Coming Soon

the tablehopper | 12:09 pm | October 28, 2009 | Foodie 411

At 1123 Folsom St., slated to open February

There is going to be a new restaurant opening in the former Julie’s Supper Club space called Radius, serving farm-to-table California cuisine with a French influence. All the meats, produce, dairy, beer, and wine will be sourced from a 100-mile radius, hence the name. (It will be open nightly.) The plan is to open the restaurant by February, but in the meantime, they new owners are converting the old dance floor section of Julie’s into a cafe and takeaway area with a separate entrance, which will be open for lunch and dinner by the end of the year.

The executive chef will be Kelly Hughett, who has quite the background, but highlights include four years under Sylvain Portay at The Ritz Carlton San Francisco, Mix Restaurant in Las Vegas, Alain Ducasse’s Plaza Athénée and Aux Lyonnais, the A.D.F. School for Professional Chefs, two years at Louis XV in Monaco, and sous chef at Adour Restaurant in New York. She will be moving back to her native California from New York in the next couple of months. Radius is an owner-operated restaurant from partners Jon Whitehead, and Yong and Christian Baker (Christian has worked at Aqua and The Ritz Carlton, and has been working at an architecture firm for the last seven years). They are currently going through demo right now—Julie’s bar will remain, but it will be beer and wine only, FYI. Seating will probably be 50 in the main restaurant and 25 in the cafe. You can follow their progress on Twitter at @radiussf.

• 1123 Folsom St. at Langton.

There’s the city’s first organic vegan Mexican restaurant coming from the Cafe Gratitude folks, Gracias Madre (the opening is slated for November). Tortillas and tamales will be handmade from organic heirloom corn grown on Matthew and Terces Englehart’s Be Love Farm in Vacaville. The menu will also highlight beans, corn, squash, chiles, and spices, along with greens, vegetables, and nut-based “cheeses” (if you’ve eaten at Cafe Gratitude, you’ll be familiar with these “cheeses”). The idea for the restaurant began when the Engleharts were inspired to visit some of their employees’ hometowns in Mexico. If you imagine you’ll be a regular customer at Gracias Madre, check their site for details on their immediate “Builders Card” offering.

• 2211 Mission St. at 18th St.

Marcia Gagliardi writes a popular weekly e-column about the SF dining scene, “the tablehopper.” Subscribe for free at www.tablehopper.com and get it in your inbox every Tuesday. Got news? Email Marcia at taste@sanfrancisco.travel.