You may not know Michael Brightman, but if you’re any kinda culture vulture, you know his successful With Love Catering and Confections business. Brightman & Co. sell homemade pastries and savories at 10 theater venues in the area. His oversized chocolate-chip cookies dusted with powdered sugar and fresh berry tarts are a tremendous improvement over the typically stale, store-bought intermission treats and have a way of redeeming even a dismal night of drama.
Now the enterprising Brightman is expanding his South Side catering kitchen into a cozy, 16-seat New York-style deli, scheduled to open this Tuesday, April 6.
The River City Deli will bow at 300 Hoffmeister Ave., hard by the river (and a short half mile from the new River City Casino). Brightman says he plans to serve lunch and dinner six days a week (closed on Mondays), featuring Reubens, hot pastrami, smoked turkey, his special tarragon-pecan chicken salad, a French dip, hot dogs, chili-cheese fries, burgers, homemade mac and cheese, salads and a variety of other homemade comfort foods.
The caterer-cum-restaurateur adds that he expects to do a healthy takeout business, too, and that if things really take off in, say, about a year, he’d consider expanding into the adjacent space, a former beauty salon, to open a full-sized restaurant with a considerably larger kitchen.
In a nod to Brightman’s other passion, the deli will be lined with posters advertising past theater productions by a variety of local companies.
– Byron Kerman
This article appears in Apr 1-30, 2010.