Tony Ramirez has been in the restaurant business for as long as he can remember.
“My father was in the food business when I was three years old,” Ramirez said.
He recalled serving customers pizza slices at age five in a pizzeria his father, Rene, formerly owned in Jamaica, Queens.
Ramirez continued the family tradition three months ago when he opened Dominacan Restaurant 6 at 271-11 Union Turnpike in New Hyde Park as co-owner.
“It’s in a good area. I wanted to generate a heavy lunch business,” Ramirez said.
Ramirez said his father opened and sold three Dominican restaurants of his own in Nassau County over the past 20 years. And he and his father were partners in three others and still own one in Deer Park – hence the Dominican Restaurant 6 name.
Ramirez said he figured the proximity of hospitals and office buildings in the area would enable him to draw lunchtime customers. So far, he said, the lunch business is good and business – primarily takeout – from residents in the area has been “kicking in” and growing beyond his expectations.
His father targeted communities with Hispanic populations for his other restaurants, he said.
But a few months ago, Ramirez said, he decided to take a calculated risk in the New Hyde Park location, where he said there is no sizable population that would be familiar with the Carribean cuisine that characterizes his native Dominican dishes.
“I’ve taken a chance in introducing the cuisine to American communities,” he said. “This food, whoever tries it, they can’t say they don’t like it.”
The menu represents the range of traditional Dominican dishes, including roast and fried pork, roasted chicken, baked ribs, chicken or pork mofungo, oxtail stew, beef stew and the crossover Cubano sandwich made with pork, ham and pickles. All the dishes are served with plenty of white or Spanish rice and side dishes of maduros (plantains), fried yuca and vegetables are also available, along with avocado in season.
All the dishes are priced at $9.50 to $5.99 and Spanish rice or rice and beans goes for $4.
“Our portions are enormous,” Ramirez said, adding that customers can’t get “the quality and love we put into it.”
Family meals for four people of each of the dishes on the menu are available in the $20 range after 4 p.m. daily. In addition to offering takeout, Dominican Restaurant 6 also delivers to the local area. It also offers limited seating at two cafeteria style tables.
Dominican Restaurant 6 is open 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Wednesday and 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. Thursday through Saturday.
Ramirez was working as a barber in different shops for 13 years and then opened a few restaurants on his own before going into partnership with his father five years ago. He’s accustomed to being in a service business and said he thoroughly enjoys it.
“In this business, you cater to the customers. I like making people happy,” he said
He said he also takes pride in sharing the Dominican cuisine that is part of his heritage with the community.
“It’s an accomplishment,” he said.
His father isn’t the only family member involved in the New Hyde Park restaurant. His cousins Nene and Alex work there, along with his daughter Cybele, a senior at Sewanhaka High School, who works behind the counter part-time.
“When you learn in a business that’s been in the family for so long, it means a lot,” Cybele said.
Raised in the Richmond Hill section of Queens, Ramirez is a New York Mets fan who advertises his team loyalty as baseball enthusiast.
When he’s not at the restaurant, he said he spends his free time with Cybele and his 11-year-old daughter Charlize.
