Sneak Peek: Louie's Wine Dive, Opening June 4 in Clayton

It's a dive you're likely to flip over.

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Apparently, we've been hanging out in the wrong dives... You know, joints that sell greasy cheeseburgers and cheap beer (and smell like even cheaper beer). Places where requesting a glass of wine would generate a disdainful "you're not from around here, are ya?" look, followed by a dusty, short-stemmed goblet of oxidized something or other.

Then there's Louie's Wine Dive& Clayton Kitchen, opening this week in the former Tani Sushi Bistro space on Bemiston. You'll discover plenty of premium wine—but alas, no Louie—and that the word "dive" was chosen very carefully.

The owners, Whitney VinZant and Corey Gonzalez, have put together an unusual and successful concept, as seven locations in less than five years will attest. (An eighth location is planned.)

VinZant’s background is in franchise restaurants, where he learned the value of efficient, time-tested systems, but never felt the passion of a concept he could call his own.

The grade school buddies wanted to create “a Brooklyn-style, neighborhood restaurant with outstanding scratch food and a major focus on wine.” Their intent was to provide “the best value we possibly could, across the board,” VinZant says, “so patrons would visit several times a week. We’d rather do that than make a ton of money the one time they come in a month.”

The first Louie’s was in Urbandale, a historic area in Des Moines, followed by Brookside, a similar-feeling neighborhood in the Kansas City area. VinZant says he'd been looking for a site in St. Louis for 2 ½ years, and Clayton had the same neighborhood vibrancy; for VinZant, it was “the perfect market for what we do.”

The duo has assembled a team of culinary hotshots: general manager Jon Meinz (formerly of Pi, Brasserie, and Pastaria), executive chef Patrick Baltes (formerly of Cyrano’s Café, Cardwell’s at the Plaza, LHM Properties, and Boundary), and second-level sommelier Patrick Olds (formerly of Cielo at the Four Seasons).

VinZant says the exciting part “was not opening another restaurant, but being able to do that with professionals who have proven themselves in this market. To give autonomy to the local team is a little scary, to be quite honest, but that shows just how far we want to go to not be perceived as ‘just another chain.’’’

Approachability is a word that VinZant uses a lot to describe Louie’s. There are 120 to 150 bottles on the wine list, and 55 to 60 by the glass. The wines are listed in two columns (white and red) and by weight (light to heavy).

If a customer agrees to buy two glasses (half a bottle) of any wine, the remaining two glasses are noted on a 16-by-10-foot chalkboard, simply known as the Wine Board. If the wine does not sell in a certain amount of time, the price is reduced and then reduced again, Dutch-auction style. “It’s really fun when the remainder of a $250 bottle of wine hits the Wine Board, “ VinZant says, “and then watch to see how long it stays up there.” Or the guest can gamble and see how low the price will go. “Does it cost us more? Sure,” says VinZant, “but we’ve provided a truly unique experience, one that people tend to talk about after they leave.”

The Wine Board also lists wines chosen specifically by Patrick Olds, who says he focuses on finding values in classic regions, rather than buying a close-out wine just because it’s been marked down. While some wine lists mirror a distributor’s close-out list, Olds says “this one definitely won’t.”

“If we have the opportunity to buy an entire lot because of our connections—or even few bottles of a highly allocated wine—those will appear on our Wine Board,” adds VinZant.

Asked if different wines would be stored in coolers calibrated to their proper serving temperatures, VinZant quips, “Yes—and I just spent way too much money assuring that would happen.”

The team at Louie’s will host four to six wine dinners per year, priced at $45 per person—far less than $75 to $125 dinners elsewhere. “That price point is not us,” VinZant emphasizes.

Cocktails are reasonably priced as well: There are nine offerings at $9 apiece, original takes on cocktails made with homemade infusions and bitters. “We work really hard on those craft cocktails—maybe too hard,” VinZant jokes. Beer is not an afterthought at Louie’s either. Local bottled beers are well represented, as well as a few rotating drafts.

The executive chef inherits a menu of proven, signature items combined with a weekly, three-course, prix fixe menu of his own choosing. VinZant calls it “setting ourselves up for success, as well as being unique to the neighborhood.” The formula allows each location's executive chef to tap into local, specialty purveyors.

Louie’s prix fixe menus are considered “mini R&D projects,” says VinZant, with company-wide menus consisting of former prix fixe successes. The price of the prix fixe is at the discretion of the local chef, but typically ranges from the high $20s to the low $30s, with paired wines generally priced at $7 to $9 per glass. The prix fixe menus are so popular, says VinZant, that many guests never even look at the regular menu (which, by the way, is as clean, bold, and straight forward as any we’ve seen).

On it, you’ll find Emily’s Apple Harvest (pictured above), a popular salad with chicken, field greens, apples, cranberries, bacon, goat cheese, candies pecans, and balsamic vinaigrette. Steak Deburgo (pictured below) is another big seller. Priced at $22, it boasts a Parmesan crust and herbed steak butter. 

A beautifully encrusted Tandoori Atlantic Salmon for $17 (pictured below) is perched on a bed of roasted red pepper quinoa and cilantro mint chutney.

For dessert, the house-made Carrot Cake for $6 (pictured below) contains candied carrots, as well as a cream-cheese frosting and crème anglaise.

While the décor is described as "rustic chic," the preponderance of white-painted barn wood from an 1880s-era milk barn calls to mind "shabby chic," a descriptor any respectable wine dive would surely embrace.

One goal of the décor—and of Louie’s, in general—is “to create energy, to maximize energy,” says VinZant. High on one wall is a signature detail: rows of wine bottles illuminated from the rear that appears to be a 111-bottle display of rosé. Below them is a banquette, with tables at bar height. “Since everyone’s on the same level, there are no low spots, no seats below the action, and that creates energy,” says VinZant.

Coppery globe lights create a warm glow, but the rustic look above them was created simply by turning ceiling tiles upside down, a detail VinZant says “set us back 39 cents a foot.”

The atmosphere was created to exude energy, with an open kitchen, a nearby dining counter, 80 seats inside (include comfy blue leather booths), 30 seats on the patio, as well as an operable set of windows. A projector shows wine videos and scenes of different vineyards, playing to a purpose. “We want to get our guests to start asking us questions, to interact,” says VinZant. “We hope we can generate a little wine knowledge along the way.

“Although we take wine seriously, we want to make the wine experience approachable and fun," VinZant adds. "We want to be the exact opposite of pretentious, intimidating, and confusing, and thought walking into a place called Louie’s Wine Dive was a good way to start."

About that name: In 2004, VinZant had a mentor who’d operated 10 successful restaurant concepts over a 40- to 50-year span. His recommendation was to “make your restaurant a place the masses will relate to. He’d always wanted to open a place called Louie’s but died of cancer before he ever did. At the time, I was ready to sign my first lease. Louie’s it was.”

The restaurant opens to the public this Saturday, June 4. Seating will be on a first come, first served basis. Louie’s will soon incorporate the Nowait system, the app that allows customers to jump onto a restaurant’s waiting list from their mobile device.  It’s a slick, new tool (one we love) that proponents call “almost a reservation.”

Louie’s Wine Dive & Clayton Kitchen

16 S. Bemiston

 314-875-9373

Website

Hours:

Mon–Thu: 11 a.m.–10 p.m.

Fri: 11 a.m.–11 p.m.

Sat–Sun Brunch: 10 a.m.–2 p.m.

Sat Dinner: 2 p.m.–11 p.m.

Sun Dinner: 2 p.m.–9 p.m.

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