Following a $3 million investment, the Bayview Café and 850 Wine & Spirits recently opened at IP Casino in Biloxi, Mississippi. Both will be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week and together provide seating for 350 people.
The café, located in a former Italian restaurant, offers “a playful mix of cuisines,” Food and Beverage Manager Stephen Morgan said. The new lounge, named for the casino’s address, features a self-serve wine-tasting machine, appealing to customers who want to sample wines at various price points.
At the Bayview, brick and brass create a warm atmosphere. The menu, created by IP House Chef Chris Roche and his staff, offers dishes influenced by Cajun, Asian, Italian, American and Southern cuisines. “You can have a different experience each time you come in,” Morgan said. He noted Mom’s Pot Roast is the number-one selection, made from a recipe borrowed from an IP chef’s mother.
Several menus for lunch, dinner and late night cover a range of tastes, including a vegan-friendly burger and Seoul Food, a Korean-style braised short rib. Appetizers and lite bites include crawfish spring rolls and Bayou Beignets made with local blue crab, shrimp and crawfish. And a bar menu also offers cheeseburger sliders and mahi-mahi fish and chips.
Morgan said the Bayview also features favorite dishes from the former Costa Cucina menu. The grand finale is a slice of Boozey Nanner Cream Pie or other selection from the dessert menu.
Public Relations Manager Emily Burke said customers had been asking for a 24-hour restaurant. As a result, the new restaurant and bar expand room service to 24 hours. “In the middle of the night you can get a great hamburger or order breakfast from the new menu anytime,” she said.
A towering wine cellar divides the restaurant from the new lounge, where the curved bar has plugs for cellphones and hooks for purses. The highlight of the lounge is an Italian Enomatic wine dispenser that lets customers try a 1-ounce sample of wine for as little as $1.60, or splurge on a full glass of Plumpjack or higher-end wine for $59 a glass.
Morgan said Mississippi Alcoholic Beverage Control allowed the dispensing machine, which keeps white wine perfectly chilled at 45 degrees or red wine at 54 degrees. “I don’t know of anyone else in the state that’s been allowed to do this,” he said. IP’s Wine Sommelier John Gaulke, offers a selection of affordable wine at under $25 per bottle.
Morgan noted the new venues added more jobs, since additional staff was required to cover the 24-hour schedule. The restaurant also provides a healthy menu for the spa and delivers food to the poker room.
Morgan said other changes at IP include renovations at Chill nightclub, with new walls built to contain the sound.
