Bay Area diners will have no shortage of new choices in 2009 as local chefs and restaurateurs ignore economic naysayers and forge ahead with new projects, especially in the East Bay.
The most ambitious is from Gar and Lara Trupelli, owners of San Francisco's Beach Chalet Brewery and Restaurant, and Park Chalet (both at 1000 Great Hwy.). They're calling their new spot - surprise! - Lake Chalet Restaurant Bar and Grill. It'll take over the top floor of the renovated Lake Merritt Boat House (1520 Lakeside Drive) in Oakland.
It's expansive - 10,000 square feet of dining space, with 350 seats, including indoor and outdoor seating overlooking the lake, and banquet space for about 100 people.
A 70-foot-long bar fronts the lake. It'll be the spot to linger over one of the beers made specifically for Lake Chalet at Beach Chalet's brewery in San Francisco. Cass Calder Smith's CCS Architecture is doing the design.
Although the Trupellis have yet to name a chef, the food will be similar in price and style to what's served at the Beach Chalet - what Gar Trupelli calls "modern American cuisine" - with dinner entrees topping out at about $20. Lunch and dinner will be served daily, with brunch on weekends. Trupelli is also hoping to do morning cafe service on the dock.
Plans are to open in the spring, which is when the landscaping of the area will also be complete.
The first floor will remain devoted to water sports, housing the Lake Merritt rowing club and another boating concession.
But diners won't have to wait until spring for other nearby openings. In the first half of January, the folks from the defunct Zax Tavern in Berkeley - the husband-and-wife team of Mark Drazek and Barbara Mulas, now joined by partner Anne Marie Adrian - are planning to open Sidebar in the former Trio Bistro site (542 Grand Ave.) across from Lake Merritt.
Sidebar will feel different from Zax, Mulas says, with a bar in the middle of the room, communal tables, an open kitchen with counter seating and ottoman seating in the lounge area.
Mulas will do the cooking, which will feature a long list of appetizers in the $6-$10 range (including her signature twice-baked goat cheese souffle), daily changing entrees (about $11-$19) and desserts from pastry chef Drazek. Adrian will serve as general manager.
Although it's described as a gastropub, all beer will be in bottles, with many by-the-glass wine offerings.
A month later - in early February - look for the opening of Adesso from Dopo's Jon Smulewitz.
Adesso (4524 Piedmont Ave.) will focus on house-made salumi and pates, panini, small plates, gelato, dessert and a long list of Italian wines.
Because it's just two blocks from Dopo (4293 Piedmont Ave.), Smulewitz figures he and Dopo sous chef Peter Swanson will go back and forth to do the cooking.
Former Chronicle Rising Star Chef James Syhabout is also hoping to open his own place in the East Bay if the deal closes according to plan. In the meantime, he's left his position as chef de cuisine at the four-star Manresa in Los Gatos (320 Village Lane).
"I'm very excited for James, but also very excited for our future," says Manresa chef-owner David Kinch, who has promoted Syhabout's sous chef, John Paul Carmona, just 25 years old, to replace Syhabout.
Carmona has been at Manresa just over two years, having worked at Ken Oringer's Clio in Boston and at Mugaritz in the Basque region of Spain.
"John Paul is in tune with the garden, and has a great grasp of the produce that comes out of there. I expect him to take full advantage," Kinch says.
We'll let you know as soon as the ink is dry on Syhabout's new venture.
Back across the bay, Paul Einbund has left as sommelier at the four-star Coi (373 Broadway), also to open his own place nearby, on Russian Hill. He's tentatively calling it Warmth, and it will be part cafe and wine bar, part knitting shop.
It's a unique venture combining Einbund's passion for wine with his wife, Vanessa's, passion for knitting. He foresees the cafe serving Blue Bottle coffee, Pinkie's Bakery pastries and bread, Andante Dairy cheese and his own wine selections. The knitting shop will be in the back.
Einbund envisions a place that's "very simple, clean, neighborhoody, with everything executed perfectly - perfectly chosen wines, cheese, yarns." He's hoping to firm things up shortly, then open in the spring.
Einbund will remain a partner in Coi with chef Daniel Patterson, who e-mails that Einbund has his full support.
In the Financial District, Perbacco's Staffan Terje and Umberto Gibin are taking over the space next door for what they're hoping to call Barbacco (230 California).
As The Chronicle's Michael Bauer wrote in his blog last week, the new place will be serve a casual lunch of salads, sandwiches, soups, baked pasta and a couple of entrees, either what Gibin calls a "quick full service" designed to get diners in and out in about 45 minutes, with an average check of about $17, or takeout for about $11-$12. At dinner, the place will be more of a wine bar, with about 100 wines and 50 by the glass.
The dinner menu is still up in the air, but will include Terje's house-made salumi, and a combination of small and large plates ranging from $5 to $17. Terje will oversee the food, but the chef will likely be promoted from Perbacco's kitchen.
Seating will include larger tables that can seat several parties at once, plus lots of counter seating. "It will be completely different from Perbacco," Gibin says.