“Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.” Yogi Berra may or may not have said that, and if he did, he was talking about Ruggeri’s, an iconic Italian restaurant on The Hill in St. Louis.
But Yogi might as well have been talking about The House of Marigold, a stylish new restaurant out Shelbyville Road. This breakfast-and-lunch spot opened late in March and got so popular, so fast, that it took me until now to find a way to beat the crowds and get in.
Stymied by a no-reservations policy, two-hour waits and an overflowing parking lot on several early attempts, I finally resorted to calling to ask about the best way to claim a table.
The gist of management’s advice: Don’t try it on a weekend, and don’t wait until after 11 a.m.
That seemed fair, so we rolled in at 10:30 on a Friday morning, got a table right away, enjoyed great service and a fine meal, and watched the tables fill up around us as the noise level grew.
Located in a free-standing building that previously housed a short-lived branch of Royals Hot Chicken, House of Marigold has been through a serious remodel. It’s spacious and airy, with walls of windows, rows of hanging lights, and classic casual decor in whites, greens, golds and natural wood.
The co-owners, the husband and wife team of Chef Kristopher and host Adrienne Cole, parlayed a history in the local eats business and a successful catering company with popular mobile bar carts into powerful word of mouth publicity.
The restaurant claims a commitment to local produce and meat suppliers (including Kentucky beef from poet Wendell Berry’s Our Home Place local farms initiative). The menu incorporates breakfast, brunch, and lunch options throughout its 8 a.m.-3 p.m. daily operations. (The dining room is available to rent after those hour for special events and private dinners.)
Cole’s seasonal menu offers breakfast items (billed as “I’m not ready for lunch”), “biscuit things,” shareable dishes, salads, sandwiches, and entrees (“whole lotta lunch”). Most items range in price from $10 to $18, with entrees a bit more spendy at $22 (for vegetable pad Thai) to $27 (for seared salmon); add more protein to any dish for $7 (for chicken breast) to $12 (for steak, salmon, or shrimp). ...
Read the full review on LouisvilleHotBytes,
https://www.louisvillehotbytes.com/early-bird-marigold
You'll also find this review in LEO Weekly's Food & Drink section today:
http://www.leoweekly.com/category/food-drink/
The House of Marigold
10310 Shelbyville Road
384-3767
https://thehouseofmarigold.com/welcome
https://facebook.com/marigoldcateringco
https://instagram.com/houseofmarigoldky
Noise Level: Undraped tables, glass window walls and hard surfaces bounce around the sound of a happy crowd, making conversation difficult. Noise levels averaged a 79.7 roar to an ear-shattering 92.2dB peak.
Accessibility: The dining room and restrooms appear fully accessible to wheelchair users.