New restaurants due at Country Club, downtown

Published 12:00 am Thursday, December 11, 2008

Permit applications are pending for what would complete a move of one Vicksburg restaurant and add another venue to the local dining scene.

Monsour’s Restaurant has applied to the Mississippi Department of Health for a license to operate at 1100 Washington St., the home of the former Biscuit Company restaurant and bar, owner Eddie Monsour confirmed Wednesday.

Word of Monsour’s move from the Vicksburg Country Club off Indiana Avenue has circulated for months and ramped up in recent weeks with advertisements touting the new location in the century-old building — home to a number of establishments in decades past, most notably the Biscuit Company and its array of food and live entertainment.

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Interior space has been remodeled for a full restaurant operation, Monsour said, with an opening date eyed for January if permits and furnishings arrive.

Monsour’s space at the Vicksburg Country Club, which has been open to members and nonmembers, is under contract to Refined South Restaurant Group LLC, headed by Jay Parmegiani. License applications to the Office of Alcoholic Beverage Control, part of the state Tax Commission, have been filed under the trade name Roca.

In recent years, Parmegiani has teamed with his father, Jacques Parmegiani, in operating at Jacques’ Cafe & Sports Lounge at Battlefield Inn on North Frontage Road. Wednesday, the younger Parmegiani said major renovations to the current kitchen at the country club — which will be called Roca, named for his great-grandmother — will begin after Jan. 1 and a grand opening will be announced at a later date. Ballroom space would be available for usage including civic club meetings, he said.

Monsour’s move downtown would signal just the second tenant for the building at 1100 Washington Street since the business flooded and closed in 2003. Litigation followed and a settlement was paid to its operators. A brief reincarnation as the New New Orleans Cafe lasted less than three months in 2007.

Parmegiani, 30, attended Vicksburg High School and earned a degree at the College of Culinary Arts at Johnson & Wales University’s Miami campus. Culinary offerings at Roca are being formulated, he said, but should feature traditional Southern fare along with European influences.

Monsour is an award-winning cook and is in the second generation of a family operating fine-dining restaurants in Vicksburg.

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Contact Danny Barrett Jr. at dbarrett@vicksburgpost.com.