KuFù, a bistro focused on Sicilian-Asian cuisine that had been operating in Modica for nearly nine years, closed in July 2026. The chef and owner of the establishment, Luca Stracquadanio, has not distanced himself from the kitchen after the restaurant's closure; this season he is working as a guest chef alongside resident chef Giovanni Cortese at Terrazza Panorama Roof Kitchen, which operates within Mercato del Porto in Marina di Ragusa.

Speaking to Gambero Rosso, Stracquadanio mentions that if he were to invest again in the future, he is considering smaller, informal, and lower management cost establishments. Examples he gives include a fish shop-like concept with self-service tables or simpler restaurants that could be established just outside major city centers.

This statement opens up a broader discussion about restaurant management: Is it possible to reduce service, space, and personnel costs while maintaining quality?

KuFù was not fine dining; the discussion is actually broader

Stracquadanio's assessment that “fine dining is in crisis” stands out in Gambero Rosso. However, it would not be accurate to classify KuFù directly as a fine dining restaurant.

Gambero Rosso's past Modica guide described the establishment as a bistro that combines the Japanese izakaya atmosphere with Sicilian ingredients. The menu changes based on daily produce; udon, Japanese and Asian techniques met Sicilian products in the same culinary language.

Therefore, interpreting KuFù's closure as the “collapse of fine dining” would be too broad a conclusion.

A more meaningful question is: How sustainable are independent restaurants' service and labor-intensive business models in today's cost structure?

Stracquadanio's search for a model that requires smaller spaces, informal service, and less labor directly highlights this discussion.

Italy's data shows the pressure is not just one chef's opinion

The Rapporto Ristorazione 2026 published by FIPE-Confcommercio in April 2026 does not indicate that the sector has completely contracted; however, it points to significant structural issues.

In 2025, Italy's restaurant sector's total consumption reached approximately 100 billion euros, while real growth remained at only 0.5 percent. The number of restaurants and mobile catering businesses decreased by 0.4 percent compared to the previous year; the decline across all foodservice businesses was 1 percent.

A more striking indicator is business mobility.

According to FIPE data, throughout 2025, 10,062 new businesses opened in the restaurant sector while 25,239 businesses ceased operations. The net difference corresponds to more than 15,000 businesses. Approximately 60 percent of the closures were concentrated in Northwestern Italy and the southern regions of the country.

There is also ongoing pressure on the employee side. The number of paid employees in the sector decreased by 10.3 percent in 2025; according to FIPE, about half of the businesses are struggling to find the personnel they need.

In contrast, demand has not completely disappeared. In Unioncamere's July 2026 forecast, accommodation, restaurant, and tourism services continued to be among the strongest hiring areas in the service sector, with approximately 138,000 new job entries planned for July alone.

When these two data points are read together, it becomes clear that the sector's fundamental problem is more complex than the statement “there are no customers”: businesses are still looking for employees, but finding, retaining, and efficiently employing staff within the existing turnover is becoming increasingly difficult.

“Less staff” is not a solution on its own

Stracquadanio's ideas about self-service or more informal formats could theoretically reduce the need for service staff.

However, reducing the number of waiters in a business does not mean that the total labor burden decreases at the same rate.

In a self-service model, the way customers place orders and receive products changes. In return, kitchen preparation, dishwashing, cleaning, stock acceptance, production, cash management, and customer flow management continue.

If the concept is not designed correctly, costs can be shifted to another point.

For example, a self-service establishment where customers wait a long time at the cash register, table cleaning is slow, or the kitchen is trying to produce too many different products at once may have lower service capacity rather than being more efficient with fewer employees.

Therefore, the lean restaurant model should not be designed solely as “reducing waitstaff.”

The number of SKUs on the menu, preparation steps, table turnover rate, order channels, and kitchen layout must all be simplified simultaneously.

Terrazza Panorama offers a different working model

Stracquadanio's current location, Terrazza Panorama, is interesting in this regard.

The resident chef of the new rooftop project is Giovanni Cortese. Stracquadanio joins the team in a guest chef role for the first season. While the menu of the two chefs preserves Sicilian and Mediterranean products, Stracquadanio's approach to fermentation, acidity, and techniques from Asian cuisines is distinctly visible.

This model also illustrates the economic difference between carrying all fixed costs of one's restaurant and providing expertise to another establishment's kitchen infrastructure.

While guest chef or consultancy-based work can provide the chef with creative space, it can reduce the burden of financing rent, equipment investment, front office staff, and the entire operation alone.

For hotel and restaurant businesses, the opposite is true: it becomes possible to utilize a well-known chef's kitchen knowledge for a limited time or in specific menu sections without establishing a full-time new concept.

However, for this model to be sustainable, recipe transfer and employee training are critical. If the product standard disappears when the guest chef leaves, the collaboration creates only temporary marketing visibility rather than operational value.

Is Modica really in “crisis”?

Stracquadanio tells Gambero Rosso that Modica's restaurants are going through a difficult period, and if he were to invest again in Sicily today, he would prefer Pozzallo. He explains this by citing the “new energy” in Pozzallo and the lower overtourism pressure compared to some destinations in Southeastern Sicily.

It would not be correct to present this view as an objective investment ranking.

No current data has been identified that directly compares the 2026 restaurant economy of Modica and Pozzallo in terms of rent, occupancy, per capita spending, or restaurant closure data.

However, it appears that businesses in Modica are facing some concrete problems in the summer of 2026. During the serious water shortages in July, CNA Ristorazione Ragusa representative Federica Muriana stated that historical center businesses were under significant pressure due to both the water issue and the decline in tourist numbers.

This data does not prove that the entire Modica restaurant sector is in a structural crisis. However, it presents a local signal indicating that Stracquadanio's assessment is not entirely irrelevant.

The preference for Pozzallo should remain as the chef's personal investment opinion for now.

Could smaller restaurants really be more profitable?

Smaller spaces and fewer employees can create strong advantages.

Rent may decrease. The front office staff may shrink. The menu can be kept narrower. Purchasing can become more concentrated. The need for kitchen equipment may decrease.

However, fewer seats also mean lower maximum turnover capacity.

Therefore, what matters is not the size of the restaurant, but how much income is generated per square meter and per employee hour.

When businesses develop new concepts, they need to monitor not only the total number of staff but also:

• turnover per employee hour,

• revenue per table or seat,

• contribution margin,

• food cost and waste rate,

• table turnover rate,

• preparation time per product on the menu,

• rent/turnover ratio

together.

The true success of the lean model is not to provide less service to customers, but to eliminate non-value-adding operational steps while preserving the service that the customer values.

According to Stafflink

The strongest conclusion that can be drawn from the closure of KuFù is not that “fine dining is dead.”

In our view, the main issue is how much the high fixed cost restaurant model can withstand the complexity that does not generate income.

Fewer employees and smaller spaces may be a good start; however, if a poorly designed menu, low table turnover, or high waste persists, the cost problem is merely reduced.

Stracquadanio's ideas of a fish shop + self-service table are therefore interesting. While product quality remains at the center of the kitchen, the goal is to simplify the service architecture. However, in such a model, the successful KPI should not be “how many employees did we reduce?” but rather how many employee hours and how many euros of fixed costs do we use to deliver a plate of the same quality to the customer?

Moreover, trying to solve the personnel issue in the sector solely by reducing the staff is risky in the long run. If the workload of the remaining employees increases, service quality, job security, and employee turnover may deteriorate.

A stronger approach would be to increase employee productivity through shorter menus, fewer unnecessary processes, proper kitchen layout, digital ordering, or self-service tools.

The model Stracquadanio is seeking after KuFù is worth watching in this regard: less “restaurant ritual,” but a more economical operation that maintains high product standards.