Blue Moon Eatery will soon be another reason to head to Main Street in Edwardsville. Chef-owner Jason Shafer is opening Blue Moon at 1114 N. Main St., in a space that was most recently occupied by Taylor’s Chicken and Ribs. Blue Moon Eatery will not be a sit-down restaurant; rather, Shafer and his culinary team will focus on corporate catering and carryout.
Global fusion will be the food focus at Blue Moon. Among the 40-some items on its rotating menu will be pastas, hot and cold sandwiches, build-your-own burgers, soups, salads and desserts. Shafer explained that the menu will be similar to what he developed in 2009 for Blue Moon Café, a restaurant that was slated to open that summer in Glen Carbon, Ill., but was never realized. As an example dish, he cited The Navajo, which will feature warm house-made Indian fry bread stuffed with grilled chicken, avocado, iceberg lettuce, salsa verde and crumbled queso fresco.
Shafer, a graduate of the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco, has worked in the industry for the last seven years (including Paula LeDuc Fine Catering in the Bay Area) and in St. Louis since 2007. He noted that the majority of his menu items will be prepared entirely in house. “It’s all made fresh. The only thing not made here are pastas and bread. Soups, salads, desserts – those are all made in-house – even the crackers for the soups.”
Although Blue Moon will not offer dine-in service, customers grabbing their carryout orders can take advantage of the retail section, which will showcase food products such as olive oil and some other items from nearby Township Grocer that the eatery will use to prepare its dishes. In early summer, Shafer expects to have liquor, beer and wine for sale as well.
When Blue Moon Eatery opens (Shafer projected an opening for March 25 or April 1.), its hours will be Monday through Saturday from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. A website is in the works; a Facebook page is up and running.
This article appears in February 2013.