Small delights await at new Bocage on Phila
Champagne bar a pricey, but fun, little jewel box in Saratoga
Imagine you’re in a friend’s kitchen. A stylish friend who loves entertaining from behind their long marble island, guests lolling on bar stools, while they pop Champagne and pull delightful treats from an oversized stainless fridge.
So it is at Bocage Champagne Bar, a diminutive new place on Phila Street in Saratoga Springs that’s perfectly welcoming and cozy for dropping in solo or with friends. Married owners Clark Gale and Zachary Denham designed the 500-square-foot space around three glittering orb chandeliers suspended over the bar like oversized bubbles. Fittingly, they almost chose the name "perlage" — an Italian word describing the bubbles in sparkling wine — but settled on Bocage, an 18th-century term for the hedge-rowed farm fields common in the Champagne region of France and in Ireland and southern England. The decision was influenced, in part, by Gale’s passion for New York wines and the similarity of terrain they saw in travels around northern France.
It might be a stretch to justify a Champagne bar in a dining column. But a slim menu of crustless tea sandwiches in a half-dozen flavors, local cheese and charcuterie boards with sliced Rupert Rising baguette bread, dried fruits and housemade jam, plus and the imminent arrival of fresh-shucked oysters, caviar samplers and a dessert menu with chef-made pot de creme and jammy tartlets, makes this irresistible at the start of summer. For many, myself included, the chance to close the day with happy-hour Champagne and shared small
plates is the quintessential dinner ideal. And those looking to pregame a meal elsewhere or grab an after-dinner cocktail or a glass of bubbly with a sweet treat will find Bocage the one to beat.
Though Gale and Denham share pedigreed backgrounds in New York City hospitality, Denham hails from Louisiana while Gale grew up in northern New York in Massena, with visits to
Saratoga Springs-based grandparents. Their glitzy wedding at The Adelphi confirmed their feeling that Saratoga is a place where people like to celebrate and, after surviving the pandemic with visits upstate, they took the leap on opening Bocage as their first solo venture.
The sparkling wine list is a joy. Unlike New York City — where you can happily count on finding the tight, Champagnelike
bubbles of an Italian franciacorta or selection of ultra-dry cava from Catalonia, Spain, on menus at Bar Pisellino or Temperance Wine — the Capital Region has remained slavishly committed to proseccos of varying quality or bubbles from big-name Champagne houses like Moet & Chandon and Veuve Clicquot. Bocage is driven by a commitment to showcasing women winemakers, boutique
natural wines and grower Champagnes, alongside pricier cuvees from Bollinger and Perrier Jouet.
Space is at a premium, meaning storage is tight. A Coravin wine system (a tube pierces the cork without allowing air to enter) makes it possible to serve a wide selection of wines, both sparkling and still, by the glass to pair with the tea sandwiches made fresh daily by chef Jacob Myers.
There is no bad time to have Marcona almonds and Castelvetrano olives, but today’s dining mission is guided by one thing: Foie gras PB&J. While the singer Lizzo swears by a PBJ pizza, these lads have turned Denham’s indulgent pandemic creation into a snackable food of the gods. Springy white bread from Rockland Bakery in Newburgh — its crusts removed, as any respectable tea sandwich should — is spread with crunchy peanut butter, sour cherry jam and soft duck liver mousse made from Hudson Valley foie gras that infuses each bite with buttery umami taste.
You could order chorizo and fig or arugula with a pesto of sundried tomato, but in summer there is no better sandwich than egg salad with cress, or in this case, dill, on crustless white bread — just in time for Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee. With these, we pick a cheese
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board with hard Manchego, Old Chatham Sheepherding Ewe’s Blue and salty Parmesan paired with dried apricots, balsamic moutarde and fig jam.
In the spirit of true Champagne dreams, Bocage features a lemon-dill creme fraiche topped with black Osetra caviar and juicy salmon roe pearls served, unironically, with a bag of salty kettle chips. The highbrow-lowbrow combo works beautifully in crunch and saltiness, but the price tag of $50 for such a petite presentation with perhaps a teaspoon of caviar prompts a sharp inhale. Having recently had an $18 dirty martini in Los Angeles with an optional $12 caviar “bump” of around the same size, I’m hardpressed to find value in this.
In their defense, Osetra retails at about $170 for 5 grams/1.75 ounces. This month, when oyster service is in full effect, there will be a caviar sampler too. I might have to leave it to those splurging $1,200 on a bottle of 2012 Dom Perignon Brut, or three times as expensive as at Prime at Saratoga National and quadruple what 15 Church charges. Such is the price paid for limited storage and tiny, premium space.
We pair our small plates with three glasses of bubbly: a honey-colored Channing Daughter’s Sylvanus Pétillant Naturel (the North Fork of Long Island) with fat bubbles and tropical notes; a Col di Luna "Flora" rosata (Veneta, Italy) in highly embarrassed pink; and Le Vigne di Alice, Frizzante Marzemino M. Fondo Pet Nat, a stunning rubycolored and chilled red. There’s timeless vouvray for non-bubbly fans and a few cocktails, though I’m not quite convinced by the sweetness of an Old Fashioned made with Brooklyn’s Misunderstood ginger-spiced whiskey.
Is it even summer without an Aperol spritz? Happily, Bocage makes a fabulous one topped with prosecco. And I’m happy to hear Gale is spearheading a spritz series, one each for their four featured regions: North America, Italy, Spain and France.
Given the likely crush of track season traffic on their tiny, kitchen-style space with seats for 18, counter stools for six and standing room that can bring capacity close to 30, they’ve started taking reservations for parties from one to eight people, with a 90-minute time limit.
You can expect some buy-out nights for groups who plan Bocage “takeovers” in the weeks ahead. Don’t grumble too much. Open seven days a week, there’s room for walk-ins, and this place would never survive if groups lingered all night over a bottle of wine. Be a good house guest. Drop in to say hello, enjoy a glass and some snacks, then be on your way.