Fat Dan's plans a Carmel deli and a Downtown Indianapolis steakhouse

Fat Dan’s Deli is famous for its smoked wings and brisket in Indianapolis, and the restaurant is coming to Carmel this spring, but wait until you see the supper club-style steakhouse owner Dan Jarman is bringing to Fountain Square.

Jarman just bought Crust pizzeria, 840 W. Main St., in Carmel, with plans to transition to Fat Dan’s décor and menu in four to six weeks. He'll keep Crust’s brick-oven for pizzas and calzones.

As for the steakhouse Jarman opens in early spring, maybe as soon as late March, the story might start something like “The Rat Pack walks into an Indianapolis bar … .”

“A place where Dean Martin would go get a martini and a steak,” is how Jarman describes Geraldine’s, a supper club and lounge he’s developing at the former Ironworkers Corner Bar, 1101 English Ave.

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“Just a sexy, chill, cool vibe, bronze and brass, what steakhouses used to be before everybody started … you know, putting sushi on their menu and building these big, giant, thousand-seat, cavernous steakhouses,” he said.

A visit to a newer one of central Downtown’s 13 steakhouses in a half-mile-square area convinced Jarman, a former Sullivan's Steakhouse corporate trainer, to finally pursue his longtime dream of owning a classic steakhouse.

“I saw sushi on the menu. And egg rolls. It ticked me off,” he said.

The Geraldine's building’s past hardly speaks to the silver coffee service, nightly live piano jazz, white tablecloths and hand-cut steaks and chops Jarman has in mind.

Ironworkers was a dive bar that closed a couple years ago. The 1800s-era red brick two-story sports an exterior wall painting advertising the pre-Prohibition, Milwaukee-based beer company Jung Brewing. Jung Beer displayed wall ads on other buildings around the city.

The address was listed as Rockwood Manufactuing Co. from the 1920s to the 1940s, according to IndyStar records. Files also show the building served as an A&P food store and Louis J. Wahl Hardware in the 1920s, a poolroom in the 1930s, an apartment in the 1940s and a restaurant in the 1960s. In the basement, Jarman found a 1935 newspaper with a front-page headline announcing Babe Ruth's retirement from Major League Baseball.

The place may have been a brothel, too, according to what Jarman has heard from previous landlords.

New arched windows surround the entire Geraldine's scene, but Jarman has left much of structure’s elements intact. The Jung Beer remains. Exposed ceilings reveal old, dark, wooden support beams. Jarman has stripped walls to the brick.

A hefty, rough wooden staircase winds around a brass chandelier, one of various fixtures Jarman found at vintage shops and antique stores. Steps lead to the second-floor dining room, where French-style, oval-back chairs will slide on the original wood floor.

The menu will serve six to eight chops sourced from Indiana, Colorado, Nebraska, Iowa and other places, plus pork, veal and chicken options and five to six side dishes. Pasta and seafood entrees would vary from time to time. Soups, salads and appetizers will round out the offerings.

Geraldine’s is off the Downtown beaten steakhouse path, per Jarman’s intention. He wants a destination restaurant with a neighborhood feel, a place where guests can dress up but still be treated to prices 10 percent to 15 percent lower than big-box steakhouses dotting Mile Square.

A dedicated parking lot next door, valet service and street parking will be available at 100-seat Geraldine's. Jarman is also sketching a 40-seat patio.

Jarman named his restaurant after his mother in an ode to the memorable restaurant meals he shared with his parents.

“When I was a kid, Mom and Dad would take me out. We’d go to the small, cool little steakhouses,” Jarman said.

“You can’t stop the world changing, but it’s nice to step back.”