WATERVILLE — The City of Waterville will soon welcome a new Lebanese restaurant.

MEZZA’s head chef, Tom Nale, served as Waterville’s mayor in the 1980s and was a district court judge for decades.

As the grandchild of Lebanese immigrants, he’ll keep family recipes alive at MEZZA.

“My grandfather, in the house that he owned, he had a brick oven, and he baked Syrian bread, as they called it at the time, for the entire neighborhood. So that means an awful lot to me, and to my brothers and sister,” Nale reflected.

Located at 34 Temple St. in Waterville, the site is close to Nale’s childhood home — and, he remarked, “around 150 yards” from where his grandparents landed when they arrived from Lebanon. 

MEZZA is named after the Arabic word for “small plates,” as the eatery intends to mostly serve traditionally smaller portions.

It’s not just the dishes that are rich in history, as the restaurant’s physical space was once the site of the Lebanese Bakery, a place Nale frequented.

After the bakery’s owner, Laya Joseph, passed away in January, her family chose to cease operations.

For Nale, this meant it was his turn to provide traditional Lebanese food to Waterville — and, after making plans with chefs Jim Veilleux and Melissa Grant, MEZZA was born.

Waterville patrons got to try a taste of the new cuisine at their third soft opening event on Saturday, and the eatery’s owners say they sold out in less than an hour.

“It was a great experience, and watching all the people come in and serving to them was fantastic, seeing how excited they were for the style of food,” said Melissa Grant, who co-owns the restaurant alongside Veilleux.

“The fact of creating that concept…not just being another restaurant, but to be part of the community,” Veilleux stated, regarding what helping open MEZZA means to him. 

MEZZA is set to open in June.