Fine-dining restaurant, Desert Sage, closes doors

Desert Sage, a fine-dining restaurant in downtown Boise, closed Oct. 31 after five years in business, and plans announced previously for an expanded Desert Sage on ParkCenter Boulevard were derailed.

Executive Chef and part owner David Root cited declining sales and growing upscale competition as reasons for closing the restaurant, in the Union Block Building on Idaho Street.

“It’s been very slow with the economic downturn and then the Sept. 11 attacks,” Root said. “I’ve been feeding the restaurant out of my own pocket the last couple of months.”

A number of fine-dining establishments in the downtown area – such as Tuscany, Mortimer’s Idaho Cuisine, Manhattan Grille, Conundrum and Schott’s Steak & Chops – have opened within the last two years, fragmenting an already-crowded market, Root said.

Desert Sage sales for October were down 50 percent from the same month last year and 75 percent less than October 1999, he said. The restaurant opened in December 1996.

“I have no animosity against any restaurant people in town,” Root said. “This is a tough business and extremely competitive.”

“Desert Sage has had a wonderful, positive influence on dining here and we’ve raised the bar,” he said. “To close it, I’m sad, but it’s about business.”

Root’s lease on the 2,700 square foot, ground-floor space ends Nov. 30. He plans to seek a buyer for the business during November.

Also halted were Root’s plans to relocate the Boise Desert Sage next year to a 3.5-acre parcel on the northeast corner of ParkCenter Boulevard, near the West ParkCenter Bridge.

A 10,000-square-foot, freestanding restaurant was planned as part of a two-building development (IBR, 4-30-01). The second building was to be about six stories high, 60,000 to 75,000 square feet, and used for Class A office space and penthouse apartments.

One of Root’s partners in the Desert Sage, Kevin Fortun, said last week that the ParkCenter project would go forward, but probably would not include a Desert Sage. He said construction would not begin until late 2002 at the earliest.

“The timetable is pushed back and I’m glad we did that,” Fortun said. “I anticipate in the summer of 2002, we’ll put the energy back into ParkCenter.”

“With regards to the restaurant, we’re changing channels a little bit – to food offerings that better fit the Boise market,” Fortun said. “We’re thinking steaks, prime rib, great appetizers, a bar – a place that’s fun to go to where you get a mix of different clientele.”

Root is still envisioned as the restaurant’s executive chef. He and the Fortun brothers will probably meet next spring or summer to discuss ideas for the restaurant, Fortun said.

Fortun and his brother, Steve, are principals in Boise River Properties LLC, a Kirkland, Wash.-based entity that bought the vacant ParkCenter parcel, formerly the site of the Idaho Shakespeare Festival, last January.

Fortun said he is keeping busy in Idaho building Copper Ridge, a 58,000-square-foot retail / penthouse development in Ketchum, whose costs he put at more than $15 million. The project is slated for completion in spring 2003.

Root’s plans include remaining in Boise and possibly doing some consulting work for restaurants in Seattle and Reno. He plans to continue as executive chef – planning menus and visiting often – of a 140-seat Desert Sage restaurant that opened in October in La Quinta, Calif., near Palm Springs.

The restaurant was planned as the first of several out-of-state Desert Sage restaurants. Another was targeted to open in California’s Napa Valley in early 2002, but has been postponed, Root said.

“We’re being aware of the economy,” he said. “There’s no reason to rush.”