MANCHESTER COUNTRY CLUB: Auriemma group to open new restaurant: Owners of Cafe Aura transform golf club's space

Mar. 18—MANCHESTER — As spring approaches and its bright soft hues color the earth, people are returning to their favorite country clubs for rounds of golf across the state. At Manchester Country Club, 305 S. Main St., they will be returning home to something brand new — a completely renovated clubhouse and a rebranding of its Waterview Café, now called The Hollow.

The restaurant is run by RTG Management, which consists of Todd Stigliano, Geno Auriemma, and Randy McNamara.

McNamara, The Hollow's food and beverage operator, said that RTG's involvement with the the golf course, which celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2017, is with the food and beverage operations of the country club. The chefs, managers, and team are separate from the other local dining establishment RTG operates, Café Aura at 45 East Center St.

If You Go

WHERE: The Hollow, 305 South Main St., Manchester Country Club.

OPENING: Early April

HOURS: TBA

MENU: Bar and grill pub food featuring golf-themed Grand Slam burgers and a variety of special menus for weddings and other events.

JOBS: The Hollow is hiring. For information, visit: mancc.com/

the-hollow-is-now-hiring

CONTACT: 860-646-0103; www.mancc.com

With taking over the dining operations of the clubhouse came a renovation of the whole building that started just after Christmas, McNamara said. Opening day is slated for the first week of April.

"We needed to update it," he said. "We needed to be more welcoming. It's a better representation of the evolution of the country club. It's a very popular country club. There's a demand for better food and beverage, which is what we bring to the table."

McNamara said that with golf being one of the few activities people could do during the COVID-19 pandemic, Manchester Country Club experienced impressive growth in 2000 with 49,000 rounds of golf played — an increase of 14,000 from the previous year.

The restaurant's new name, The Hollow, is a nod to Globe Hollow reservoir, which the golf course resides on, McNamara said.

"The vision is to carry on what the town of Manchester is evolving toward," he said. "Café Aura is one representation of that, where we took an iconic building and an iconic brand and updated it and made it more accessible to everybody. Here it's basically the same thing. We opened it up. The dining room is nearly twice the size it used to be. The bar is much bigger with much more front as you walk in. The décor will be brighter. The upstairs will be completely remodeled with banquet facilities. We doubled the size of the kitchen and brought the walk-in freezer inside instead of going outside."

Another major advancement, he said, is that the Manchester Country Club will now be up to code and American with Disabilities Act (ADA) compliant.

"It's very exciting if you saw the before and after," McNamara said. "We put restaurant-specific restrooms in. We took out the locker rooms because no one ever used them. We turned those into ADA-compliant restrooms. There is also a unisex handicapped restroom upstairs. The entire building is now ADA compliant."

In a non-pandemic setting, he said, The Hollow could hold up to 70 people downstairs, 200 people upstairs and also have a seasonal outdoor tent that seats 160.

For people who are missing the famous, yet now defunct, Corey's Catsup and Mustard that used to reside on Main Street, there is a happy surprise, as the owner and chef, Corey Wry, is the executive chef at The Hollow.

"We're going to do bar and grill pub food," Wry said.

Though the menu isn't finalized yet, one of the spotlights will be the Grand Slam burgers, each burger named after one of the four Grand Slam tournaments in golf, The Masters, The U.S. Open, The Open Championship, and the PGA Championship. There will also be a fifth burger for the unofficial fifth Grand Slam tournament, The Players Championship.

McNamara said that the menu remains the same for both lunch and dinner and a variety of special event menus will be available for groups and parties that wish to rent out the space.

"We have approximately nine menus for guests to choose from for anything from a bereavement luncheon to a full-blown wedding dinner," he said.

The Hollow will be open year-round, he said, as long as there is a demand for it.

"We'll see how it goes," he said. We will be in business when the guests need us. When they want us, we'll be available for them."

"We're very excited about it," Wry said. "We have a couple things for our banquet clients; four- or five-course weddings. We try to cover a broad variety. I love looking forward to that. That'll be new to me."

McNamara also said he hopes to have themed events throughout the year, including whiskey dinners, wine dinners, and in the tent, cigar dinners.

"One of the first I want to do is a Kentucky Derby Day," he said. "There're so many possibilities, especially around the holidays. If the members are interested, we can do a members' family night."