Italian restaurant Giardino comes to Missionary Ridge in Chattanooga

Jake Leonard and Oscar Ixcot have spent years working in the restaurant business locally and when the opportunity to open their own place on Missionary Ridge on Westside Drive came up, they jumped at the chance.

The two met at Il Primo with Leonard, who has also worked at St. John’s and Easy Bistro, working the front of the house and Ixcot cooking in the back. That dynamic will continue at Giardino with the addition of Leonard’s wife, Nikki Pruitt handling bar duties and Ixcot’s brother, Adrian, joining him in the kitchen.

Leonard said the two had some discussion, though fairly brief, over how the menu should look.

“I love Italian wine,” he said. “It has become my strength and Oscar has being cooking Italian dishes for years, so we said let’s do Italian. Oscar felt like this would be a great place to cook the dishes he’s been cooking up.”