There’s French dining, and then there’s New York French dining. Chateau Royale is enthusiastically the latter.
“We knew we wanted to be something grand, and also something that was a little bit more American — specifically New York-leaning,” says co-owner Cody Pruitt. The restaurateur is opening the doors to Chateau Royale in the Greenwich Village with business partner Jacob Cohen, two years after they debuted their popular West Village bistro Libertine on Greenwich Street. Feeling that they had “more to say,” they began looking for a space for their next concept, landing on a cozy two-floor property on a leafy stretch of Thompson Street, just north of Houston Street.
“ Libertine really was our way of emphasizing what a bistro actually is; it’s not just a restaurant without a tablecloth, it’s a regional French restaurant,” Pruitt says. “We wanted it to be transportive from one place to another. Whereas here, we wanted to do something more temporally based,” he adds. “There’s such an amazingly rich history of French restaurants in New York that are not authentically French, but very much they’re authentically New York French.”
Pruitt cites nearby restaurants like Raoul’s and Balthazar as inspiration for the concept, which is rooted in grand New York dining nostalgia without the kitsch. “A lot of what we want to serve here and our design choices were inspired by these places that lasted decades,” Pruitt says. “And we wanted to lean into the time element of nostalgia for transportive-ness, instead of just removing ourselves from the West Village and going to Paris.”
Speaking of nostalgia: former tenants in the space have included a live music venue, a Mexican restaurant, an Italian restaurant, a live poultry market and a carriage house. The team reimagined the space for its next chapter over the past year and a half, retaining only the original flooring and “bones” of the building.
Chateau Royale houses two distinct but inherently linked dining concepts. On the ground floor, the 30-seat bar room is sultry with low lighting and warm wood tones. Oxblood banquettes and bar stool seating set the scene for casual dinner and cocktails; upstairs, a white-walled, more formal dining experience awaits. Picture-frame windows throughout the room overlook the tree-lined block, and a large pendant light extends down from the room’s skylight. The overall design is quietly elegant and minimalist, with thoughtful details throughout each floor.
The kitchen is led by executive chef Brian Young, formerly chef du cuisine at Le Bernadin. While several dishes are shared between the two spaces — including the foie gras tourcheon and escargots bourguignon — the downstairs bar menu features more casual fare, like a burger and hot dog homage to Harry’s Bar in Paris. Upstairs, the menu is built out with traditional French mains like lobster thermidor and Dover sole à la Grenouille, an homage to the iconic and now-closed uptown French restaurant.
“A lot of what we’re offering in terms of cuisine is referential or inspired by dishes that were popular for decades, and then for different reasons, they are no longer popular or as ubiquitous as they were,” says Pruitt, citing dishes like duck à l’orange and chicken cordon bleu.
The main bar room is anchored by a list of 15 cocktails inspired by classic Paris bars including the Ritz and Harry’s. Upstairs, drinks are poured and presented table side from a mobile brass and mahogany bar cart.
Chateau Royale will be open for dinner seven days a week, with weekend brunch service imminent. The hope is that the restaurant will become a home-away-from-home for its guests.
“If a neighbor comes in and gets a burger downstairs or a glass of wine before going home after work, fantastic. If they treat upstairs as a special occasion restaurant, fantastic,” Pruitt says. “We want to be flexible and open and hospitable in as many ways as we can.”
Escargots, from the Chateau Royale menu.
Courtesy of Evan Sung
Dining and Cooking