Brandon event venue adding outdoor upscale hookah lounge
Oct. 15, 2021
Riviera Events and Catering has a new addition: Shisha Lounge Riviera, a patio lounge specializing in hookah.
Owner Matt Sapari opened the Brandon business eight years ago and finished the patio during down time in the pandemic.
It seats about 80, and he decided to specialize in hookah in addition to beer, wine and a light menu.
Sapari has 40 years of experience with hookah, dating back to when he lived in New York.
“I’ve always thought that in order for people to have that experience they have to go to Minneapolis or Omaha or Chicago, and we’ve never had an upscale lounge,” he said. “We have places downtown that do cigars, but nobody really did the hookah, so we’re going to be educating a lot of people on smoking hookah, and it’s an experience I wanted to bring to my hometown.”
Shisha Lounge, which is open to those 21 and older, offers 22 flavors of hookah, which is a type of tobacco Sapari said goes back to ancient time. “Shisha” is Turkish for hookah.
Hookahs are waterpipes that are used to smoke specially made tobacco mixtures.
At Shisha Lounge, flavors range from apple to peach, grape, mint and bubblegum, in addition to house blends.
“And if you’re sitting next to someone and they’re smoking, you will not know they’re smoking. It does not smell like cigarettes or cigars,” Sapari said.
The menu is Mediterranean, with appetizers including hummus and Turkish salad, pita sandwiches and platters including falafel, beef shawarma and gyro.
“We opened it last week and I’ve invited mostly family and friends to check it out,” Sapari said, adding the patio is set up to be mostly year-round, though there will be openings to allow for smoking.
An enclosed lounge will be ready once he’s installed doors that open to the outside.
“It will be open to the public whether they want to smoke or not,” he said. “On that patio it faces west, so a lot of people come over and drink and have an appetizer and watch the sun set.”
Hours for now are 5 to 10 p.m. Thursday and Sunday and 5 to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday. Reservations are required for groups of eight or more.
He’s also been busy on the event and catering side of the business, after remodeling the entire building during the pandemic.
“It looks three times as nice and I’m happy with it,” he said. “You can’t really remodel with weddings at the same time. But booking are coming back and we’re booking on average three or four weddings a week.”
