Food lineup for The Playground in Atlantic City

Bart Blatstein starts the ball rolling Friday, June 26 on T Street – the first phase of his rebirth of Pier Shops at Caesars in Atlantic City, in a $50 million project known as The Playground.

When The Playground is finished by the end of the year, it will have 14 music venues, two private clubs, a bowling alley, and a sports bar.

The pier also is now home to The Continental and Buddakan, two Stephen Starr restaurants.

This weekend, we'll get a taste of T Street, on the pier's Boardwalk level. It is a collection of seven bars and clubs designed to evoke 6th Street in Austin, Music Row in Nashville, and Beale Street in Memphis.

Garces Events Down the Shore created a menu of bar snacks and hand-held foods intended to be easy to eat and designed for sharing. Patrons can walk between and among all seven venues - the Prohibition-themed 1921, Southern-themed Tag, Purdy (jazz and bluegrass), Riviera (beer garden on the ocean), Bo's (dueling piano bar) and Bluey (Irish pub). Five of the venues will feature live music nightly.

Garces Events Down the Shore's chef de cuisine, Mike Siegel (formerly chef de cuisine at The Olde Bar in Old City), and general manager Patrick Sterr (formerly GM of Village Whiskey) will oversee.

I've buttoned up the menu in a PDF (here).

Count on a Nashville-style hot chicken sandwich; burgers (themed to each venue); sausages (befitting Garces' Chicago roots); loaded fries; chicken wings glazed in apricot sauce and topped with blue cheese mousse, fried shrimp with lemon and caper remoulade; and Mexican pizzas served on 10-inch flour tortillas.

Wine/cocktail list is here.