When Mike Hernandez opened Bistro 821 on Feb. 13, 1994, he had no idea that the restaurant would become Fifth Avenue South‘s most enduring.
As he recalls, there was just Mangrove Café and an English pub down the street.
The space? “It might have been FPL or the phone company.”
Taking inspiration from travels to LuLu’s in San Francisco and London’s emerging gastropub scene, Hernandez set two of his priorities on design and an open kitchen.
As for his top priority ― the food ― his first hire meant moving Jesse Housman, sous chef at Hernandez’s Michael’s Café on U.S. 41, to lead the kitchen.
The first night was fully packed, yet panic sunk in night two, falling on Valentine’s Day because people pre-booked other restaurants for the hallmark holiday before there was word of mouth around town on the bistro’s opening. Restaurants didn’t have websites; there was no Google to see a restaurant’s opening hours or check out availability via OpenTable.
A busy night three proved reassuring. One year later, a rave review from this newspaper on Dec. 1, 1995, called it “a downtown delight.”