Big City Tavern’s longtime home on Las Olas Boulevard is getting a makeover and — et voilà — it won’t be another Italian joint. It’ll be a French brasserie.
In mid-January, West Palm Beach-based Big Time Restaurant Group (Rocco’s Tacos, Louie Bossi’s, Elisabetta’s) plans to open Parisol, a casual-chic Fort Lauderdale spot serving French onion soup, steak and Maine lobster frites, Alsatian pizzas, and croque monsieur and croque madame sandwiches. It will also boast a full pastry program of breads baked in-house, alongside desserts such as chocolate soufflés, crème caramel and mousse au chocolate.
Though she originally tried to open in time to host festive réveillon dinners — that’s Christmas/New Year’s Eve for non-Francophiles — Big Time chef-partner Lisabet Summa told the South Florida Sun Sentinel on Friday that Parisol requires a “total renovation” of the old Big City Tavern space.
For one, the redesign will soften its current brick-lined-saloon facade, adding cafe-style seating, white tablecloths and decor “that will be very beautiful, fun and of the subtropics,” she said.
“I couldn’t give up on Las Olas,” said Summa, who is Big Time’s longtime culinary director. “I’m not sure how many restaurants I have left in me at age 65, but I told my co-founder [Big Time’s Todd Herbst] that I wanted to open a French restaurant before I retire.”
Closing Big City Tavern, at 609 E. Las Olas Blvd., at the end of September completed a trio of shutdowns for Big Time — following City Cellar Wine Bar & Grill (May) and Grease Burger, Beer and Whiskey Bar (July) in West Palm Beach.
Still, Summa said diners shouldn’t interpret danger for Big Time’s brand. Instead, it signals an acknowledgment of “changing consumer tastes” that dovetailed with three expiring leases.
“We can’t be stuck in the past,” Summa said. “Business opportunities wane and they rise, and trends go in cycles. I think we’ve borne these storms pretty well, but it’s not like I see this as an antidote for our restaurant group. I see Parisol as a breath of fresh air and a chance for me to try something new. I want to open this restaurant and see it thrive.”
Summa, who’s programming the menu, said she picked Parisol’s not-quite-haute cuisine to be more accessible to diners’ wallets, with entrees around $30 and appetizers priced in the teens, similar in price to those of its Las Olas neighbors Rocco’s Tacos and Louie Bossi’s.
Call Parisol a counterpoint to the recent luxurification of Las Olas, which just saw the arrivals of high-end restaurants Caviar Club and NAIA. It may also be a gamble bringing French cuisine to this restaurant row: Both Elba and La Bonne Crepe closed blocks away in recent years; the next-closest spot on Las Olas, Nanou French Bakery & Café, borders the beach.
“There’s a lot of places to get great food on Las Olas, but we have the cachet to serve cuisine that isn’t overdone here like all the Italian restaurants,” she said. “People have a love affair with French food. It’s reliable, dependable, lovable cuisine.”
And, for Summa, nostalgic.
The restaurant’s idea is inspired by Summa’s early career working at French destination restaurants in Chicago (Alouette, Maxim’s de Paris), but also by her well-studied knowledge of Parisian food trends like bistronomy, a mashup of haute cuisine and less-pretentious, lower-cost bistro cooking.
“French restaurants can be a bit stuffy and serious, but ours will be lively and fun,” she said.
Summa said Parisol will also have a greatest-hits medley of bites borrowed from other Big Time restaurants. For example, there will be caviar-crowned scrambled eggs (from the opening menu at Big City Tavern), charcuterie boards (a nod to Louie Bossi’s salumi program) and a raw bar (a nod to City Oyster & Sushi Bar in Delray Beach).
And its signature dish? It’s French onion soup, based on chicken and veal stock, white wine and herbs, caramelized onions, a blanket of bubbling Gruyère and garlic-rubbed sourdough croutons.
“I’m pretty obsessed with it,” Summa said. “People will be popping into Parisol for that one all the time.”
Parisol, at 609 E. Las Olas Blvd., Fort Lauderdale, is expected to debut in mid-January, starting with dinner service. For more information, visit BigTimeRestaurants.com.
Sun Sentinel senior features writer Phillip Valys can be reached at pvalys@sunsentinel.com or Twitter/X @philvalys.
Dining and Cooking