It’s been two years since The Bread & Board owners Jonathan Cobbs and Dwayne Beliakoff met VyStar Credit Union CEO Brian Wolfburg on the patio of their Five Points restaurant in Riverside.
The talk was about a restaurant and provision market for the ground-floor of VyStar’s six-story 100 W. Bay St. building on the credit union’s Downtown campus.
After months of planning, the partnership grew and attention turned to the building’s rooftop.
Beliakoff said Wolfburg made it clear he wanted something beyond an extension of The Bread & Board’s operations downstairs and more than a catering and event space for VyStar.
“Initially with the rooftop space, we knew there was going to be an exaggerated employee lounge,” Beliakoff said. “It was a big outdoor space with furniture and there were always plans for a kitchen, event venue and maybe yoga and morning coffee.”
After the meeting, the Jacksonville-based restaurateur said he retreated to his office and remembered his draft menu inspired by coastal Mexican cuisine from the Baja California peninsula.
“I reached behind me into my vertical file and pulled out a menu that I’d written five or six years earlier in Portland, Oregon,” Beliakoff said. “I snapped a picture, sent it to (Wolfburg) and he said, ‘bingo.’”
Estrella Cocina has a target opening date of May 1, Wolfburg and Beliakoff said this week.
The 3,500-square-foot indoor and 4,500-square-foot outdoor spaces on the roof will seat 225 people and can expand, according to The Bread & Board.
Beliakoff said there will be a drink and salsa bar with a “tequila shrine,” a fire pit and two lounge areas.
Estrella Cocina will have standing room for up to 500 people, and Beliakoff said two mobile bars can be rolled out during busy periods.
The space offers city and river views, as well as indoor and outdoor seating with roll-up garage doors separating the spaces.
“It was meant for people to have room to mingle and wander and take advantage of those views,” Beliakoff said.
The tacos and platters will be seafood-focused but not “seafood-heavy,” he said. Beliakoff’s recipes were inspired by two decades of travel in coastal Mexican towns like Puerto Vallarta, Sayulita, Zihuatanejo and Escondido - and his grandmother, who was Mexican.
Corn and flour tortillas will be made on-site, and Estrella Cocina will feature 10 fresh salsas.
No menu item will be priced above $14, and Beliakoff said the portions will be filling.
“Nothing The Bread & Board has ever done has been considered small. I believe in bang-for-buck value,” he said.
“When something hits the table, I want the wow factor.”
Estrella Cocina also will have a 3:30 p.m. happy hour seven days a week, Beliakoff said.
The rooftop Mexican concept is a creative partnership between The Bread & Board owners and VyStar, which owns both the VyStar Tower and the 100 W. Bay St. building.
Cobbs and Beliakoff’s investment in the Mexican concept includes design, marketing and consulting. VyStar paid for the build-out of the space which the restaurateurs will lease.
Dana B. Kenyon Co. is the project contractor and RS&H Inc. is the architect, according to a March 10 news release. Micamy Design Studio and RS&H designed the interior.
A $1.34 million interior build-out also is underway for The Bread & Board’s 7,200-square-foot restaurant and provisions marketplace on the ground floor at 100 W. Bay St.
The restaurant announced its Downtown expansion in March 2020.
“By partnering with innovative restaurateurs like Dwayne and Jonathan, we are working hard to ensure that our employees have great food and amenities, we’re doing good for downtown and leading by example on what is possible in Jacksonville,” Wolfburg said in a news release.
Wolfburg said this week work on the ground-floor space is about a month behind schedule.
VyStar has not rushed The Bread & Board or project contractors to finish because the coronavirus is limiting the credit union’s in-person staffing until the summer, according to Wolfburg.
Beliakoff said the original goal was to have a soft opening for Estrella Cocina in March and open before The Bread & Board Restaurant and Provisions Market downstairs.
The pandemic allowed Cobbs and Beliakoff “a little bit more desk time” to tweak recipes and test the menu in their Town Center kitchen.
The Bread & Board’s first location opened at 1030 Oak St. in Five Points and the second is 4413 Town Center Parkway in St. John's Town Center North.
“Hopefully there is a turnaround about to happen,” Beliakoff said. “Not just with the economy, but for Downtown.”
