Gusto Copping a Lattitude coastal cuisine built on sustainable environmental policies combine with breath-taking views of the bay to make lattitude’s one of the area’s most popular eateries for locals and visitors alike. the owner is even a tv star!

by Dan Shafer

Two years ago when Tene Shake bought the restaurant that for the previous 25 years had been the wildly popular Tinnery at Lover’s Point in Pacific Grove, some people might have scratched their heads. Didn’t this guy have enough to do already? He already owned two restaurants (Isabella’s and Cabo Wild Mexican Seafood, both on the Wharf), a wholesale/retail fish market, two well-known tourist attractions and a handful of commercial real estate developments.

But those who knew him just smiled knowingly. Shake, the youngest of five brothers (thus his name, “Tene,” pronounced “teeny”) who together make up the largest restaurant group on the Peninsula, never stops moving, thinking, creating, shaking things up.

Now, two years later, Lattitudes (“the double-T is intentional; this is a latitude with an attitude,” he says with his patented grin) is a hot local restaurant that is also frequent host to visitors from all over the world.

“We have about an equal mix of locals and visitors,” Shake says. “My real aim, though, is to be a popular local restaurant. If visitors happen to stumble in and get a good meal, that’s a nice bonus. But I like to get to know my customers and socialize with them. That’s part of the fun of being in this business.” Locals and visitors alike have come to love the Coastal Cuisine Tene conjures up. And the view — 180+ degrees of bay and ocean — doesn’t hurt, either.

But even that’s not enough to satisfy Shake’s unquenchable thirst for excellence. He told me:

“I’ve hired local architect Eric Miller and the Hatch Group from Newport Beach. Some time in the next year or so, we’re going to do a complete remodel of the restaurant to create something even more innovative. I feel that’s part of my generation’s responsibility to the up-and-coming young chefs: to establish what it means to be a Monterey restaurateur.” Whatever the future may bring, Lattitudes currently offers some of the most adventurous seafood eating on the Peninsula. There is almost nothing ordinary about the menu or the preparation of the food at this romantically casual establishment. Even the dÈcor is unusual, from the circular fireplace prominently located in the main dining area to the custom artwork jellyfish ceiling lighting.

“When the Monterey Bay Aquarium closed their jellyfish exhibit a year or so ago,” Shake says proudly, “I was fortunate enough to be able to buy three of the five custom jellyfish lights that were created uniquely for the exhibit.”

The seafood preparations at Lattitudes are like artwork, too. From the Parmesan salmon to the Pasta Capri featuring Bay shrimp, to the Tempura prawns served with rice and a savory sesame ginger sauce, nothing smacks of “same old, same old.”

Shake’s signature dish is a whole Dungeness crab. But what he does to a crab! This dish is sautÈed in garlic and butter and then slow-roasted in the oven. I’m a big fan of this uniquely West Coast dish but I’ve never had it prepared so nicely and deliciously.

If you want a real feast, check out Shake’s seafood paella for two (or more). This incredible concoction includes Dungeness crab, mussels, clams, lobster, scallops and shrimp in the traditional saffron rice.

Although Lattitude’s menu centers on seafood, it has almost equal appeal for those who prefer beef or chicken. Particularly nicely done are the Burgundy braised beef short ribs, although many of my friends really enjoy the chicken Alfredo. I can’t comment on those dishes; I always dive into seafood when I hit this place.

Shake has assembled a solid team at Lattitudes. He gets to cook sometimes, but Executive Chef John Gervin, General Manager Mike Kellogg, and Director of Operations Ralph Elrayes help keep things running smoothly at Lattitudes while Tene is off running things at his two other restaurants or one of his many other enterprises.

Tene says he couldn’t do all of the variety of things he does and keep his life running smoothly if it weren’t for, Tracy, his wife of 25 years.

Those “other enterprises” include a recently developed television show, “Coastal Cuisine: Taking the Fear Out of Cooking Seafood.”

“I just love the ocean and seafood,” says Shake, who from the time he could walk was involved in a family life that centered on restaurants and fishing along Monterey’s Fisherman’s Wharf.

“My brothers and I fished commercially from a young age. We also worked at every job in the restaurant from dishwasher and bus boy to host, waiter, cook, and manager. It was exciting for me because I got to be like my older brothers, hang out with them. I just fell in love with the business.”

Shakes’ parents, Pakistani-born Sabu and Isabella, of Italian lineage, came to Monterey in 1950 and by 1952 had opened their first restaurant on the Wharf. Tene’s Isabella’s Restaurant on the Wharf is named for his mother.

“My real ambition,” he says, “probably sounds too grandiose but I like setting big goals for myself. I want to be known as America’s Seafood Chef. Nobody else has staked a claim to that title, so I’m going for it.”