Justin Severino reflects on closing Pittsburgh's Cure restaurant

Justin Severino will deeply miss his employees at Cure in Lawrenceville when it closes on March 23.

“One of my goals when I opened Cure was to build a team and to treat my employees the way I wanted to be treated, because that translates into an excellent guest experience and working space,” the award-winning chef told the Tribune-Review on Friday. “We have such a positive sense of team which contributed to the success of Cure. They’ve become family.”

A main part of his future includes time with his 7-month-old daughter, Frannie.

“I hope to be working less late-night hours and more early day hours,” he said. “Family time is important. I want to be a dad and enjoy my time with my daughter.”

Severino will continue to run his other popular Lawrenceville restaurant, Morcilla.

“Cure has, and will be my priority until the final day it closes,” he said. “It has been a profitable business, and now I am just switching gears for my future.”

He plans to invite former employees to return to the restaurant during the final weeks and bring back some of his favorite dishes and those that were popular among customers.

Then his focus will become the online charcuterie company – Salty Pork Bits, an online subscription based cured meat company which opened in July.

He said he doesn’t want the attention to be about Cure closing, but rather about Salty Pork Bits.

Cure provided him the opportunity to create Salty Pork Bits. The growth of that business has required more space. He plans to add a retail counter and eventually offer a simple charcuterie-driven menu with some seating available.

“Whenever you exceed expectations that is a good thing and we did that,” he said. “I can’t satisfy all the needs Salty Pork Bits being in the basement of Morcilla. It’s been mind blowing how well it’s done, so I need to shift my business. I feel with Cure that I’ve done it all and left it all on the butcher block.”