Tower Grove South burger restaurant the Dam will permanently close after service on Saturday (May 14). Owner Michele Coen intends to focus on her catering business, Michele C Catering & Events, which she is relocating from the Dam to the Dark Room at the Grandel in Grand Center.
The Dam opened in 2013 at 3173 Morganford Road, serving burgers and Belgian-style hand-cut fries with dipping sauces out of its small storefront — and to innumerable hungry soccer fans at the adjacent Amsterdam Tavern.
For this restaurant critic, the Dam’s signature dish has always been its Animal burger, a fearsome stack of three patties with American cheese, bacon, grilled onions, jalapeños and barbecue sauce.
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“I love Tower Grove South,” Coen says. “I love all my neighbors….”
Still, she says, while she has owned the Dam for nearly 10 years, she has operated her catering and events business for almost 20, “so that’s where (I’m going to use) the next 10 years to push towards.”
The restaurant industry’s ongoing staffing shortage also informed her decision to close, which Sauce first reported.
Fans of the Dam can expect sliders and fries with sauces on the Dark Room’s menu.
“I’m excited for my new adventure with Kranzberg Arts Foundation, and I think it’s gonna be great,” Coen says.
The Dam is the second restaurant to close in May on this block of Morganford. The brick-and-mortar version of Tyler Garcia’s Locoz Tacoz, which operated as a walk-up counter inside the bar Tres Equis at 3169 Morganford, closed May 7.
More on the future of Locoz Tacoz as I learn it.
