TROY — Two longtime restaurateurs who have been out of the business in recent years are returning to the industry with their first venture as business partners by taking over Troy Beer Garden and its upstairs cocktail lounge, The Berlin. They are buying the businesses, at 2 King St., opposite the Troy end of the Green Island Bridge, from founder Matt Baumgartner, who retains ownership of the building.
Closed for minor renovations this week, Troy Beer Garden will reopen Tuesday, Oct. 11, under the proprietorship of Mickey Blanchfield, who owned the tavern Beff’s on Everett Road in Albany from 1991 to 2015, and Amy Conway, of the upscale Conway’s on Yates in Albany from the mid-1990s until the early aughts.
They tell me they are keeping the look of the plant-festooned wonderland that Baumgartner created when he transformed the Troy location of Wolff’s Biergarten into Troy Beer Garden in April 2021. They are also keeping the progressive cocktail program.
But they are abandoning a menu that offered only plant-based food. The announcement was made Wednesday afternoon with an Instagram photo of a shrimp dish that generated an entirely predictable argument, growing to more than 80 comments in less than 24 hours.
Sample discussion:
- “Thank god for some alternative options!”
- “Ohhhh nooooooo this is a a devolution not an improvement. Shrimp are beings, not food.”
- “It’s wrong to kill animals when you don’t need to and that obviously eating animals is worse than eating plants.”
- “If you had actually supported the business they probably wouldn’t have changed their menu.”
In replies, Conway and Blanchfield tried to cool the conversation, repeatedly insisting they will continue to have plant-based food. But, they said in interviews, though Troy Beer Garden had swarmed with customers for many months after opening, as people checked it out for the first time and sampled the vegan fare, food orders had plummeted by this past summer.
Alluding to Baumgartner’s community popularity from past businesses including Bombers Burrito Bar, The Olde English, Noche, the multi-location Wolff’s and his current June Farms, among others, Conway said, “Everybody loves Matt, he did a beautiful job with turning it into (Troy Beer Garden), and everybody wanted to check it out at first, but food dropped way off.”
Blanchfield said the revenue figures the pair saw in February, when they first started considering TBG and The Berlin, remained strong. However, he said, “We continued to come in as time went on and we’d watch. People would have a drink but leave because they couldn’t find what they wanted, or it seemed like they’d tried the food before and knew this time they were definitely going somewhere else for dinner.”
Blanchfield added, “We saw great potential here, but we knew as a business model it wasn’t sustainable as it was.” (Baumgartner’s staff originally supervised food production for TBG, but it eventually was outsourced to a vegan catering company.)
In addition to the contentious shrimp, the new Troy Beer Garden menu will include shareable plates, salads with protein options, sandwiches and meat specials. A pizza oven has been ordered. Blanchfield, who found much pizza success at Beff’s, said Conway eventually relaxed her ban on fried food to allow for another’s Beff’s favorite, chicken “toes” (i.e., fingers or tenders).
“It’s not a pub, and it’s not a place for full, expensive entrees,” said Conway.
Other changes include a 5-foot-tall wall between the bar and dining area, a Blanchfield-expanded beer list, couches replaced by more dining tables and the abandonment of TBG’s requirement that customers scan a QR code at the table to order food and pay online.
“We’ve hired servers,” said Conway. “There will be table service.”
“I’m old-school enough to hate QR codes,” said Blanchfield. “We’re going to keep the beautiful look of the place, but there’s going to be an expanded crowd there, not just people in their 20s. We want people in their 30s, 40s, 50s, families — all of that.”
Starting Tuesday, Troy Beer Garden will be open 4 to 10 p.m. Tuesday to Saturday. Lunch may be added next year.
The Berlin, lately open only for private events, will retain its signature look of a 1930s cocktail lounge when it reopens later this fall. Conway said she plans expanded days, hours and programming, including theme nights, paint-and-sip parties and acoustic music.
The sale to Blanchfield and Conway leaves Baumgartner with only June Farms as an operating hospitality business. After founding Bombers on Lark Street in Albany in 1997, he opened at least seven more restaurant/bar concepts, with two, Bombers and Wolff’s, each having four locations at one point. He has since sold interest in all but June Farms, a bar with food in West Sand Lake that is also an event venue, animal farm and home to multiple Airbnb accommodations.