M.M. Cloutier
Indoor-outdoor Palm Beach bistro Almond, which opened in early 2020 in a high-profile Royal Poinciana Way restaurant space, will not reopen this autumn for another season here.
The sister to the 25-year-old Almond in Bridgehampton, New York, concluded its Mother’s Day service in Palm Beach in May and embarked on what seemed like its typical annual summer hiatus. But it turns out that was its last day.
The lights are out in the dining room where patrons delighted in Almond’s whimsical orange-hued Scalamandre wallpaper and globally inspired menus with area farm-sourced ingredients.
Almond officials told the Daily News Saturday they decided not to renew their Palm Beach lease, which ended May 31 at 207 Royal Poinciana Way, after the terms of a new one didn’t jibe with their vision.
Considering Almond weathered the 2020 onslaught of the recent COVID-19 pandemic — which hit weeks after its debut — and then earned a loyal following and a position as a Palm Beach Food & Wine Festival event-host, closing “was a tough decision,” co-owner and longtime restaurateur Eric Lemonides said.
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“There are many things I will remember fondly about Palm Beach, especially the welcome from the town and how helpful it was during the pandemic,” said Lemonides, co-founder years ago of the Almond concept with executive chef Jason Weiner. “We love that kind of small-town spirit.”
Along with Lee Felty, another Almond partner, Lemonides and Weiner “will be missed dearly,” Palm Beach Food & Wine Festival organizer-founder David Sabin told the Daily News Tuesday.
Almond’s festival event last year — a food-paired rosé-wine tasting — was “truly a success” and “we made fun memories together,” Sabin said.
While Palm Beach has been an “it” place for restaurants and businesses since the pandemic as more and more well-to-do people continue to move to the area, at least one other island restaurant has shuttered recently.
The original 1941-opened Worth Avenue icon Ta-boo, which is set to be reprised on the Avenue by famed superstar chef-restaurateur Thomas Keller by 2025, ended its fabled 80-year run in May 2023.
With its sidewalk-side patio and such popular menu items as escargots, spaghetti with lobster, steak frites and chicken tamales, Almond debuted with 100 seats on Feb. 10, 2020 after a private-preview party.
During the restaurant’s early days, Lemonides told the Daily News that it would always strive to be “a neighborhood restaurant — the kind of place where on any given night … you say, ‘Let’s go to Almond.’”
Julian Bharti, a local investor in the Palm Beach location of Almond, could not be reached for comment, but in 2020 he told the Daily News, “I’ve known the Almond guys for years and have wanted them to open an Almond here … It’s the right place at the right time.”
Like many local restaurants, Almond survived the rise of the pandemic in 2020 by temporarily transitioning to a takeout model while also benefiting from federal financial pandemic assistance.
Read more:15 beloved Palm Beach restaurants that have closed during the past 25 years
After that, the restaurant slowly became popular with locals.
By 2022, it hosted a popular New Year’s Eve bash complete with a disco ball in its rear private dining room, which brought the restaurant’s total square footage to 2,000-plus.
A year later, Almond reprised its disco-ball New Year’s Eve party and joined the Palm Beach Food & Wine Festival.
The owner of the Palm Beach building that has housed Almond is the Palm Beach-based Frisbie Group, which in 2016 purchased the property as part of a larger transaction involving four contiguous Royal Poinciana Way buildings for $10.25 million.
Almond’s former restaurant space has long been home to restaurants.
Prior to Almond, short-lived Maven followed Nick & Johnnie’s Patio Bar & Grill’s nine-year run. Before that, Landry’s Inc’s Grotto opened briefly after famed Chuck & Harold’s drew crowds for 25 years in the wake of another longtime local favorite, Peter Dinkel’s.
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