Pastaria Vivi Brings Handmade Pasta Market Concept to Encinitas

Encinitas now has a chef-led pasta stop that works as a market, a lunch counter and a take-home dinner fix all at once. Pastaria Vivi opened earlier this month in the Encinitas Village Shopping Center near Trader Joe’s, giving North County a new place for handmade pasta, Northern Italian sauces and specialty pantry staples in a format built for both quick pickups and a lingering meal.

The shop is at 119 N. El Camino Real, Suite G, Encinitas, CA 92024, and the Encinitas Chamber of Commerce lists hours of Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from noon to 5 p.m. The chamber says the team makes fresh pasta and sauces in small batches each morning, a detail that fits the store’s pitch as a neighborhood source for chef-crafted food instead of a standard sit-down restaurant.

The concept grew out of a long kitchen connection between Brandon Jennings and William Treff, who first met while working at No. 9 Park in Boston. Treff is a Culinary Institute of America graduate with experience under the Barbara Lynch Group and at Lazy Bear in San Francisco, while Jennings worked with Tao Group Hospitality in London, Singapore and Los Angeles before later becoming executive chef at Mille Fleurs in Rancho Santa Fe. Chef Harrison Axelrod is also part of the founding team, adding Michelin-recognized kitchen experience to a project that the founders tested at Cardiff Farmers Market before opening the brick-and-mortar shop.

Pastaria Vivi’s setup is meant to serve more than one kind of customer. The room includes a pasta bar, a communal table and an outdoor patio, with the broader concept built around retail and casual dining rather than a formal restaurant alone. Jennings said he wanted customers to be able to get pasta and sauce for not much more than $10 per person, a price point that gives the opening immediate relevance for weeknight cooking and easy local shopping.

The menu centers on fresh, handmade pasta and sauces, while the retail side adds imported Italian pantry items, artisan goods and ceramics. Fox 5/KUSI reported that the shop is also the exclusive retail home of Aisu Creamery gelato, created by Makoto Chino of Chino Farm in Rancho Santa Fe. Plans also include pasta-making classes, tastings, community events, a monthly Vivi Pasta Box subscription and an in-house grain milling room by 2027, setting Pastaria Vivi up as a specialized Encinitas food destination with room to grow.