A mother and son team that operated a food truck for two years will turn the seasonal business into a year-round brick-and-mortar restaurant in Old Town this week.
Nanny’s is slated to open Tuesday and will serve classic breakfast fare and lunch, including burgers, hot dogs, chicken tenders and a few different sandwiches. Gifford’s ice cream, milkshakes and dough boys will be available for dessert.
The restaurant opening at 241 Main St. in Old Town will bring new life to a downtown building that has been vacant since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The city bought the building in 2022 in an effort to reinvent itself and attract new businesses as it recovered from a large fire in September 2019.
Although the building housing Nanny’s was not damaged in the massive blaze, several buildings in the heart of downtown were devastated.
James Reinzo, who owns Nanny’s with his mother, Joan Reinzo, has invested about $50,000 in renovations and is in the process of buying the building from Old Town, he said.
“My father passed almost four years ago, and I promised him that I would keep my mom happy,” he said. “She loves being around people and talking, and now she’ll be able to do that.”
Nanny is what Reinzo’s father used to lovingly call his mother, so in a way, this business honors him, Reinzo said.
Joan Reinzo ran a food truck, called Nanny’s Takeout, from 2021 to 2023, but the family decided to sell the two connected trucks because the business could not operate in the winter, her son said. It is using those funds to invest in the Old Town building.
The new business gives area residents another option for breakfast other than Governor’s Restaurant & Bakery and doughnut shop Meme G’s. Reinzo is particularly excited to offer a breakfast buffet from 7 to 10:30 a.m. Tuesday through Friday, but individual items are also available to order, he said.
The breakfast menu will features eight specials for $10 each, including one with a breakfast burrito and hash browns or home fries and another with pancakes and a protein. The breakfast buffet is $15.
For lunch, baskets with a burger, sausage grinder, grilled cheese, among other options, will be available. The baskets, which are from $10.50 to $15, include a drink, fries and a choice of potato salad, coleslaw or baked beans.
“Everything is homemade,” Reinzo said, noting he expects dough boys will be a hot item because they’re hard to find at local eateries.
Customers will order at a window, and their food will be served to them either inside or outside, where seating will become available when the weather warms up.
Reinzo has hired a manager to run the restaurant, along with four kitchen and waiting staff members. His mother will also help out in the kitchen.
Reinzo, who lives in the unorganized territory of Greenfield, owns and operates Sunset Development Inc., a contracting business that his father started in 1974. He also owns Sunset Transportation, which buses students to Dr. Lewis S. Libby School in Milford, he said.
He hopes to send buses to area housing complexes that serve elderly and disabled residents, so people without their own transportation can eat at the restaurant, he said. That includes Sarah Springs Manor on Indian Island, along with Penobscot River House and three properties overseen by the Housing Authority of the City of Old Town.
Nanny’s will be open from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Friday. Reinzo wants to offer the transportation service once a day if there is enough interest, though a schedule has not yet been set, he said.
“Our end goal is to be open all week,” he said. “We want to give people a place to come on the weekend, but we need to get our feet wet and succeed.”
