A Well-Deserved Honor for Oh So Talented Tutti

A Well-Deserved Honor for Oh So Talented Tutti

By Ali Patusky

Tutti Perricone

Tutti Perricone has never ridden a horse, but there she was on Saturday,

June 11, being celebrated as one of the newest members of the Upperville Colt & Horse Show’s Wall of Honor as a tribute to her years of hard work and overall devotion to the oldest show in America.

Perricone has lived in Middleburg her entire life, growing up as the youngest of six children who lived a mile out of town off Foxcroft Road. She’s worked in various local restaurants until 1986 when she opened her own, the Back Street Café. Her popular eatery and catering business was located in the Middleburg building now occupied by Best Thai Kitchen.

“My contribution has never really been financial, it’s always been through services there.” Perricone said. “As far as my computer books go back, and it’s probably further than this, I started catering there in 2007. So every year I do the evening cocktail parties and the Wall of Honor lunch. I’ve always really loved the Upperville Horse Show. It seems like a very wellorganized event that everyone looks forward to.”

The Wall of Honor was established in 2005 as a way to pay tribute to people and horses who have contributed to the show’s success. “Those who return year after year to work on the committee or compete have become as familiar and important as the oaks that grace the historic show grounds,” the show’s website reads. “They are in fact themselves, ‘Upperville Oaks.’”

Asked about her initial reaction to being added to the wall, she said, “I was shocked. But I also felt honored that they wanted to do that.

I thought it was really sweet…I love everybody that’s up there.” Perricone is no stranger to the hospitality and food industry, especially locally.

“It was my first and only job,” she said. “I was a bus girl at L’Auberge in Middleburg…a French restaurant. Then I went from there to the Red Fox, and I was at the Red Fox for eleven years. Then, when Mosby’s Tavern opened, I went there and I was the bookkeeper. From Mosby’s Tavern, I opened up my own restaurant in 1986. I had it for 26 years. That was the Backstreet Cafe.”

From that Federal Street location, she did catering and ran the restaurant, no easy feat.

“Don’t ask me how I did it,” she said, “because it was a tiny little building.”

In 2011, she closed the restaurant and decided to focus on catering. She also was approached by Middleburg Academy to prepare student lunches, with the opportunity to use the school’s kitchen for the catering business. She did that until the school closed in 2020, and the Middleburg Community Charter School offered her a similar job soon after.

“I do lunches for kindergarteners through fifth graders, which is adorable,” she said. “I love it. I make them homemade food and they always get fresh fruits and vegetables.”

Perricone attended that school as a child when it was the Middleburg Elementary School, “and now I’m back there in another capacity, and it’s really sweet.”

In addition to her considerable culinary skills, she’s also known around the area as an accomplished singer. She’s had two one-woman shows, her most recent in 2020 as a tribute to her late husband, Vince Perricone, who passed away in 2019. She also has worked with her good friend Tom Sweitzer, cofounder of Middleburg’s innovative music therapy center, A Place To Be.

“When he first came to Middleburg, he was teaching at the Hill School,” she said, “and he did a lot of plays there. I used to be one of his actors.” Her favorite part, of course, was the music. “I’ve always loved to sing,” she said. “When I had my restaurant I would sing on special occasions like Valentine’s Day and New Years. I’ve never done it professionally. I always say I want to be a lounge singer when I grow up, so we’ll see what happens.”

Perricone clearly has had a lasting impact on most everyone she meets. As one of her closest friends, Cricket Bedford, said, “What I love best about Tutti is she not only literally ‘feeds’ all of us around her with her delicious food, but she feeds our souls with her genuine warmth and kindness. Just try to find a photo when she’s not smiling.”