Victoria's on New Brunswick's Church Street is No Laughing Matter

Victoria's on New Brunswick's Church Street is No Laughing Matter

Stress Factory Owners Serving Up Great Food, Welcoming Vibe at New Restaurant

Vinnie and Vickie Brand have gone to great expense and effort in designing and decorating their new Italian restaurant, Victoria’s

In fact, they discovered the perfect lighting to hang over the bar about 3,500 miles away.

“We didn’t even know fairy lights existed,” Vinnie said. “We wanted to have a unique space. We were looking all over the place for lights - New York, everywhere. So, we were on a trip in Spain and we were on the top of this 16th-century castle and they had these lights and my wife goes, ‘That’s the lights.’ ”

New lights, flooring, fixtures and more - several changes have already been made to the restaurant at 94 Church St. as the Brands rechristen what had been Panico’s into a new space.

The front door is custom-made, and there are newly installed garage door windows in the front. New tables and a laser-etched sign are on the way.

The menu selection under Chef Bosco will be slightly scaled back but will be made with higher-grade ingredients such as cheese, sauce, and flour. That slight crisp to the chicken parmigiana and that garlic bite to the Route 27 pizza will be even more delicious, Brand said.

“We’re creating a very magical environment, something that when you come in, you go, ‘I feel good here. I feel welcome here,’ " Vinnie said. “That’s the environment we wanted. We want people to come in, and we want them to feel great.

“What we want to do with the restaurant, we want to build an inviting, friendly place,” he added. “The food is excellent, but not stuffy at all. The pizza is great, but it’s not a pizzeria. The bar is a brass cocktail bar, but you can still get a Budweiser. We are building this kind of environment where when you come, you should be wrapped into this warm glow.”

The Brands say they can apply a lot of lessons learned owning and operating The Stress Factory, a longtime institution in New Brunswick.

Chris Rock, Andrew Dice Clay, Bill Burr, Drew Carey, and many other legendary stand-up comics had graced the Stress Factory’s stage since it opened in 1994.

The Stress Factory has perhaps never played a bigger role in the city than during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic when laughter was the best medicine in the face of a health emergency. The Brands invested tens of thousands of dollars in a large white tent, under which the shows could still go on.

The white tent has become a permanent fixture and will connect the club and the restaurant in what Vinnie calls “an entertainment complex.”

When asked if owning a restaurant had been a longtime goal, Vinnie said, “We’re very open-minded, ambitious people. We’re, how do I want to say this, we’re excitable business people.

“When the opportunity came up, we said, ‘OK, let’s do this,’ “ he added. “Did we always want to do this? Kind of, sort of, yeah.”

Story By: Chuck O'Donnell
Photo Credit: Stress Factory