Local food artists Jordana and Garrett VanBergen are finalizing plans to buy the longtime home of children’s boutique Lad & Lassie, which closed in February 2020, and convert it into a restaurant and cafe. EvaDean.

Jordana told The Record that EvaDean hopes to open in mid-2023 and will feature a bakery on the right half of the site and a breakfast-lunch-brunch restaurant on the other side.

“It’s a bit scary. This building needs a lot of love,” she said. “It’s a very big project, but we are very excited.”

Although the sale of the building has not yet been completed, a purchase agreement is in the works, according to the VanBergens and a representative of Connor Max LLC, the owner of the property.

Wilmette Village officials said they have not yet received official documentation for EvaDean’s, but are aware of pending sale and restaurant plans.

While EvaDean’s will be the first company to own a restaurant for the VanBergens, Garrett and Jordana have extensive professional culinary experience.

Garrett VanBergen is the executive chef of Evanston Farma farm-to-tavern restaurant open for lunch, dinner and weekend brunch.

Jordana VanBergen is a Wilmette native and pastry chef. For 10 years, she has worked at Bennison Bakery in Evanston, which is owned and operated by his father, Jory Downer. Her grandfather, Guy Downer, was a baker who bought Bennison’s in 1967. Her grandmother was also a baker. Her name was EvaDean.

Jordana said the couple were looking for places in the area to open their own restaurant and settled there in downtown Wilmette.

“Downtown Wilmette has gotten really cool,” she said. “A lot more than when I was young. … You drive through downtown Wilmette, it’s bustling. There’s a lot more going on there.

A major draw of the building for the VanBergens was the ability to use part of Veterans Park, a small public space adjoining the building to the east, for outdoor dining.

Although use of the park requires formal approval, the Village of Wilmette would also like the building’s occupant to use part of the park, Braiman said.

Garrett VanBergen will be the restaurant-side chef, while Jordana will run the bakery. Garrett’s specialty, she said, is farm-to-table cuisine with specials that rotate with the season.

The VanBergens will also seek to obtain a liquor license from the village in order to serve alcohol – such as wine and cocktails, such as Bloody Marys – with lunch and brunch.

In downtown Wilmette, EvaDean’s will be the third breakfast location, joining Hotcakes at the corner of Wilmette Avenue and Fuel at the north end of the Metra station on Washington Court. The area also includes other bakeries, such as St. Roger Abbey French Organic Patisserie, Panera Bread, and Lawrence Dean’s, as well as incoming Buck Russell’s Bakery and Sandwich Shop.

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Those looking for breakfast or lunch have a new choice in an old building in Cudahy.

La Crema opened in the old Samano building at 3431 E. Plankinton Ave.

Milwaukee residents Gerardo Flores and his sister Claudia Flores began moving the restaurant into the renovated building in November 2021. The siblings hosted a soft opening for La Crema on February 21.

The company name is a Spanish translation of part of the classic French phrase “crème de la crème” which refers to something like the best. Claudia Flores said they used the Spanish version to represent their heritage.

La Crema is open from 7:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. and serves breakfast and lunch but not dinner. Claudia Flores said dinner orders are often “more complex.”

A steak and seafood restaurant from North Carolina named Firebirds Wood Fired Grill has made its way to Texas.

The state’s first Firebirds opens February 14, 2022 in North Fort Worth near downtown Alliance near Keller. Much of the northeast corner of 35W and Heritage Trace Parkway is a pile of dirt right now, but HEB has purchased a parcel of land there. A Chuy’s Tex-Mex is already open next to Firebirds.

After opening, the company’s East Coast rapid operators will focus on Collin County, where a Firebirds is slated to open in Plano, near the Frisco border at State Highway 121 and Preston Road.

The company now has 55 restaurants and plans to open four more in 2022.

The restaurant looks familiar – a bit like a Houston, but with more light.

“We felt early on that the Firebirds were a real fit for the customer base here,” Stephen Loftis, vice president of marketing, says of Fort Worth. He calls the restaurant “contemporary-polished”. It’s the kind of place where steaks are served for lunch and dinner, but you can bring your kids.

The most popular dishes on the menu are the lobster and spinach queso ($14.95 all day), wood-grilled salmon ($16.95 lunch, $25.95 dinner) and a rib eye Cajun ($37.95 all day for 16 ounces).

The seven salads on the menu are generously proportioned. Seared Tuna Superfood Salad comes with a dozen pieces of sushi-grade tuna near a bed of spinach and grains dressed in a tangy avocado-lime vinaigrette.

The restaurant also sells seven burgers. The most popular is the Durango burger, an incredibly high stacked sandwich with pepper jack cheese and fried onions. It’s one of many Colorado-themed menu items: Although this restaurant started in North Carolina and is now in Texas, founder Dennis Thompson had a home in Aspen, Colorado, and named several dishes in his honor.

Southwestern au gratin potatoes, made with a smoked tomato cheese sauce, are spicy and creamy. They’re a good match for Cajun rib eye, says Fort Worth chef Sean Martin.

Martin moved to Fort Worth for work and spent most of his career with the Firebirds. He started working for the company as a dishwasher when he was 18. He became sous-chef at this Delaware restaurant, then was promoted to executive chef at two Firebirds in New Jersey, then two more in Pennsylvania. He is just getting to know Fort Worth alongside general manager Michy Cruz, a native of Virginia.

And are these foreigners worried about moving to beef-loving Texas?

No, says Loftis. “We’re just going to bring our A-game,” he says.

Firebirds Wood Fired Grill is located at 2900 Amador Drive, Fort Worth. The second Firebirds in Texas is scheduled to open in late 2022 at 5430 State Highway 121, Plano.

For more food news, follow Sarah Blaskovich on Twitter at @sblaskovich.

INCLINE VILLAGE, Nevada – What started as a spicy chicken pop-up known as Bertie’s has evolved into sustainable seafood cuisine. The opening of Cape House last week marked the end of an era for Bertie’s, but a new beginning for owner Rick Boyd and the Incline Village community.

“We’re excited to be back in full-service catering,” Boyd said.

By comparison, Boyd explained that Bertie’s primarily served take-out during lunch and dinner hours.

“We’ve done really well with Bertie’s, but we absolutely need to be able to sit down and have conversations with our customers,” Boyd said.

The initial seafood transition plan was first halted by COVID, but even when restrictions began to lift again, Boyd saw a bigger problem with understaffing in the area.

“It was hard to find people while trying to staff Bertie’s for lunch and dinner,” Boyd said. “Some people worked six days a week and didn’t have a life of their own. And by switching to full-service seafood, the price obviously goes up and allows us to have a smaller staff and not be around for that long.

Now Boyd and his team are excited to come back refreshed and ready to serve a sustainable menu of seafood. Sustainability comes from the nation’s current struggle for some high-end items, like king crab.

“We haven’t been able to get some things that we would normally have on the full-time menu either because they’re not available or because they’re just unreasonably priced,” Boyd said. “So we’re really trying to focus on sustainable seafood. “

The menu features fish like trout, salmon caught in the Pacific, oysters, red snapper, and other fish that have faster spawning times.

Cape House officially opened on Tuesday, November 9 and business has been stable since then. Boyd and his team are excited to continue to figure out what the business might look like as the holiday season approaches, as well as to connect with its customers.

“Incline Village is much more of a local community,” Boyd said. “You see a lot of the same faces, even during peak tourist seasons; they are not lost in the crowd. We must therefore try to have a very strong involvement within the community. This has been very important to us since we moved here, it was really trying to come to terms with this.

The restaurant’s opening hours are from 4.30 p.m. to 9 p.m., preferably by reservation. To view the new full menu and to make reservations, visit cape-house.com, or call 775-413-5050.

For more information on organizing a private party, send an email to [email protected].