The Apollo Group will open Baptiste, an 80-seat French bistro on the ground floor of The Eve Hotel in Redfern, this November — its second new concept at the property alongside rooftop restaurant Tenjo, which launches the same month.

Baptiste takes over the former Bar Julius site and will trade seven days a week from 7am until late, covering breakfast, lunch, dinner and an all-day snacks-and-drinks window. The trading model deliberately builds in two happy hours — 4-5pm and 10-11pm — an unusually aggressive daypart strategy aimed at capturing both late-night drop-ins and hotel guests looking for a glass of wine outside standard meal times.

Owner-operator Jonathan Barthelmess framed the concept as an intentionally familiar neighbourhood bistro rather than a launch designed to make headlines. "We didn't want to open a restaurant that read as brand new, but a bistro that felt like it had been on the corner for years," he said. "The food is simple on purpose, a chicken off the rôtisserie, a baguette, a plate of chips, a glass of wine at four in the afternoon. It's the kind of place we wanted in the neighbourhood, so we built it."

That simplicity carries menu-engineering logic. A rotisserie chicken, positioned as the signature dish, offers consistent throughput and low waste across a 15-plus-hour trading day, while à la carte classics — butcher's cut steak frites, Niçoise and Caesar salads, and desserts including profiteroles, crème caramel and rum baba — rely on ingredients with long shelf lives and cross-daypart application. A rotating offal dish adds a low-cost-protein lever to the lineup.

Head Chef Luke Papalia, who moves across from sibling venue Olympus, developed the menu with Barthelmess. Launch dishes include fresh goat's cheese with chive oil and herbs and an onion and olive tart, with a dedicated oyster station anchoring the bar counter — a high-margin format that supports the drinks-led happy hour windows.

The beverage program pairs classic wines with bottles from newer French and Australian producers. Sam Christie curates a daily by-the-glass list, while Matt Whiley builds the cocktail offering — a rotating glass pour that keeps the wine program fresh without committing capital to deep inventory.

Poached marron with pommes allumettes sits alongside the rotisserie chicken at the top of the menu, giving the venue a premium Australian seafood counterpoint to its French bistro staples.

The back-to-back November openings give Apollo Group two distinct formats within a single hotel property: an all-day, seven-day ground-floor bistro built for volume and repeat neighbourhood traffic, and a destination rooftop restaurant in Tenjo. Official opening dates for both will be announced shortly.