By Christina Johnson
RUMSON – With its tables layered in white linen tablecloths, cherry wood paneled walls and traditional tableside Caesar salad service, the newly re-opened Fromagerie is seeking to distinguish itself from the trendy food scene battling it out around its Ridge Road home.
Partners Steven Botta and Angelo Bongiovanni, with restaurant owners Paul and Enilda Sansone, are confident that quiet, elegant, traditional Continental cuisine is poised for a comeback. Their heavy, bound menus describe the classic American favorites of the good life in the 1960s-80s: Escargot and foie gras. Lamb with mint jelly. Black beluga lentils. Aged porterhouse steak and 8-ounce lobster tails.
You won’t find kale salad, sushi roll or fish tacos here.
“We were fans of the restaurant, and we started talking about bringing Fromagerie back to its glory days, when the Peters owned it,” said Botta, the executive chef, about the motivation by the partners to scoop up the landmark property after it was put up for sale by the David Burke Group. Prior to Burke’s control, Hubert and Markus Peter famously ran Fromagerie for 34 years. The new owners have opened Fromagerie with a familiar, but refreshed personality in fine dining. “I think people were hungry for something different,” he said. The “jackets-only” policy for men in the dining room, on Friday and Saturday nights, was dusted off and re-established. Cocktails are served. Food is cooked to order. Service is purposefully unrushed.
The Fromagerie is unlike other eateries, in that its located in a century-old former home, with private banquettes and alcoves and two gas fireplaces, which gives it an unfair advantage when it comes to charm. Upon passing through the wooden front door with the distinctive antique metal pull, diners can choose to be seated in the clubby bar room to the left (now known as The Rumson Room); in the formal dining room at the right, or upstairs in a large lounge with a bar where sometimes live music trios offer Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin favorites. An intimate wine room lined with bottles and dominated by a wooden table is down- stairs. The softly colored marble and tile restrooms with artwork and hanging mirrors are upscale, and worth the visit.
“It’s really ‘the full experience’ we were going for,” said
Jill Ryan, the Little Silver-based interior decorator who helped the Fromagerie make its transition to its neutral palette, sparked by pops of color in the paintings and accessories. “We wanted guests to feel surrounded by a comfortable and beautiful restaurant.” She made improvements to ease the flow in the restaurant, and used partitioning to create an inviting little banquette for four at the left of the door way in the Rumson Room – once the least popular table in the room, it’s now the most requested. “Everybody always likes to have their own private space,” she said.
Seating in the bar room is on leather chairs with antique brass or copper nail head trim, a proper setting to sip Fromagerie’s take on cocktails like the Old Fashioned, the Negroni or Blood Orange Martini. The lighting is cast by recessed lighting, sconces and hanging antique metal and glass teardrop chandeliers. On standby, between tables, are floor-standing Champagne ice buckets and antique serving carts.
“Something unique to the old Fromagerie that we kept are these ‘pocketbook poufs,’” said Ryan, of Jill Ryan Interiors. “They are like miniature footstools for ladies to leave their pocketbooks on, next to their chair.” A dozen originals were reclaimed and re-upholstered in faux ostrich leather for the new restaurant.
Orazio Mattioli of Colts Neck was the general contractor on the new Fromagerie. “It was a challenging project to take a historically old restaurant and give it new life,” he said. When he peeled back the layers, he discovered its many extensions over the years, old knob-and-tube electrical wiring in the walls, old newspapers stuffed in window seams, a few old photos, an antique carnival wheel in the attic, the original mailbox with logo on it and “50 years of Band- Aids.” To fortify the structure, his company installed steel beams, leveled some floors which were as much as six inches out of whack, and removed columns from the bar room.
To make the restaurant more accessible to people with disabilities, a ramp is being installed on the side of the restaurant that leads to the first floor. But due to the structure’s load bearing walls, a handicapped-accessible bathroom cannot be created on the first floor, and is instead located on the second floor, which still meets compliance because it’s a historic structure, he said.
Chef Botta, a businessman-turned chef, is particularly proud of the restaurant’s selection of aged beef, which he said is “probably bigger than most Manhattan steakhouses.” His experience in the restaurant world has been earned through partnership with Bongiovanni, a childhood friend from Brooklyn who ran restaurants in New York City.
Together the Monmouth County residents own Brando’s Cita Cucina in Asbury Park and Osteria Cucina Rustica in Marlboro.
The restaurant is open for dinner only, seven days a week, from 5-10 p.m. Happy hour starts at 4 p.m.
Fromagerie is located at 26 Ridge Road in Rumson. The website is FromagerieNJ.com
