Food People:
Click here to read about more food peopleStyle & Substance
By Elizabeth Licata
Ever since he was fifteen, washing dishes in a Turgeon brothers eatery, Steve Calvaneso wanted to be in the restaurant business. Now, just over twenty years later, he’s running a successful mini-empire of upscale Western New York restaurants, including two exciting new downtown venues: The Ya Ya Bayou Brewhouse and Bacchus.
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Three of them are within a mile of each other, but Calvaneso is confident the clientele is there to keep all of them thriving.
“It’s not about a silver bullet,” Calvaneso says about Western New York’s future. “It’s about businessmen like me spending some money and supporting our home town. People seek out quality. I try to create destination restaurants in awesome spaces.”
Awesome, indeed. Calvaneso’s downtown restaurants are located in three exquisite spaces: the Market Arcade complex (Ya-Ya), the Calumet Building (Bacchus), and a classic turn-of-the-century former department store on Main Street (City Grill). His suburban venue, Calvaneso’s—though lacking the historic architecture—offers similar big-city elegance. “In Manhattan, it would be a neighborhood restaurant,” says Calvaneso.
Together, the four venues, as well as Exquisite Catering, which operates from the Delaware Park Casino, make up Ultimate Restaurants, Inc. The corporation started when Calvaneso converted two former Hooligans restaurants in 1999, one on Transit Rd. and one downtown, into Calvaneso’s and City Grill.
“We gutted Calvaneso’s completely, but City Grill already had a great base,” he says. Both restaurants focus on the casual but savvy diner, someone who doesn’t feel like wearing a suit and tie, but does know about wine lists and interesting food.
Calvaneso thinks overly formal upscale dining is in decline. “Diners are more savvy, but the atmosphere is more laid back, now,” he states. “They don’t want the pomp, but they do want spotless, comfortable surroundings, attention to detail, and sophisticated food.”
Almost immediately, the two restaurants received national recognition for the quality and diversity of their wine lists. City Grill has an all “New World” wine list—wines from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, South America, America’s West Coast, and, last but not least, New York State.
There are always far more wines by the glass available at both Calvaneso’s and at City Grill than at any other Buffalo restaurant—making it possible to enjoy a pleasant evening of wine tasting without the formality, rules, and intimidation.
A paradise for wine geeks
Calvaneso is now poised to up the wine ante to a level never before seen in Western New York. The soon-to-open Bacchus will offer 200 wines by the glass and over fifty half bottles. Every bottle on the menu will be available by the glass. There are really only a few places that do this—Soho Kitchen in Manhattan comes to mind—partly because of the difficulty in keeping all the open bottles fresh and mainly because most restaurants don’t have this kind of commitment to wine diversity. For all the wine adventurers in Western New York, the opening of Bacchus will be the highlight of the fall season.
Along with the wine, Calvaneso plans a menu of small dishes, so that food tasting can be coordinated with the different wines. “After two bites, you stop tasting the intensity of the food, so we’re making it possible to try five or six different plates,” says Calvaneso. “We want to remove the intimidation from wine and food pairing. Some things really do go together better, and every night we’ll feature certain foods to go with certain wines.”
Focus on the local: Ya Ya
Calvaneso is not just a hero for wine geeks. More than a few Buffalo officials stopped having to wring their hands over the empty space (and unpaid debts) left by Empire Brewing, when Ultimate Restaurants stepped in to take over the block-long Market Arcade space. Unlike the imported Breckenridge and Empire chains, Calvaneso’s plans for the space are based on his knowledge of the local clientele and his realism about what can be expected in terms of revenue. Like Breckenridge and Empire, Ya Ya Bayou Brewhouse—which opened its doors in July—has locally brewed suds, but it will also offer a sophisticated wine list and a well-defined menu of New Orleans specialties: fresh oysters, po boys, crawfish, gumbo, southern fried chicken, and steaks. At the moment, the beer is being brewed by Flying Bison, in accordance with Calvaneso’s insistence that local products be supported, but eventually, Ya Ya will have its own custom brewcrafters.
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It is difficult to put your finger on what these four restaurants have in common. There is a feeling of comfort, definitely, which may come from the carefully orchestrated casualness. You feel free to come in whenever you want and sit over your wine and talk without being the cynosure of too much official attention. It’s a big-city feeling—but without the big-city prices.
As we sat sipping wine at a City Grill table, listening to Thursday-in-the-Square wind down, it was easy to feel optimistic about Buffalo—as long as businessmen like Steve Calvaneso continue to make such imaginative investments in an environment where imagination is so sorely needed.
Elizabeth Licata is editor of Buffalo Spree.
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