by HOLLY HABER|photographs by CARTER ROSE
Grange Hall, that Travis Street reservoir of retail cool, deepens the pool this month with the unveiling of an adjoining cafe for lunch and afternoon tea. The fare? Simple but clever, according to Rajan Patel, co-owner and self-professed “total foodie.” The menu may not rank among the Michelin-starred restaurants he and co-owner Jeffrey Lee favor, but they promise it will be meticulously executed. Take the madeleines. Proust would surely approve that the little cakes will be baked to order and served warm from the oven — the perfect complement to premium teas from the venerable Parisian emporium Mariage Frères. “It will be novel in that I don’t think you can go anywhere in the city and be served Mariage Frères,” Patel says, “let alone eight varieties of it. We are [also]offering them iced if anyone chooses to be decadent enough to ice a Mariage Frères tea.” Epicurean Sharon Hage, of York Street fame, serves as consulting chef, while Chad Martin, formerly of Hôtel St. Germain, mans the kitchen.
Anyone who has seen the Grange Hall boutique, which is now bigger and loaded with more fine jewelry and imposing artwork, knows that beautiful presentation is a given. The details extend to the new cafe’s tableware, where specialties such as black-olive biscotti with house-made ricotta and crudités are plated on fine bone china resembling Carrara marble. Better yet? Pretty much all the accoutrements are sold on site. It would be wise to start a tab.
