CULINARY ACADEMY GRAD WORKS IN FAMILY'S RESTAURANT.

Byline: Suzie St.John Now Open

BURBANK - Lisa Biondi could have worked at her choice of upscale restaurants after she graduated at the top of her class from the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco.

These days, though, she runs the kitchen at her family's Chef Piero's Italian Cuisine and Seafood restaurant in Burbank.

The decision was a no-brainer, considering her father, Piero, has owned the restaurant at 2825 W. Olive Ave. for 38 years and both her mother, Marie, and sister, Jhonna, work there.

Her father sweetened the offer by giving her and Jhonna, who is the manager, the opportunity to make some changes to the eatery.

``I wasn't really surprised at Lisa's decision. We're a family so it goes without saying,'' Piero Biondi said.

The Biondi sisters brainstormed ways to modernize the restaurant and boost business. Now it sports a wine shop and an espresso bar. A patio should be ready by month's end.

The sisters share a passion for wine so the shop was a natural.

Lisa Biondi said one of the main reasons she attended the culinary school was its close proximity to Northern California's wineries.

Situated in the center of the restaurant, the shop features wooden racks stacked with approximately 118 bottles of various types of wine. Prices run from $7.99 to $150 per bottle.

Customers have the option of perusing the racks for a wine to go with their meal or buying a bottle to take home. A $7 corkage fee is charged for in-house drinking.

``The customers love being able to hand-pick their wine instead of just going by a wine list,'' Lisa Biondi said.

She added that future plans include monthly wine tasting parties with a selection of wines and appetizers.

``We would really like for the wine shop to take off so we can introduce more people to the pleasures of wine,'' she said.

A hunter green canopy advertising the wine shop, tastings and espresso bar decorates the outside of the building.

``There were people who have lived here for 20 years and didn't know this was a restaurant until we put up the canopy,'' said Piero Biondi, who at 15 left his native Italy to make a better life for himself in the United States.

He arrived in Washington, D.C., in 1955 and found a job as a dishwasher at a restaurant called Gusti's. He worked his way up to chef and in 1958, with $7,000 in his pocket, moved to California.

After Biondi arrived in Los Angeles, he became the chef at Pappy's, which then featured continental cuisine. Four years later he bought it. He said he couldn't be happier about his family members accepting roles in running the restaurant.

``It doesn't get any better, especially when you see the passion (Lisa and Jhonna) have for the restaurant,'' Biondi said.

Since Lisa became chef two years ago, their lunch business has increased by 60 percent and she expects it to grow even more with the new year-round patio that will seat 70 people, increasing the restaurant's occupancy to 130.

The espresso bar has been the slowest growing in popularity but the Biondis believe it won't take long for word to spread.

Piero's wife of 39 years runs the espresso bar, which opens at 8 a.m. daily. She also is responsible for the floral and fruit designs painted on the bar in the wine shop.

``We're really happy with the changes and think our customers will be, too,'' Lisa Biondi said. ``We wanted to take it from being a nondescript- looking restaurant from the outside to a trattoria that has brightened up a bit and is more up to date.''

< In other retail news: --Silicon Entertainment opened a NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway interactive racing center at CityWalk in Universal City. The new Speedway is Silicon's 14th overall and second in California; another racing center is operating in the Irvine Spectrum Center.

The racing centers provide an intense, life-like racing experience that simulates the motion, sights and sounds of an actual NASCAR race.

Located next to Sam Goody's, the CityWalk store features 12 nearly full-size race car simulators complete with racing colors, sponsor logos and numbers. Each car is mounted on a responsive, full-motion platform and seats two- a driver and a crew/spotter - in a full-size cockpit. The cars also are equipped with five 3-D display systems, full sound, working steering wheel and gauges, racing seats, seat belts, working gas-clutch-brake pedals, rearview mirror and racing tires.

A grand opening with an appearance by a NASCAR Winston Cup driver is planned for a future date. For more information, call [phone].

--Michaels Stores, Inc., the largest national arts and crafts specialty retailer, is opening a new store in Glendale. The store, located in the Glendale Fashion Center at the intersection of North Glendale and California avenues, is scheduled to open April 9. It is one of the 70 new retail locations Michaels plans to open throughout the country in fiscal year 2000.

The 20,000-square-foot store will offer a broad assortment of basic and seasonal crafts and florals, art supplies, needlecrafts, ribbons, kid's crafts, books and magazines, and custom floral designing and framing.

It will employ approximately 43 full- and part-time employees in cashier, customer service, sales floor and management positions. Hiring is currently taking place.

The company owns and operates 564 Michaels stores in 47 states, Canada and Puerto Rico, and Aaron Brothers stores, located primarily on the West Coast.