SARAH FENSKE

Flament Co.'s jerk sandwich — a positive development downtown, for sure.

It's been a busy month for the St. Louis bar and restaurant scene — with some high-profile closures and some exciting new openings too. Two beloved restaurants (Billie's Fine Foods and Macklind Avenue Deli) closed after being gutted by fire, even as Webster Groves got a beautiful new nightlife spot, Downtown West got a steakhouse and Clayton got the second location of Peel Wood Fired Pizza — lucky, lucky Clayton.

But a disproportionate amount of the action seemed to be downtown this month. In addition to Porano, Howl at the Moon suddenly shut its doors, smack in the middle of baseball season, while Gerard Craft stopped tinkering with his two-year-old Porano Pasta and decided to close it altogether, blaming a paucity of convention business.

Closings

Openings

Others are still feeling bullish on downtown. Flament Co.'s the Place American Eatery brings New York-style slices to the UPS building , while Breakfast Lunch and Tacos offers just as its name promises on 6th Street. Out with the old, in with the new.Here are the rest of this month's changes. Did we miss anything? Let us know in the comment section below.