Kane’s upcoming eatery inspired by grand European cafes
Less than a week before the opening of Explorateur, a highly anticipated new restaurant in the middle of downtown Boston, construction is still underway. The 7,300-square-foot space buzzes with the sound of drills and saws as a squadron of tool-toting workers affixes signage, builds banquettes and tries to transform an active work zone into a glam breakfast-through-dinner destination within just a few days' time. In the middle of the hubbub stands owner Ed Kane in a T-shirt, baseball hat and jeans, and a bracelet of wooden beads on one wrist. He's totally unflustered, confident that, appearances aside, Explorateur will come together in time for a public opening slated for next week. There's a reason Kane is so cool, calm and collected: He's done this before — many times. He's already opened more than 20 restaurants and nightclubs over the course of his career — from his 1989 debut, Stars on Hingham Harbor, to the properties he runs under the mantle of Big Night Entertainment Group, with his brother Joe Kane and their partner Randy Greenstein. Big Night's heavyweight portfolio includes Boston's trendy Asian-fusion restaurants Red Lantern and Empire, as well as the celeb-baiting Shrine nightclub and Scorpion Bar at Foxwoods Casino & Resort. In October, Big Night will roll out a 21,000-square-foot play palace in Boston's Seaport that houses another Scorpion Bar location and The Grande, a massive dance club tricked out with fittings such as a 70-foot LED wall and a custom kinetic lighting system capable of creating dazzling displays. It's a $12.5 million project. So comparatively speaking, the $4 million price tag attached to Explorateur sounds modest. But the place is pretty lavish, starting with the $15,000 golden front door that offers entrance to its dining room, on the first floor of a historic 1898-built Freemasons headquarters at 186 Tremont St. The Grand Lodge of Masons in Massachusetts was the first in the West-
ern hemisphere (its two prior buildings on the site fell victim to fires) and the structure holds plenty of mystique — including, Kane recounts, stories of buried tunnels running beneath downtown Boston.
Explorateur, though, is very much a product of 2017, an all-day enterprise that will serve La Colombe coffee drinks and decadent pastries from its cafe area in the a.m. hours, and transition into an elevated dining experience serving French-Californian cuisine at night.
“I love our nightclubs, but on a Saturday night, this is the kind of place where I'd spend my own time,” Kane said. “This is the most personally involved I've been in a project in a long time.” Explorateur, he says, was inspired in large part by travels that exposed him to the tradition of “grand European cafes” such as London's The Wolseley, a multifaceted affair offering breakfast through afternoon tea through late-night noshes.
Adjacent to Explorateur's marble- and brass-wrapped cafe area, stocked with java and pastries, the main dining room is bedecked with green leather furnishings and 15-foot-high Tremont Street-facing windows that reach up to the restored century-old coffered ceilings. Creative cocktails and craft beers are poured at the long bar; a second, smaller bar is located in a separate “Library Room,” where guests can gather by big bookshelves at tables illuminated by the kind of classic task lights under which bookworms burn the midnight oil.
Kane says that over the course of his decadesspanning career, successful new restaurants have increasingly come to represent larger cross-sections of people. In today's dining rooms, traditional fine diners more often rub elbows with adventurous millennials who place a high priority on eating well.
Hence the FrenchCalifornian cuisine at Explorateur, executed by chef Jacob Mendros, a 25-yearold Kittery, Maine, native with experience from Back Bay's French fine dining icon L'Espalier. Mendros, who collaborates at Explorateur with chef Michael Morway, says that the idea is to combine elements of Continental refinement with contemporary presentations and approaches. Escargot and moules marinieres share menu space with kale and beet salads, flatbreads brushed with olive oil and rosemary, ahi tuna bowls and a breakfast sandwich of merguez sausage with chipotle mayo.
“The French side of it is represented by technique and experience,” Mendros said. “The Californian side brings imagination and innovation.”
If you build it, we will come.