‘Vegas in Valpo’: Fine-dining spot will have Michelin Star aspirations, nine-course tasting meals, tableside theatrics and valet parking

Such tableside theatrics will be part of the show at the high-end Figs and Fables, an uber-luxe modern fine dining restaurant unlike anything in Northwest Indiana. Figs and Fables has Michelin star aspirations and plans for nine-course tasting menus, valet parking and average bills of more than $225 for two diners.

“I want to bring a little Vegas to Valpo,” restaurateur Adam Brenner said. “This will be like something on the strip in Las Vegas, in Los Angeles, Beverly Hills, Manhattan or Chicago.” 

Brenner now runs the Valpo Soup Company, which he opened in the former South Bend Chocolate Company space on the Porter County Courthouse Square in downtown Valparaiso during the height of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. It delayed his plans to obtain the liquor license that would be necessary to make such a venture profitable.

The Valparaiso Soup Company at 57 Franklin will close by the end of the year. The space will be extensively renovated so that Figs and Fables can reopen, likely before Valentine’s Day. He’s striving for an eatery along the lines of Alinea, The Girl and the Goat or The Purple Pig in Chicago.

“Valpo Soup Company isn’t going out of business. It’s doing really, really well. But after three years my staff and I are ready to do something different. In Las Vegas, they do a new concept every few years,” he said. “We want to bring a world-class restaurant to Valpo. We believe the demographic is there to do this. We were just waiting on the liquor license. It’s not like California or Arizona where you can just buy a liquor license. There’s a whole process you have to navigate and you have to wait for one to become available.”

Figs and Fables will serve small plates both cold and hot, entrees, desserts, a tasting menu and cocktails, spirits and wines. It will feature some molecular gastronomy, including foams and fogs, such as sautéed mushrooms with a crystalized garlic cloud. Some cocktails and spirits will be served in smoke boxes that deliver a scented smoke experience that lingers for a moment, enhancing the flavors.

“There will be showstoppers like the tableside cooking,” Brenner said. “You’ll eat with your eyes as much as your mouth. It will be a complete dining experience. It will be a fantastic meal that also will entertain. It will be more than just food. There will be smoke, dry ice, fire, people dressed to the nines. It will be a dining experience. You’ll walk out of Figs and Fables saying it was incredible and one of the best meals of my life.”

The décor will draw inspiration from childhood fables and fairy tales, featuring accent pieces, colorful rugs and evocations of dark woods. Brenner said it would be sophisticated but whimsical.

“It will be like an enchanted forest meets Downton Abbey,” he said. “It will be above and beyond in style and décor. It will have linens and wine glasses. It will be fancier than what you see out here in Northwest Indiana.”

The Valparaiso-based architecture firm Shive-Hattery, which designed Valpo Soup Company and also the building itself, will reimagine the 2,600-square-foot restaurant space. The new color scheme will feature purples, greens and golds.

“Think of the master steakhouses. Only we’ll be much more culinary,” he said.

The restaurant will keep much of the same layout but will convert the line where people now place orders into a bar and lounge with plush seating and modern music. People will be able to watch the chefs work in a glass kitchen that will be visible from the foyer and lounge. 

The dining room will include an extensive wine cellar that can double as a private dining room for six. 

“We’re going to probably have the most significant wine list in the state,” he said. “We’re going to have 18 or 20 wines by the glass, which is unheard of around here.”

Figs and Fables will have a wide selection of French Champagnes and various varietals of American wines from Napa Valley and Sonoma Valley.

“I don’t want anyone to have bottle shock from a wine from New Zealand. I want them to know their money is going to the quality of wine,” he said. “We’ll have a good variety of wines to pair with all foods.”

It will serve wines customers bring for a corkage fee and pair wines from its selection with a nine-course tasting menu billed as a “gastronomic journey.” 

Fig and Fables is imagined as a place for foodies, cocktail enthusiasts and connoisseurs of fine dining. It will seek to stimulate the senses.

“I don’t want to label the menu but it will basically be a world’s fair. I don’t like the word fusion but it will be a combination of my favorite cuisines from around the world,” he said. “It will have Indian, Japanese and French influences. My goal is to have the first Michelin Star in the state of Indiana. That would make national news. We’re going to try for James Beard Awards. We will be pushing the boundaries of what’s possible here. Some people will throw shade and be skeptical that a fancy restaurant will work or that it will be the same high-quality food as Chicago fine dining. We’re trying to bring a world-class fancy restaurant for everybody. There’s a little disconnect. When I describe what I trying to do, people people think like Pesto’s. No, fancier. Then people think like Main and Lincoln. No, fancier.”

Fig and Fables likely will have an average bill of $225 to $250 for a party of two. Brenner said he envisions it as a destination spot where people will celebrate graduations, anniversaries and other special occasions but that it would be a weekly spot for others.

“In Los Angeles and Las Vegas, $200 is a normal dinner,” he said. “People here get nervous when it’s more than $75 or $80. But at Valpo Soup Company we got a regular white-collar business. The Valpo airport is filled with private jets. This isn’t the same town it was 30 years ago. Lincolnway isn’t even what it was when I was in grad school 20 years ago. I see all the Mercedes, BMWs, Bentleys and Ferraris. There’s money in Valpo. Some left Chicago. But there’s the market out here to appeal to that demographic. People have the finances for higher gastronomy. I want to put Valpo on the map for gastronomy, making as well known for a nice dining scene as it is for university basketball.”

The menu will include small plates like Ahi Ginger Spoons with seared ahi, diced avocado and cucumber drizzled in green onion sauce; Yellowfin Crudo with a freshly squeezed kaffir lime ponzu sauce, coconut oil, roasted jalapeno and corn; and Carpaccio Roll-ups with raw Wagyu filet mignon, arugula, sautéed mushrooms, lemon dijon mustard aioli, black Hawaiian sea salt and aged balsamic vinegar. 

“There will be no chicken on the menu. It’s been done. We’re not going to offer cheeseburgers at the restaurant. You have to draw the line somewhere when it comes to fine dining,” he said. “This is going to be modern fine dining. It’s not going to be stodgy and old-fashioned. It’s going to be like something in San Francisco.”

In lieu of chicken it will have whole quail marinated overnight and served with a butter thyme sauce and freshly ground cardamom. Other menu items include Ceylonese Meatballs, Pakora, Miso Glazed Chilean Sea Bass, a New Zealand rack of lamb and the Smoked Kraken with the seaweed fog.

The restaurant will employ at least 18 and 20 people, including all the staff from the Valpo Soup Company. He compared the transition to the popular FX show “The Bear,” in which an Italian Beef restaurant transitions to being a fine dining restaurant in season 2

“We’re hiring all the staff, who have been to culinary school and doing this for years,” he said. “It’s like ‘The Bear,’ especially that episode where they go to Alinea. We’re trying to bring that elegance and service, the highest quality and the highest caliber of food.”

All the employees will work full-time and make at least $20 an hour as he wants to ensure the highest level of service. He’s planning to get city approval to offer valet parking service, to take advantage of a parking lot out back.

Brenner will serve as executive chef. He’s been interested in cooking since seeing Julia Child on television.

“I have a passion for cooking and creating something new. I can’t draw to save my life, but I can cook,” he said. “This will be an assault of the senses type of food. It will use flavor profiles from Indian and other types of food. It will be like creating music, creating a symphony, painting with different colors.”

Brenner has more than 25 years of experience in the restaurant and dining industry. He’s doing catering in Beverly Hills, has been a professor at culinary institutions and has long worked in restaurants, including five-star restaurants in Paris, Tokyo and India.

The Los Angeles native obtained his master’s degree at Valparaiso University, married a Valparaiso native and returned to be closer to her family.

“I fell in love when I came to the town to finish my master’s in 2007 and now we have two young kids,” he said. “It’s been my dream to open up a world-class restaurant but when COVID hit I withdrew my request for a liquor license, which then went to Peddler’s Pub instead, and decided to open the lunch spot. After meeting so many people, forging relationships and establishing a reputation for quality, I decided it was time for the fancy restaurant. Having worked downtown serving the lunch crowd, I feel like I’ve established myself.”

Valpo Soup Company initially encountered the same skepticism over prices that Fig and Fables likely will, Brenner said.

“People asked how dare we charge $9 for soup,” he said. “Every price has gone up. The days of $5 lunches are gone. The days of $10 lunches are gone. It’s now $15 for lunch. Fig and Fables is going to be expensive but we truly believe there’s a market for it. We believe there will be some negative energy and hate. It’s not going to be for everyone. Not everyone drives a Mercedes. We expect the prices will mean a little notoriety and that we’ll be talked about. But Northwest Indiana is a big place and we believe there’s the market for this.”

Fig and Fables should build upon downtown Valpo as a dining destination.

“We’re not going to be taken customers from other people. People are still going to go to Radius for a burger or Furin for sushi,” he said. “This is not competition. It’s something different that’s disrupting the dining scene.”

The restaurant will seat about 46 people and take reservations. The goal will be to provide 5-star service with attention to detail.

Figs and Fables would encourage a business casual dress code of jackets for men and cocktail attire for women. 

“Without sounding too pretentious, we’re going to feel expensive and high-end,” he said. “You’re going to want to dress up, not put on jeans and a T-shirt. You’re going to want to wear a sport coat or heels and a cocktail dress for a Friday or Saturday night.”

It will not allow children under 12.

“A couple spending a couple hundred dollars doesn’t want to hear a crying baby,” he said. “This is a place for adults, where adults can be adults. Get a babysitter and leave the kids at home. This is not a family restaurant. We’re trying to create a sexy atmosphere that inspires romance.”

As the name suggests, the restaurant has two menu items with figs: a salad and dessert.

“We were thinking of a name that suggested telling stories through your food and liked the alliteration,” he said.

The project has been about six years in the making.

“This is making a dream of mine come true. I’ve opened multiple restaurants but never done a project like this bistro. I usually have an army of staff but this is literally me by myself. It’s a different monster,” he said. “My French teacher said it best when she taught me the difference between eating dinner and dining. It’s service and hospitality. That’s a real quote I use. I never shy away from the different or the new. I joyfully leap into the unknown.”

Figs and Fables will be open from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday and 4 p.m. to 12 p.m. Friday and Saturday.