[Real Detroit] Urban Cellars

Photo by Nicole Rupersburg.

In the last couple of years, craft cocktail culture has exploded in metro Detroit. We went from just a handful of restaurants with an exceptional selection of craft cocktails both classic and those created in-house that only those who REALLY knew would really appreciate, to dozens of cocktail-focused bars and restaurants from Ann Arbor to White Lake that emphasize fresh, house-made ingredients and artisan spirits on their drink menus.

Urban Cellars is now open inside the newly-renovated Crowne Plaza Pontchartrain Detroit located across the street from COBO Center. The common areas of the hotel have gone through a serious remodeling, including the lobby and the hotel's main restaurant and lounge located on the lobby level. The restaurant is the Jefferson House, led by ambitious up-and-coming Executive Chef Justin Vaiciunas, who is also the hotel's director of food and beverage overseeing the full dining program.

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[EID Preview] The Jefferson House + Urban Cellars

All photos by Nicole Rupersburg.

The Crowne Plaza Pontchartrain Hotel will open in Detroit next month, and with it a new upscale restaurant and bar on the lobby level. Which you can read all about from me here in Model D. (And there's more about the hotel itself here.)

Executive Chef Justin Vaiciunas, who is overseeing the whole food and beverage program at the Pontch, recently gave me a preview of some menu items. Vaiciunas, whom I have previously (and perhaps clairvoyantly) named one of metro Detroit's up-and-coming chefs, left Detroit briefly last winter to work in a high-profile ski resort out west, but is now back with his cutting-edge American fusion cuisine with a particular mindfulness towards presentation and a dash of molecular gastronomy technique. His goal is to nail down a "best restaurant" title for the Jefferson House in its first year. Based on the look of these dishes alone, he certainly stands a shot.

Jefferson House dining room.

Shaved prosciutto salad with mascarpone cheese, truffle oil and pear jus. 

The Beggar's Purse pasta in wild mushroom cream sauce.

The bar at Urban Cellars.

Roasted airline chicken with tableside-smoked BBQ sauce, potato salad and yellow beans.

The roasted airline chicken presentation. 

Tomato caprese with espresso-infused balsamic, basil oil, and fresh mozzarella.

For more photos, check out the Flickr set here.

[Model D] Top of the Pontch, Jefferson House, Urban Cellars opening in the Crowne Plaza Hotel Pontchartrain

Photo by Nicole Rupersburg.

As the Crowne Plaza Hotel Pontchartrain undergoes a serious exterior overhaul to prepare to welcome its first guests this June, the overhaul happening inside is just as ambitious, both in design and concept. 

The Jefferson House will be the Pontch's primary restaurant, located across from the lobby. The look is modern meets old world: copper leaf ceilings, plush cream-colored chairs, dark-stained wainscoting covering the walls. It's warm and rich and comfortable, refined without being too stuffy. They'll serve breakfast, lunch and dinner, and will also have a 40-seat outdoor patio on Jefferson. Attached to the Jefferson House is Urban Cellars, the hotel's sizable bar, which will specialize in craft cocktails.

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