After Café Brazil ended its 32-year run in December, chef Tony Zarlenga hinted something might take its place.
“While the Café Brazil you know and love may not continue in the same form, the spirit of this space and its story may yet live on in a new chapter,” he wrote in a Facebook post.
Next month, Jonathan Odde and Clarke Boyer will open a whiskey bar at 4408 Lowell Blvd. and make good on those tea leaves.
“Big shoes to fill… And that’s why we wanted to do something here,” said Odde, who owns and operates The Burns Pub in Broomfield. “If (Tony’s) not going to be here, then we want to do something really cool.”
Little Wolf, which is set to open in mid-May, will feature a menu of about 50 American single malt whiskies to start, along with rum and agave spirits. It will also have food, including charcuterie, a Brazilian-styled burger and Oaxacan shrimp.
Boyer said the bites will revolve around flavors from across the globe, with Asian and Latin twists on American staples. Eventually, they want the menu to list specific cocktails that pair well with its entrees and appetizers.
“We don’t want to just come in and open a bar and say, ‘Hey, we’re a whiskey bar. Come drink,’” said Boyer, who recently worked for Colorado spirits brand Arta Tequilia. “I think what this neighborhood wants is somewhere that they can go eat and get fed and enjoy some wonderful food that pairs nicely with our bar program.”
Little Wolf will also host classes and events in the 3,500-square-foot space, like an agave spirits sommelier course. Specific distilleries, like Denver-based Stranahan’s, will be showcased during brand-specific nights.
Boyer was a former ambassador for whiskey companies, and Odde has judged numerous local and national spirits competitions. Each month, the two also meet with a small group for rare-whisky tastings as part of an “ultra-exclusive club,” they joked.
“We were going to try to take over Cafe Brazil, but it just didn’t work out that way,” Boyer said. “So we’re doing this different concept, which, to be honest, is a little bit more in our wheelhouse because we’re both hardcore whiskey fans.”
Because the space already had a kitchen, they didn’t have to do much with the back-of-house. But the two wanted more bar seats, so they demolished a wall to add a half dozen and to have a more separated area for the educational side.
The decor will be more mid-century modern, the pair said, with tiki and Latin influences throughout. In the bigger dining room, there will also be several couch-filled nooks with tables scattered about.
They said the buildout cost $60,000.
”If you want to lounge, you can kick back and relax a little bit. But if you want to sit at a table, have some dinner, you can do that too,” Odde said. “And we’ll have plenty of bar areas, as well.”
Odde and Boyer signed a three-to-four-year lease, which they said is complicated.
That’s because their landlord, who bought the corner of 44th and Lowell for $4 million in 2023, plans to develop an “L-shaped… mixed-use development” there. The Little Wolf building and two others on the parcel will be knocked down to make way for the project.
“We are coming into this particular space for a limited time, and then we’ll have a new space here once the new building goes up,” Boyer said. “At that point in time, once we get closer to the end (of the lease), we’ll figure out. Do we move this business somewhere else and then come in here with something different? Or do we just wait? It would suck to shut down for 18 months and lose the momentum.”
Though there is uncertainty down the line, both are optimistic the new space will be a boon to the community and restaurant.
“We really believed in his vision for everything…If it weren’t for that, we wouldn’t be doing this here,” Odde said of the property owner, John Horvat. “They’re putting in something that’s going to be cool and contribute to the neighborhood.”
Story via BusinessDen.
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