Bella's Italian Restaurant

Bella’s Italian Restaurant is a family-owned Italian restaurant at 16110 W. 135th St. in Olathe, Kansas, run by the Veliu family. It serves from-scratch Italian fare built on recipes the family carried from Bari, Italy — by way of the Bronx, Dallas, and a six-year run in Lee’s Summit, Missouri — before opening this Johnson County location in November 2025.¹²³

Description

Bella’s Italian Restaurant is a full-service Italian restaurant occupying the former Applebee’s space near Kohl’s and the Olathe Indian Creek Library on West 135th Street.¹² The kitchen emphasizes fresh, made-to-order cooking rooted in the Veliu family’s recipes from Bari, Italy, with a menu of handmade pastas and classic Italian entrées.³ Popular dishes include lasagna, chicken parmigiana, fettuccine alfredo, and shrimp scampi.² Owner Limi Veliu has summarized the kitchen’s approach as “Everything is fresh, 100%. We do things the old-fashioned and hard way.”²

Ownership and history

The restaurant is owned and operated by the Veliu family, led by Limi Veliu alongside Shenda Veliu, with brother Genci Veliu and cousins working in the kitchen.² The Bella’s name and lineage trace back to Limi Veliu’s grandparents, who first opened a Bella’s in the Bronx after immigrating to New York from Bari, Italy. The name comes from “Bella” — meaning “beautiful” — the nickname Veliu’s grandfather used for his grandmother.¹³

The family later operated in Dallas, Texas before relocating to the Kansas City metro, where they ran a Bella’s in Lee’s Summit, Missouri for roughly six years; Lee’s Summit Mayor Bill Baird is credited with persuading the family to come to that city after dining with them in Dallas.¹² The family opened the Olathe location in the fall of 2025, soft-opening at the end of November with a grand opening planned for January 2026; the Lee’s Summit location transferred to new ownership around the same time.² Veliu has expressed interest in additional Johnson County locations, potentially in Overland Park or Lenexa.¹

Links

• Official site: https://www.bellasolathe.com/
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/bellas-italian-restaurant-olathe
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/p/Bellas-Italian-Restaurant-Olathe-KS-61580242324255/

Sources

Disputes

None at this time.

Footnotes

1. Johnson County Post, “Bella’s Italian Restaurant opening new Olathe location soon” (Nov. 11, 2025). https://johnsoncountypost.com/2025/11/11/bellas-italian-restaurant-olathe-273803/ — asserts: name, address (16110 W. 135th St., Olathe), owner Limi Veliu, grandparents-in-the-Bronx / Bari, Italy origin, “Bella” nickname meaning, six-year Lee’s Summit history, Mayor Bill Baird, future Overland Park/Lenexa interest, made-to-order cuisine. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

2. Johnson County Post, “Locally owned Bella’s Italian Restaurant opens in Olathe” (Dec. 16, 2025). https://johnsoncountypost.com/2025/12/16/bellas-olathe-open-276033/ — asserts: owners Limi and Shenda Veliu, brother Genci Veliu and cousins in kitchen, former Applebee’s space, end-of-November 2025 soft open / January 2026 grand opening, hours, signature dishes (lasagna, chicken parmigiana, fettuccine alfredo, shrimp scampi), “Everything is fresh, 100%” quote, Lee’s Summit handoff. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷

3. Yahoo News / The Kansas City Star (republished), “Family-owned Italian restaurant opens in Olathe: ‘We will surprise this city’.” https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/family-owned-italian-restaurant-opens-110000068.html — asserts: family operation, Bari, Italy recipe lineage, handmade pastas / classic entrées, family origin story. ↩ ↩² ↩³