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Nicole-Taylor’s Pasta & Market & Backroom Eatery, part of the 54th and Monon Shops retail center since 2009, will close Dec. 24 and reopen as Corridor restaurant on Jan. 21.
Owners Erin Kem and Logan McMahan said they’re rebranding Nicole-Taylor’s to expand the restaurant’s focus on Italian flavors to tastes spanning Spain to the Middle East—or a geographic “corridor” provided by the Mediterranean Sea.
“We’re adding a lot of new options to what we’re already doing,” McMahan said. “Instead of replacing or throwing out the old, we’re keeping the tried-and-true classics that we have and we’re adding Mediterranean options.”
Kem and McMahan purchased Nicole-Taylor’s, 1134 E. 54th St., from founders Rosa Hanslits and Tony Hanslits in July 2023. Tony Hanslits served as executive chef at the Chef’s Academy at Harrison College, which closed in 2018. The Hanslits previously operated Italian restaurant Tavola Di Tosa, which served customers in Broad Ripple from 2000 to 2004.
A role at Tavola Di Tosa was Kem’s first culinary job in Indianapolis. She later worked at R Bistro, the highly regarded Mass Ave restaurant that closed in 2016.
Although Corridor will retire the Nicole-Taylor’s name that originated as a tribute to the daughters of Rosa and Tony Hanslits, the business will continue to host its popular Chef’s Table special events Wednesday through Saturday and sell handcrafted pasta in a market setting.
The market’s hours are 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday. Lunch will be served in Corridor’s dining room from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday.
The dining room will be revamped, Kem and McMahan said, to increase seating capacity from 30 to nearly 50.
Kem, who grew up in Muncie and studied at the New England Culinary Institute, met McMahan when they were co-workers at Irvington’s Landlocked Baking Co. in 2022.
“We hit it off, realized we have a bunch of mutual friends and couldn’t believe we hadn’t already met each other,” Kem said of their time at Landlocked, which closed earlier this year.
IUPUI alum McMahan can be seen as a competitor in the second season of “Top Vegan,” a streaming series that premiered at YouTube in September.
For more information about Corridor, visit nicoletaylorspasta.com.
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