Dining Room Furniture Should Be How to Choose?

So, rather than finding the perfect location and spending endless amounts of money on decor and kitchen equipment, the team behind the recently opened Nights and Weekends has taken an unconventional route. The franchise owners of the Meat and Bread sandwich shop in the downtown Grain Exchange Building approached Nights and Weekends’ now-manager Aaron Ellard, knowing that he has plenty of restaurant experience, including running a roving dim sum pop-up called SUM SUM that’s held events in Calgary bars over the last few years. Since Meat and Bread is only open for lunch, the owners thought Ellard could make good use of the space in its off-hours.

Chefs from left: Bern Glatz, Nick Berenyi and Zander Hamm with the Nights and Weekends pop-up restaurant get food ready before opening in the Meat and Bread sandwich shop. Gavin Young/Postmedia

Gavin Young

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CALwp

Ellard recruited co-chefs Bern Glatz (who has worked in the kitchens at Ten Foot Henry, Anju, UNA and Mercato) and Nick Berenyi (formerly of Bar Von Der Fels, Ox and Angela and UNA), as well as his SUM SUM partner Zander Hamm, who helped out with the menu. Klaire McCallum of Vine Arts signed on as wine director and Nights and Weekends was born.

Despite having a regular location, the restaurant still brands itself as a pop-up, since the space is not really its own. The Nights and Weekends crew moves in on Thursdays through Sundays from 5 p.m. onward when the sandwich shop is closed. The furniture, signage and kitchen all belong to Meat and Bread — dinner guests sit at the 30 seats that line the sandwich counter, front window and a long table towards the back of the room, just as they would if they were grabbing a quick workday lunch. Nights and Weekends is essentially squatting in another restaurant, which is a huge part of its charm.

“We’re a completely different business than the one that operates there during the day,” Ellard says. “We face a lot of constraints in that we’re working around everything that is already in place.”

Chef Bern Glatz prepares a dish at the Nights and Weekends pop-up restaurant in the Meat and Bread sandwich shop. Gavin Young/Postmedia

Gavin Young

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CALwp

The non-committal nature of the space also gives the chefs a chance to flex their creativity. Without the pressure of having a large corporate dining room to fill, Glatz and Berenyi’s small plates menu is daring, fun and full of flavour. Like the venue, the food has an enticing fly-by-night feel — every few months the chefs will revamp the menu from scratch, hinging it on an entirely different kind of cuisine.

Currently, diners can choose from a small menu with a decidedly Asian fusion flair, with dishes like a cold baby beet salad with shishito peppers and cashews ($12), house-made tagliatelle with guanciale, kombu dashi and shiitake mushrooms ($9) or a larger format bao plate for two with a rotating filling (it’s set at market price, but when I stopped in it was $24 for four succulent pork belly buns). The servers recommend ordering four to five plates per couple, which is more than enough food.

The drinks are also a key part of the concept — limited storage space means that McCallum can only have a few wines on hand but she keeps a well-curated selection, maintaining a “whatever is open” policy for wines ordered by the glass. There are also a few cocktails to try as well as surprisingly affordable bottles of wine.

Nights and Weekends is located at 821 1st St. S.W. and is open from 5 p.m. to 12 a.m. Thursdays through Sunday. To make a reservation visit

nightsandweekends.ca

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The popular Dinner and a Movie nights at Heritage Park have returned for 2019. Held once a month, guests enjoy a three-course dinner in the Selkirk Grille inspired by an iconic movie, followed by a screening of said movie in the Gasoline Alley Museum. Tickets are $44 for the whole shebang or $8 for those who want to just do the movie.

The first event of the year is on Jan. 29, featuring the classic

Groundhog Day

(maybe the chef will serve the same thing for all three courses?). A full list of dates and movie selections can be found at

heritagepark.ca

and reservations can be made on the site or by calling 403-268-8607.

Send some positive vibes out to Calgary’s Dave Bohati next weekend as he travels to Kelowna to represent our local restaurant community at the Canadian Culinary Championships. Bohati, executive chef for both the Calgary and Canmore Murrieta’s locations, will face 10 other chefs from around the country in a fight for the top title. Bohati won the Calgary qualifier in November as part of Canada’s Great Kitchen Party fundraising event with a dish of smoked Waygu beef cheeks.

Bohati has made it to the national finals before: he previously won the Calgary qualifier in 2014. The competition takes place Feb. 1-2 in Kelowna. Calgarians willing to make the trek to cheer Bohati on can buy tickets at

greatkitchenparty.com

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Elizabeth Chorney-Booth can be reached at

elizabooth@gmail.com

. Follow her on Twitter at @elizaboothy or Instagram at @elizabooth.