For a decade, a small Italian restaurant on McKenzie Street built a loyal following in downtown Foley. Then, without warning, its previous owner shut the doors. Today Portabella’s in Foley is open again under Chef Rich Lee and his wife, Pam, a husband-and-wife team who took over the restaurant in June 2023 and have spent the time since building on the reputation it already had, adding a few touches of their own along the way.
The couple call their approach “Italia-Bama,” a phrase they coined to describe the place where Italian flavors meet Southern hospitality. It is a fitting label for a restaurant run by a chef who learned his trade on ships and in some of New Orleans’ most famous dining rooms, and a partner who spent 35 years in mortgage banking before deciding it was time to work alongside her husband.
From the Coast Guard to Canal Street
Rich Lee’s path to Foley began right after high school, when he joined the U.S. Coast Guard. Going to sea set him on a long career in food service that took him to ports around the world. After the Coast Guard, he cooked with the Merchant Marines, preparing meals for crews and training other cooks, and later worked with Sodexo, the international food services company, where training chefs was again part of his job.
He eventually landed in New Orleans, where he ran busy kitchens at several of the city’s flagship restaurants, including Antoine’s, Brennan’s and Palace Café. Those names carry weight in Southern dining. Antoine’s, in the French Quarter, dates to 1840 and is widely known as one of the oldest family-run restaurants in the country. Brennan’s, on Royal Street, is famous for its breakfast tradition and as the birthplace of Bananas Foster. Palace Café, on Canal Street, is one of the Brennan family’s contemporary Creole restaurants. Working in kitchens of that caliber means high volume, exacting standards and a deep familiarity with the flavors that define Gulf Coast cooking.
Rich is originally from South Carolina. Pam is a New Orleans native, and her love of cooking ran alongside her long banking career. When the two eventually went looking for a business they could run together, they had a rare combination: a chef with decades of professional kitchen experience and a partner with a strong grasp of finance and a genuine passion for food.
How an Old Friendship Led to Foley
The couple’s connection to Foley came through one of Rich’s old Coast Guard friends. About 12 years ago, Rich reconnected with Tyler Higginbotham, who owns 5 Star Air Conditioning. Over the years Rich and Pam enjoyed visiting Tyler and his wife, Cindy, and on some of those trips they ate at Portabella’s.
The timing that followed felt providential to the couple. “Pam had just quit her job, and we prayed and said, ‘Lord, give us a way to work together,'” Rich says. “That week, I was talking to Tyler and he mentioned that he was so bummed that this restaurant had closed out of the blue.”
Rich and Pam drove to Foley to look at the situation, and they closed the deal within about a month and a half. For Rich, the size of the place was part of its appeal. “We wanted to start somewhere small, and this is perfect,” he says. “I just knew that all I would need was a little bit of money and a partner to do it.”
A Cozy Room With a Familiar Menu
Portabella’s is not a sprawling dining hall. With just 12 tables, the restaurant is cozy, casual and quaint. It occupies a low-slung cinder block storefront on the east side of McKenzie Street, a couple of blocks south of downtown Foley’s main intersection. The restaurant opens at 3 p.m., and on a good day diners start arriving right at opening and keep coming until closing, five or six hours later depending on the night.
Despite Rich’s training in sophisticated flavors and techniques, the menu is designed to be approachable rather than intimidating. The new owners took an “ain’t-broke-don’t-fix-it” approach and changed very little from what the previous owner served.
“It had a great reputation already as a local Italian neighborhood restaurant,” Pam says. “We wanted to carry on that tradition and just take it to another level, and I think we have. We call it Italia-Bama. We coined that phrase because it’s where Italian flavors meet Southern hospitality.”
The couple’s influence shows up in the details. Pam pushed for gluten-free options, giving diners with dietary restrictions more choices. Rich channels his creativity into nightly specials, which have become popular with regulars. The dining room itself got a warmer feel, with framed mirrors, paintings and a trellis-style archway just inside the entrance. An experienced kitchen crew and a knowledgeable waitstaff round out the operation.
A Main Street Grant and Plans to Grow
The couple’s energy has not gone unnoticed in town. Foley Main Street, the city’s downtown revitalization program, recently awarded Rich and Pam a $10,000 grant, which they plan to use to upgrade the restaurant’s furnishings. As a result, they will compete at the statewide level for additional Main Street grant funds.
Foley Main Street is part of Main Street Alabama, the statewide program affiliated with the national Main Street America network. The Main Street approach, which grew out of historic preservation efforts in the late 1970s and 1980s, focuses on strengthening traditional downtowns by supporting small businesses, preserving historic buildings, promoting local events and improving the look and feel of commercial districts. Grants to individual businesses are one of the tools local programs use to encourage owners to invest in their storefronts and interiors.
The application process required a short pitch. “We did a three-minute video pitch about what we are all about, what we would use the money for and how we think it would help our business,” Pam says. “Evidently they really enjoyed our personalities and the message,” Rich adds.
Other plans are already taking shape. The couple converted a 1,200-square-foot space at the rear of the building, the same size as the main dining room, into Bella’s Too, a private dining room that will be available to rent for private events. They are also talking about expanding across the region by franchising the Portabella’s concept.
“We feel like our recipes are easy to make, and the ingredients can be acquired anywhere, and we have the business model prepared, so anyone could easily come in and start running a restaurant,” Pam says.
Caroling in Heritage Park and a Singing Chef
The Lees’ ambitions reach beyond the restaurant’s walls. This past holiday season they started a public caroling event at Heritage Park in downtown Foley, and they hope to build on it. The idea was inspired by the annual Christmas sing-alongs in New Orleans’ Jackson Square, a beloved tradition they have enjoyed for many years. The Jackson Square caroling event, held each December in front of St. Louis Cathedral, draws thousands of people with candles and song sheets, and it is easy to see why a New Orleans native and a former French Quarter chef would want to bring something similar to their new hometown.
Singing is a shared passion for the couple, and it spills into the dining room. Diners should not be surprised if the chef steps out of the kitchen once the orders are caught up and breaks into song. He is known for serenading guests with an Italian version of “Happy Birthday” and for crooning sentimental favorites like “Pennies from Heaven” in a style that recalls Frank Sinatra.
Pam has so far kept her own singing to karaoke, but she is warming to the idea of a dining room duet. “I haven’t joined him yet,” she says, “but I will.”
Foley’s Growing Downtown Dining Scene
Portabella’s sits in a city that has changed considerably over the past century. Foley was founded in the early 1900s and incorporated in 1915, taking its name from John B. Foley, a Chicago businessman who bought large tracts of land in south Baldwin County and helped bring the railroad to the area. For decades the city was known as an agricultural center, surrounded by farms growing potatoes, cotton and other crops, and the historic railroad depot downtown now serves as a museum that tells part of that story.
Today Foley is one of the fastest-growing cities in Baldwin County. Its location along Highway 59, the main route to Gulf Shores, has made it a gateway for beach traffic, and the city has added major attractions and sports tourism venues in recent years. Downtown, the city has worked to keep its historic core lively with parks, public art, festivals and locally owned shops and restaurants, the kind of environment the Main Street program is designed to support.
Small, independent restaurants like Portabella’s play an outsized role in that effort. They give residents a reason to come downtown in the evening, give visitors a taste of something beyond the chain restaurants along the highway corridors, and often become gathering places where neighbors run into one another.
What Diners Should Know
- Location: Portabella’s is on the east side of McKenzie Street, a couple of blocks south of downtown Foley’s main intersection.
- Hours: The restaurant opens at 3 p.m. and typically stays open five to six hours depending on the night. Diners should check with the restaurant for current hours before visiting.
- Size: With only 12 tables, the dining room is small, so busy nights can fill up.
- Menu: Expect a neighborhood Italian menu largely carried over from the previous owner, gluten-free options and rotating nightly specials from the chef.
- Private events: Bella’s Too, a private dining room at the rear of the building, is available to rent for private gatherings.
For Rich and Pam Lee, the restaurant is the answer to a prayer for a way to work together. For Foley, it is the return of a neighborhood favorite, with a Coast Guard veteran and former New Orleans chef at the stove and, on a good night, a song or two to go with dinner.