Springfield's 'Bachelor' celebrity focuses on restaurant

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. -- Aaron Buerge is handing out long stem roses once again, only this time they're in a martini glass and he has no aspirations of getting hitched.

The star of ABC's romance-reality series "The Bachelor" is concentrating on his new restaurant in downtown Springfield now that he and Helene Eksterowicz have called off their engagement.

"I don't have much of a personal life right now," says Buerge, a 28-year-old banker. "I'm still not caught up from being off for the show. It's been a wild ride, for sure."

Buerge refuses to dish on the breakup with the New Jersey grade-school psychologist. He's saving details for an ABC special on Thursday.

"I have no regrets," Buerge says.

He's also hopeful St. Louis native Trista Rehn will get the fairy-tale ending on "The Bachelorette."

In the first edition of "The Bachelor" last spring, Harvard-educated management consultant Alex Michel picked his favorite bachelorette but held on to the ring and his bachelor status.

"I don't think it matters how you meet -- whether it's on a cruise ship or a TV show," Buerge says. "You just have to take a leap of faith and see where it goes."

Buerge's darling these days is Trolley's Downtown Bar and Grille. He and three friends opened the restaurant to a soldout crowd of 140 on Valentine's Day.

The restaurant was planned long before Buerge landed the show and he couldn't resist talking about it during the eight-episode odyssey.

To help him decide who should get the diamond ring, Buerge brought the finalists -- 27-year-old Eksterowicz and Brooke Smith, a 22-year-old senior at the University of Alabama -- home to meet his family. Both took on-camera tours of the eatery while it was under construction.

"No amount of marketing dollars could do for Springfield what the show did. And it wasn't just for the restaurant, it was for the entire city," Buerge says. "We've had calls from Vancouver, Canada."

Buerge recently emerged from the restaurant to find a Dallas couple hoping to get an autograph. Others peer in windows and linger over the outside menu, which features seafood, pastas and smoked meats.

Although the interior gives customers the feeling of traveling along a Springfield street in the 1930s, there are a few subtle hints of Buerge's television days. Just inside the front door is a painting of Buerge beside the silhouette of a woman curiously resembling Eksterowicz. A question mark is painted in the center of the woman's hidden face.

"That was done back in October when the show was still airing, so it was still a big mystery," Buerge explains.

The drink menu includes "The Bachelor's Party Punch," a $15 martini-for-four that includes three kinds of rum, almond and banana liquors, as well as pineapple and orange juices.

There's also the "Long Stem Rose," a play on the symbolic flower Buerge handed out as he whittled the field of 25 wannabe brides. The $6 drink consists of raspberry vodka, almond liquor and lime juice.

"It's cheesy, I know," Buerge says with a laugh.

Partner Steve Warlick says interest in the restaurant is higher than initially expected because of Buerge's popularity.

"That's a good problem to have," Warlick says.

They don't want to turn people away, so dinner requires reservations for now. The bar is open to everyone.

Buerge says he and Warlick hope to expand to Kansas City and St. Louis. They also have received a down payment from a businessman interested in copying the concept in Atlanta.

At least for now, there appears to be no shortage of interest in Trolley's or Buerge.

"My 82-year-old mother thinks you are just marvelous," one delivery woman tells Buerge. "When she came down for Thanksgiving, I had to bring her down and show her where this was going to be."