outside restaurant entrance
Through no small endeavor, the new Butcher & The Boar officially opens in the Basset Creek office building on February 7. This is, of course, a rebirth.
I love looking back at our 2012 OG Sneak Peek with founding chef Jack Riebel, because we were basically in the unfinished basement cooking sausages on a rigged flattop and drinking whiskey. So young, so fresh. That original restaurant on Hennepin would come to define American craft cooking for the city. Eventually though, Riebel was pushed out, founding partner Tim Rooney passed on, chefs came and went, and the spot closed amid financial skullduggery during the pandemic.
Then, a bit of a bidding war for the rights to the restaurant resulted in the Kaskaid Hospitality team claiming the space and opening The Butcher's Tale as an homage in May of 2021. Jester Concepts retained the name and the sausages, with a pledge to find a new home to reimagine the iconic, smokey, penny-decked restaurant envisioned by Rooney and Riebel.
kitchen and staff
And hoooo-boy, I think they did it. I happened to walk in yesterday and David Shea of Shea Design was there to check in on the work. He mentioned how much fun it had been working with this team to take on the challenge of reinventing the original that his company had labored over many years ago, "The fun part was partnering with Brent and Mike who shared the vision and the respect for what Butcher was and what it could become to a new generation of guests."
It starts at the front door. They knew they had a challenge to make this quiet, off-the-main-drag office and condo building look like the destination restaurant that B&TB should be. The soaring windows of the newly constructed entry way send the signal they wanted. I barely recognize the space as the old MSP Mag offices.
main dining
When you enter, at night, you get the glow: Warm lights, soft leather everywhere, giant rugs softening the hard floors, lots of wood. This is not a carbon copy of the original spot, it's truly an homage that strives to pull the best features of the original and offer them to you. It might be weird to say this, but it's more about the feeling you get from the space, it connects. It gives you the vibe you might remember from the heady days of the original, but it's not trying to be a theme park. If you have never stepped foot in the original, you won't feel like you're missing the joke, you'll probably just think "hmmmmm, whiskey drink tonight?"
the bar getting ready to open
The bar was custom-made and features a stuffed boar as the centerpiece (Jester loves those heads, please visit the one in the Constantine back room.) There's an Old Fashioned on the menu of course, but it won't be the Parlour Old Fashioned—it was important to the team that they establish themselves separately from their sister bar just down the road.
big booths
Booths lining the glass opposite the bar clearly recall the seating in the original. But you have to love the massive booths just beyond that hold 6-8 people. You've seen some in PS Steak, and these inspire that same notion: Let's get the gang in here and hunker down together for the night. Behind the papered glass is Phase 2, more on that later.
long table in shadow room
This may be one of the bigger restaurants to open since the pandemic, but it doesn't feel cavernous. There are lots of smaller spaces carved out of the footprint. They understand that private dining is an important component in design, and they've created smaller rooms that can be open to regular dining crowds without feeling cut off, while still being able to close doors and create special spaces when needed. This one, the Shadow Room, with a huge long table that seats about 20 has a window into the kitchen so that you never feel out of the action. It's named for the shadow art on the wall, but it recalls the charred walls of the original.
glass room with chandelier
But there is one room that has special significance. It's called the Riebel Room and is named after the late great Jack Riebel in honor of the Riebel era. "The Riebel family was the first to dine in this room," owner Brent Frederick told me. "Before Jack passed, we talked with him about what we wanted to do with the restaurant, how we wanted it to be, and he gave us his blessing. It meant a lot. His wife Kat is part of our ownership group." The private, glassed-in room features a stunning chandelier and has a nice prominence in the dining space.
penny floor and bathroom
The pennies are back, but not on the bar like in the original space. In this iteration of B&TB, the pennies cover the floor in the back hallway, which leads to 8 single non-gendered bathrooms. Each one has a different design and tile work.
yard with trees and street
There are more things to come! This area along the side of the building will become patio seating some time this summer. While they have to cut down some of the birch trees to make it work, they are replanting with oak trees.
billiard lights
And that Phase 2 room behind the sheeting? In the coming weeks, that will become the Char Bar. The separate cocktail room will focus on whiskey and have its own menu, much like how Parlour Bar lives with Borough down the street. There are a lot of cool design elements planned with cigar boxes and suitcases, but all I was allowed to snap was the cool lighting. Stay tuned for that!
dining room with long banquette
There's this snuggy banquette in the front room that I feel like might be the best seat in the house. Though, we'll see what that means to whomever comes in. Little design touches like that, with mismatched chairs and hidden charging sockets along the bar, are the moments and textures that Frederick and his team bring to the places they open. It's especially important here, because their mission is to honor a titan of the dining scene, while remaining true to themselves and their own vision. "The menu has some of the classic favorites, but it's not a recreation of the old menu with stuff added on," partner Mike DeCamp told me. "We're hoping we've created something that maybe Jack would have done if he was opening Butcher & The Boar in 2023." Honoring the past with a forward gaze. Evolution, then, is the name of this game.
drink on the bar
Soft open parties are happening, but you can reserve for the February 7 opening night. Or, the bar will always be walk-in friendly.
