By MARALINE KUBIK

By MARALINE KUBIK
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
COITSVILLE -- Kenny Kalasky isn't used to staying in one place. Now that he's planning to stay put -- at least for awhile -- he's making way for an ever-changing view.
The walls and menus at his restaurant, Kenny's Family Restaurant, which opened last March on U.S. Route 422 just west of the Pennsylvania line, feature paintings of places he's already been.
Kalasky completed a slew of paintings during the 21/2 years he spent aboard his 33-foot sailboat traveling from the Florida Keys to Venezuela, returning to the United States in July 1997. Among the paintings are one of his boat, "Liberty," anchored in the bay of some far-away island, and an old Spanish lighthouse perched on a bluff somewhere between Key West and Caracas.
All of Kalasky's paintings are done in acrylic. Watercolors can be ruined by a single drop of water, and oils take days to dry, making both poor choices for an artist who works on the deck of a sailboat, he said.
The walls of Kenny's Restaurant also feature sites Kalasky's never seen -- watercolor paintings by Dennis Balch of Campbell, and oil paintings by Karen Nelson of Hubbard.
Changing exhibit
Kalasky hopes to fill the walls with an ever-changing exhibit of works by area artists, creating an interesting environment for his customers and offering a showroom where painters can sell their work without paying a commission.
In 2003, less than six years after returning to the Florida Keys following his sailing adventure, Kalasky decided to move back home and operate a restaurant in a building his 87-year-old father, John Kalasky, has owned for years.
The tenant who had been running the place was having a hard time turning a profit and wanted out of the lease, Kenny Kalasky explained.
Although he'd never operated a restaurant, Kalasky, who earned his MBA from Youngstown State University, had plenty of experience keeping businesses in the black. He'd worked as the manager of fiscal operations at the Cuyahoga County Drug Abuse Services Board -- the severance he was paid after his job was eliminated enabled him to make his sailing voyage. He'd also worked as controller of a 400-bed nursing home in Florida, as assistant controller of a casino boat business, and as accounting manager of a vocational rehabilitation facility.
When he got back to Ohio, he spent six weeks reworking plans for the restaurant. He hired additional help -- Kalasky employs seven full-time workers in addition to himself -- extended hours of operation and expanded the menu.
Signature items
Signature items are a seafood omelet and a Venezuelan burger. "Venezuela is a lot like Texas," he said. "They think they have the biggest of everything."
Kalasky's Venezuelan burger is a half pound of ground beef topped "with everything, including a fried egg," he said.
When the restaurant opened last spring, the Venezuelan burgers were very hot sellers, he said. "Then I think people got tired of them and demand died off. Now, demand for them seems to be coming back."
Most of Kenny's customers are locals who've visited the restaurant for years. "My dad eats here every day," he added.
How long he'll be in the restaurant business is uncertain, he said. "It's going to keep me tied down for the foreseeable future." Even so, Kalasky still thinks about his boat, which is in storage in Florida, and is entertaining the idea of bringing it to Ohio.
He learned to sail on the Great Lakes, he said, "but I never sailed Lake Superior yet, and I've always wanted to." Kalasky said that some day he'd also like to sail around the world.
Kenny's Family Restaurant is open from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. seven days a week.
kubik@vindy.com