Grabbing a burger while watching football or the World Series this season will take on a new flavor, as Rancho Mirage welcomed a new restaurant to Highway 111.
The Stadium Club Bistro took over the former site of Stuart Anderson's Black Angus Steakhouse.
Outside, the building's architecture remains the way Black Angus left it.
Inside, the wood paneled walls lend a spirit of the former steakhouse, and that's where the similarities stop.
The Stadium Club Bistro stands by itself in the Coachella Valley dining crowd — an eclectic mix of an old honkey tonk and a modern sports bar.
"It's like the House of Blues meets a sports bar," explains co-owner Billy Mieldazis, who cemented himself in the Coachella Valley restaurant scene with his legacy of launching The Falls and Ruth's Chris Steakhouses and the Palm Desert unique nightclub Red 74.
Looking at his crew in the final days before The Stadium Club opened, he smiled, and said this place was his dream come true.
Mieldazis and his team of co-owners spent top dollar for that dream.
His co-owner, John Knudsen, already had the track record of success in Las Vegas, where he conceived the designs for several eateries at Caesar's Palace. He hired the lighting designers from Hyde Nightclub at the Bellagio.
They purchased a 103-inch 3D, High Definition television for the main seating area of the Stadium Club and an even larger one for the bar area. They tweaked the brightness on the big one, so customers wouldn't have to squint as they watched the big game.
Various liquor brands adopted each room of the establishment and decorated them with tables, chairs and the unmistakable logos of Avoir Vodka, Effen Vodka and Francis Ford Coppola Wineries.
Take those large visual impressions and add in a dash of sports nostalgia, like the images of sports icons from yesteryear. Pictures of Mohammad Ali and roller derby queens offset the glare of televisions on the walls and in each booth.
Stand back and take it all in — this place looks like a good time!
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In spite all of the money invested in building the foundation of The Stadium Club, customers won't see a charge for it on their check.
Lunch starts at $6.99 on their menu — the brainchild of another investment, a great chef.
Whether you sit down for lunch or dinner — in the restaurant or in the bar area with the dance floor — The Stadium Club prides itself on its signature basket of homemade potato chips.
Golden brown and still hot and crisp on the outside, the chip gives way to a slightly softer middle, which just melts into the barbeque dipping sauce.
Mieldazis predicts The Stadium Club will play host to countless televised sporting events, the broadcasts of the Golden Globes and the Academy Awards.
He predicts his club will succeed.
He believes so strongly, he and his team already devised preliminary plans to take this concept to other buildings that formerly house a Black Angus restaurant throughout the nation.
For now, customers in Rancho Mirage get to enjoy their first bites of the restaurant's menu, find out which booth's television they prefer and look at the walls of a restaurant-gone-by; walls that symbolized opportunity to a group with a dream.
