Bellecour North Loop brings chef Gavin Kaysen’s French bistro ambitions full circle

“It’s pretty wild what we’ve created,” said Gavin Kaysen, surveying the dining room inside the about-to-open Bellecour North Loop.

The James Beard Award-winning chef’s highly anticipated new restaurant officially opens Thursday as a daytime cafe, and starting Saturday will transform into a French bistro by night. This restaurant more than any of his others — Spoon and Stable, Demi and Mara — is the culmination of a lifetime of work, and the kind of neighborhood place Kaysen loves the most.

Mornings will include coffee with stacks of freshly made pastries from chef Alexandra Motz’s team displayed by the register. Diners order at the counter, linger at tables and have the option of tucking into some light lunch dishes with maybe a glass (or bottle) of wine.

After 2 p.m., the cafe will close to reset and reopen at 5 p.m. as a full-service restaurant with classic French bistro fare.

In the evenings, the dining room plunges into warm, low-lit ambience and the small, curved bar glows red. The clink of shifting silverware forecasts the menu of French comforts served elegantly, like escargot bathed in garlic butter, towers of fresh seafood nestled into pebble ice, plump roast chicken with a sauce so smooth it looks like poured suede, and profiteroles with Grand Marnier and poured chocolate.

Beverages are created by award-winning bartender Jessi Pollak, while wines are selected by Soigné Hospitality’s new sommelier Zachary Byers, who just moved to Minneapolis from Denver.

The intimate space seats just 50 diners, with plans for additional outdoor seating in summer and the possibility of kitchen counter seats in the future.

Mementos from chapters of the lives of Kaysen and his mentors are prominently placed around Bellecour.

At the back, one of Paul Bocuse’s aprons hangs encased in museum glass, signed by the legendary chef’s son. The backing replicates the wallpaper from Bocuse’s original restaurant. Another black-and-white image of a boy selling garlic at a French market alongside his father is an early picture of chef Boulud, Kaysen’s mentor. The way the tile arches over the kitchen pass mimics the look of Grand Central Station. The historic wood floor planks that shift inside the building feel like walking through the dining room at the much-missed North Loop cafe Moose & Sadie’s. There’s significance in every detail, and Kaysen is nothing if not a details man.

While his other properties immediately found success in the local restaurant zeitgeist, Bellecour has been a different beast. The first version opened in Wayzata in 2017.

“The beauty of Wayzata is that I knew what I wanted, but it was always too big for me,” said Kaysen. Four separate dining areas and a historic grandeur created a fine-dining ambience that wasn’t quite the Bellecour he had in mind. “It’s not supposed to be a fancy restaurant.”

In the summer of 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, he closed the restaurant, but the pastries found a new home in a partnership with Cooks of Crocus Hill. The iconic kitchen supply shop created spaces where people could dip in for croissants, deviled eggs, seasonal Danish, double chocolate cookies and more. After five years, the businesses parted ways.

Alongside this journey, Kaysen has seen many life changes. Aside from maneuvering his restaurants through the pandemic, he’s become a father for the third time, unexpectedly lost one of his best friends, ran a marathon, diversified his business, mentored the talent within his team and secured the kind of confidence that comes on the other side of 40.

When Bellecour and Cooks of Crocus Hill decided it was time to shift, Kaysen was ready to refocus his energy to build the restaurants he’d wanted all along.

Bellecour Edina opened last month, in the former Cooks space. The daytime cafe is stocked with tables, coffee, a small kitchen and a menu built for the 50th and France neighborhood, serving morning through afternoon.

Now Bellecour North Loop is ready to the stick the landing: fancy, but not fussy. French, but a tribute, not an approximation of someone else’s idea. It’s everything that Minneapolis’ most well-known chef has strived to share with his hometown.

“It’s funny how life works that way,” Kaysen said. “You kind of always think you know what you know in the moment, but there always needs to be time for reflection.”

Hours: Walk-in only bakery hours starting Dec. 4, daily from 7 a.m.-2 p.m.