19 crushed that endeavor too. Armed conflict broke out in the Tigray region of Ethiopia in 2020 and the country is now […]
In last week’s edition, we told you about Bettina’s plans to open a new location in Carpinteria. This week, word on the street is that Chef Mollie Ahlstrand, formerly of Trattoria Mollie on Coast Village Road and then on State Street, is opening an Italian market/deli on Casitas Pass Road, in the same shopping center […]
I’ve known Mollie Ahlstrand for more than 30 years. Her high-end Italian restaurant on Coast Village Road was there for more than 25 of those years. But, the fires, the floods, the debris flow, and other disasters took their toll and she moved her place to Santa Barbara three years ago, only to run into […]
I’ve often extolled Mollie Ahlstrand’s food. She’s the owner/chef of Mollie’s on State, formerly Mollie’s Ristorante on Coast Village Road. In recent months, she has had her challenges. Upon closing her Coast Village Road eatery (after a 25-year run), for example, she and her son, Ali Ahlstrand, opened Mollie’s on State. Then, of course, the […]
She’s been the toast of the town, friend of Oprah and Ellen, been to the White House with President Obama. Her list of notable customers ranges from Katy Perry, the aforementioned Ms Winfrey and Ms DeGeneres, Kirk and Anne Douglas, and, well let’s put it this way: they didn’t come for the publicity; they came […]
Just ten months after opening their new State Street outpost, Mollie’s, next to the Granada theatre in the former Tupelo Junction space, culinary dynamic duo Mollie Ahlstrand and her son, Ali, have launched another eatery, Alito’s, further downtown on the busy thoroughfare. However, unlike their former nosheteria on Coast Village Road which closed in August, […]
World-renowned presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times bestselling author Doris Kearns Goodwin packed the Granada when she spoke about Leadership in Turbulent Times, the title of her seventh book published last year. The tome is a culmination of Goodwin’s five-decade career of studying American presidents focusing on Abraham Lincoln, Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt, […]
Carlitos Cafe y Cantina, the popular State Street eatery, a tiara’s toss from the Arlington Theatre, is celebrating its 40th anniversary next month. The Mexican restaurant, owned by Montecito residents Carlos and Leslie Lopez-Hollis, is one of the longest-reigning businesses on the ritzy rue. “We saw great potential with the location and knew we could […]
Major social gridlock took place when Montecito dynamic duo Mollie Ahlstrand and her son, Ali, opened their new Italian hotspot Mollie’s, the State Street eatery just a tiara’s toss from the venerable Granada. The tony twosome have long run their popular nosheteria Trattoria Mollie, on Coast Village Road, whose lease is up in the New […]
Okay, okay. Yes, most other media have already reported that Mollie Ahlstrand of Trattoria Mollie on Coast Village Road was planning to open a location on State Street next to the Granada, a space previously occupied by the once popular Tupelo Junction. Can I just tell you that I knew about this a couple months […]
If you are a regular reader of Montecito Journal, it won’t come as a surprise to learn that Trattoria Mollie is just about my favorite restaurant. And, there are at least three solid reasons for such devotion: 1) Mollie’s lasagna, featuring her hand-made pasta and a delicate cream-based tomato sauce reigns supreme; 2) Spaghetti with […]
