Genessee Royale will start Sunday brunch in September

A month after Voltaire began serving Sunday brunch in the West Bottoms,  restaurateur Todd Schulte at the nearby Genessee Royale, 1531 Genessee, has announced that he’ll also begin serving Sunday brunch starting Sunday, September 14. Schulte says he’ll also stop offering Monday lunch in the bistro, beginning September 15; breakfast and lunch will continue at Genessee Royal Tuesday through Saturday.

“During the years that I was still operating Happy Gillis,” Schulte says, “we had such a solid brunch business there that I didn’t want to be shuttling between the two restaurants on a Sunday. But my wife, Tracy, and I frequently stop by Genessee Royale on Sundays, even though it’s been closed on that day, to water the plants and herbs and maybe fix lunch for ourselves. It seemed the timing was right to start Sunday brunch.”

Since Voltaire’s brunch is a later one, offered between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m., Todd Schulte decided that the Genessee Royale brunch would have an earlier start time: “If someone comes here at 2 p.m. and wants brunch, we’ll send them over to see Wes Gartner at Voltaire,” Schulte says. “Hopefully he’ll do the same for us for brunch people who show up there too early.”

Schulte hasn’t finalized a brunch menu for Genessee Royale but says it will be a different menu from the breakfast selection currently offered by the restaurant:  “If we have a waffle, it will be a different waffle than the one we serve during the week at the bistro,” Schulte says. “And the menu will probably change every month.”

Eggs Benedict? “Everyone does eggs Benedict,” Schulte says. “We’re going to try a few new things.”

The venue’s popular bartender, Rita Accurso, is scheduled to be working during the brunch shift.