Blue Duck Italian Kitchen Is Building More Than a Restaurant

When Vy talks about Blue Duck Italian Kitchen, he does not start with pizza.

He starts with home, Eastland County, and the food available to the people who live here.

Seven years ago, after building a cooking career in Dallas, Vy moved back to the area full time after his father suffered a stroke. He came home to help his parents, and one of the first things he noticed was how hard it could be to eat well here.

“I realized Eastland is in a food desert,” he said. “Our real goal is to try to get us out of the food desert.”

That idea now sits at the center of Blue Duck Italian Kitchen in Cisco: fresh food, local ingredients where possible, affordable prices, and a restaurant culture that does not hide the work happening behind the plate.

Vy had cooked in Dallas restaurants, including fine dining and independent Texas concepts, before making the permanent move to Eastland, where he lives. Once here, he and his wife began studying agriculture at Cisco College and later spent time working on a farm in Oklahoma. They came back with a clearer sense of what local food could look like in Eastland County.

At first, Vy considered farming himself. But as he looked around the area, he saw something important: plenty of people were already growing.

“Everyone and their mother has something,” he said. “Someone is growing basil. Someone is growing thyme. Someone is doing tomatoes, eggplant, all that fun stuff.”

That changed the mission. Instead of becoming another farm, Vy wanted Blue Duck to become the place where local growers’ work could land.

“Farm to table means I grab farmers’ products and we’re the table,” he said. “There are plenty of farmers. Let’s be the table.”

During the interview, that philosophy was not abstract. Vy served a pizza built around purple cauliflower and yellow squash from local growers, talking through the ingredients as he tested which version might become a special. Some ingredients are easier to source locally than others, he said. Bulk greens like arugula and lettuce can be harder to sustain in the county, but Blue Duck chooses its battles carefully.

One of those battles has been getting rid of canned ingredients.

“We’ve been can-free since January,” Vy said. “I don’t think anyone else can say that.”

For Blue Duck, Italian food made sense because of how much the cuisine depends on freshness. Vy points to fresh dough, fresh mozzarella, fresh bread, and fresh pasta as the foundation. But getting there took time.

“Pasta is a huge mountain to climb,” he said. “It’s so difficult to do pasta fresh and consistent the whole time. It took us nearly six months to have consistent pasta dough.”

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That work now shows up in the food. The menu is built around clean, simple ingredients and the belief that fresh food can be both satisfying and accessible.

Affordability matters to Vy because of the food desert problem he is trying to answer.

“A food desert is categorized by access to affordable and healthful foods,” he said. “In order to combat that, we have to be affordable.”

That has shaped the pricing, even when comparable fresh-made food would cost more in larger markets. Vy remembered a guest from California reacting to the restaurant’s margherita pizza and saying it would cost far more where he came from.

“We’re here for the community,” Vy said.

The community focus also extends beyond the plate. Blue Duck composts food waste and uses it to support a worm colony Vy and his wife have maintained for years. The idea is part of what he calls “closing the loop”: local farms provide produce, the restaurant uses it, scraps go back into compost, and that compost can help grow more food.

“Have you heard of table back to the farm?” he asked. “Consider that a loop.”

Inside the restaurant, Blue Duck’s culture is just as intentional as its food.

Most restaurants divide the front of house from the back of house. Blue Duck does the opposite. Its open, exhibition-style kitchen keeps the work visible, which means communication has to be constant. When a large group walks in, the kitchen hears it immediately and prepares together.

“Everybody’s on display,” Vy said. “Our communication level is through the roof.”

He wanted a restaurant where the team operated as one unit, not as separate departments competing for attention. That is also why Blue Duck uses tip pooling. The idea, Vy said, is that every table belongs to the whole restaurant.

“It’s a table, and everyone has to take care of them,” he said. “That’s kitchen included. Every dish that comes out has to be awesome.”

Vy also tries to build culture through shared meals and shared experiences. About once a month, he cooks for the staff. Sometimes the meal is requested, like the spring rolls the team has asked for more than once. He also takes staff to other restaurants so they can experience different styles of service and hospitality.

“I see the restaurant industry as more than just a place to fuel your tank,” he said. “I like to bring experiences to the table.”

That sense of experience shows up in the space itself. Blue Duck is playful, a little strange, and proud of it. Vy describes it as Italy on one wall, Texas on another, with ducks everywhere. The restaurant does not take itself too seriously, even while taking the food seriously.

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“We do weird stuff here,” he said. “We don’t take ourselves too seriously, but we are serious about our food.”

The name itself carries some of that playful spirit. At the bottom of the Blue Duck website is a Dr. Seuss quote: “From there to here, from here to there, funny things are everywhere.” Vy said that line fits the restaurant’s personality.

“That’s kind of what our mentality is here,” he said. “Funny things are everywhere.”

Blue Duck is also experimenting with a chef’s corner experience for small groups. The idea is simple: a table of up to six guests answers a few questions, then lets the kitchen take over. Instead of ordering from the menu, the group is guided through a series of courses, often including shared pizzas, pastas, appetizers, dessert, and wine.

For Vy, that kind of meal is about more than food. It is about slowing down, sharing the table, and making dinner feel like an experience again.

“It’s this whole ritual where you break bread,” he said. “We take you on this journey.”

That may be the best way to understand Blue Duck Italian Kitchen. It is not just a Cisco restaurant serving Italian food in Eastland County. It is an effort to connect local growers, fresh ingredients, a hard-working team, and a community that deserves more access to good food.

Or, as Vy put it in one of his own planning notes:

“We are the table.”