Cafe Nordo Returns to Seattle!

Apparently Mr. Nordo Lefesczki loves Seattle. He's returning this fall with another grand premiere. Maybe the rest of the country just doesn't get how cool this guy is. Regardless, he's back, and we're happy to say he's got yet another new idea under his hat. This guy never stays with the same format. He's always out to impress. This time his restaurant becomes a bar, his imagination is tackling the world of bar food, and he's wrangled a master of cocktails to work with him. And, by the press release you'll see below, he's obviously got a wacky story of intrigue to accompany his inventions.

Stay tuned for more salacious details. As we get behind-the-scenes information on the food and the production you know we'll pass them along. We just love the Cafe Nordo dirt here at this blog.

In a secret gin-joint within Theo Chocolate Factory the incomparable Chef Nordo Lefesczki teams up with “America’s Best Bartender” Murray Stenson to bring Seattle an evening of sizzling entertainment, creative food, amazing cocktails, and smokin’ music that harkens back to another era.

This fall, Café Nordo returns to Fremont with “Sauced”, one part historical tour of mixology, one part film noir style thriller, shaken and served up with a dash of surreal. Fedoras nod to the beat of original jazz tunes performed live, as four of the top performers in Seattle deliver salty one-liners and perfectly poured classic cocktails to an intimate audience. Paired with each cocktail is Chef Nordo Lefesczki’s interpretation of bar food, deconstructed, reconstructed, and then deconstructed again. As per the laws of Café Nordo, only the finest local, sustainable ingredients are served, and local craft distilleries provide the booze.

With Billie Wildrick (most recently seen in Candide and On The Town at the 5^th Avenue Theatre) as the bombshell lounge singer, Mark Siano (“One of Seattle’s top cabaret acts” – Seattle Gay Scene) as the washed up bar owner, and Opal Peachey as the cocktail waitress on the edge, and Ray Tagavilla (Seattle Magazine Spotlight Award Winner) as the bartender with a secret, Sauced delves into the sexy, dirty, soul-baring darkness of humanity under the influence. Under the “beguiling” (Seattle Times) spell of Annastasia Workman’s original jazz score, performed live by the Café Nordo House Band, audiences sip and taste as a story of mystery and betrayal unfolds all around them.

Seattle’s own Sultan of the Sauce, Murray Stenson, lends his expertise by designing the evening’s flight of cocktails. In July, Stenson won the highest award for mixology in the US, “The Best Bartender in America,” voted by his peers at the 2010 Tales of the Cocktail festivities in New Orleans. Currently at the Zig Zag Café, and formerly at Il Bistro, Stenson’s blend of historical knowledge, originality, and craftsmanship garnered him national recognition in The New York Times, Playboy Magazine, and Salon.com.

After two acclaimed five-course dining experiences, Café Nordo tipples towards its third Seattle installment, changing the form but not the experience. The first, The Modern American Chicken, won Café Nordo a Seattle Times Footlight Award for Excellence in Local Theater, and introduced audiences to Café Nordo: “A fricassee of satire, zany antics and enlightened food consciousness, ‘Café Nordo has a unique spin on dining, wine-ing and watching…with kinky sincerity, the show spoofs chef-cult madness but sincerely honors the consumption of a well-cooked meal” (Seattle Times). The second, Bounty! An Epic Adventure in Seafood (“Fun filled and action packed” – Northwest Wining and Dining) treated audiences to “preternaturally fresh” (Seattle Times) seafood along with the science and folklore of the Salish Sea. Through sizzling entertainment, creative food, amazing cocktails, and smokin’ music, Sauced harkens back to a different era. A much cooler era.

For more information visit www.cafenordo.com