New Romanian-American Restaurant Moving To East Haven

EAST HAVEN, CT — Fairfield's loss is East Haven's gain, as it relates to Romanian-American cuisine.

Café Transilvania, which opened in late 2020, is closing its doors at 246 Post Road in Fairfield on June 5, with plans to open the new Transilvania Restaurant and Bar at 23 Main St. in East Haven in time for Labor Day.

The new location is a full restaurant and bar, and will be "in a beautiful Old Historical Building that looks just like Transilvania’s old buildings," owners Alina and Christian Caldarariu wrote on Facebook.

"We are so very excited that we are building a kitchen and a bar and it’s going to be Dracula Vlad The Impaler’s theme, the owners wrote. "We also have about 35 parking spots, a garden and a river in the back. We are planning to open on 1st of September this year so we can’t wait."

The cafe's menu specialized in traditional Romanian foods such as mici, which is a skinless sausage; Hungarian paprikash; stuffed cabbage; and classic American fare, such as baby back ribs, burgers and all-day breakfast.

The couple, who immigrated to the United States in 2013, both have extensive hospitality and food service expertise in their backgrounds.

Opening the new spot, however, made it impossible to operate the Fairfield site, too, but the Caldarariues are grateful for the following the café established.

"We want to thank every one of our costumers who came and tried our food and hopefully we can see [all of you] one more time before we close our doors!" they said. "It’s been a short year and a half but we can tell already that Fairfield [has] an amazing community with wonderful people and we really hope to see some of you in East Haven in the fall."

— Anna Bybee-Schier, Patch Staff contributed to this report.