Bar Frenchman will rebrand as Le Riviera
Chef owner Andrew Garbarino has decided to rename Bar Frenchman as Le Riviera, a change that will take place during the week of July 2, when he’ll have a new sign and a new menu.
“People kept booking reservations downstairs thinking it was fine dining,” he says, noting the similarity of the names between Twisted Frenchman — the flagship tasting menu restaurant on the second floor — and the Bar Frenchman downstairs.
He won’t change the designs or drink menus of the two spaces.
Bar Frenchman opened in August on the ground floor of a 122year-old building that was most recently the Royal York Auction Gallery and in the 1920s a Hudson car dealership. The 60-seat bar and dining room has been a Frenchstyle brasserie serving $19 flat iron steak, oysters and mussels, a sturgeoncaviar tasting and more.
Le Riviera will feature a Mediterranean menu with influences from Spain, France and Portugal, with input from Mr. Garbarino’s new general manager, Yannick Thomas — originally from
fall around $35 to $40.
In other switch-ups, Adam Bates will join as the pastry chef, most recently having helped Cronut inventor Dominique Ansel open his Los Angeles location last year. Mr. Bates also worked in New Zealand and closer to home at Gaby et Jules in Squirrel Hill and Avenue B, now closed.
Look for rustic French pastries on the menu at Le Riviera and more refined options at Twisted Frenchman later this summer. Eventually, they’ll be available for retail/take home.
In 2015, Mr. Garbarino, a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., opened the Twisted Frenchman on South Highland Avenue in what had been Notion. That space closed last year and was moved to the second floor of the Baum Boulevard location while Bar Frenchman was a new concept.