Contrary to rumors going around, Belmont Grill isn’t going anywhere.
“We’re not closing,” says Belmont owner-manager Jeff Anderson. But, he says, “We may be selling soon.”
It will remain the Belmont Grill, he says.
And that’s all he can say right now.
But, he reiterates, they’re not closing.
The menu gives the Belmont’s history. The beloved restaurant/bar at 4970 Poplar Avenue and Mendenhall Street, with its famous hamburgers and hot wings “was constructed between 1910 and 1920 and was originally operated as a general store by Italia Bianchi and her family on what was known as Poplar Pike in the town of White Station.”
Belmont owner-manager Jeff Anderson (Credit: Michael Donahue)
Businesses on that corner included Bianchi Bros. Grocery and Louie’s Grill, which became Louie’s Bar & Grill in 1948. Then “sometime in the early ’60s the property was leased to Bob Lloyd, who turned it into the (infamous?) Sir Robert’s, where apparently half of East Memphis ate ham sandwiches, drank beer, and played shuffleboard.
“Alan Gary (who also founded Huey’s) acquired the business in 1974 and renamed it The Half Shell.” And, the story goes on, “10 years later, in 1983, The Half Shell moved to its current location on Mendenhall and the former Half Shell became The Belmont.”
Mix Odyssey 2020 winners included Nick Lumpkin, Daniel Quinlan, and Mitch Marable. (Photo: Courtesy Volunteer Odyssey)
Mix Odyssey returns.
The Volunteer Odyssey fundraiser, where bartenders compete with each other to make the best drink of the night, will be back after a five-year hiatus. It will be held from 6 to 9 p.m., April 30th, at Baron Von Opperbean (BVO), the site of the old Mississippi River Museum at Mud Island.
Bartenders Mitchell Marable (The Lobbyist) and Nick Lumpkin (The Cove) were the instigators. “We wanted to start the competition back up,” says Marable, who is also a butcher at Buster’s Butcher. “We missed it and figured it was about time. The last one we did was the end of February 2020 right before everything started locking down.”
The event is “a fun time for bartenders to get together and see each other. We’re usually working on the same evenings. We can’t get out and have cocktails with our other comrades. We’re just working the same schedules. It’s a good cause. A good organization and just a fun night.”
Mitchell Marable (Photo: Michael Donahue)
Caroline Norris, Volunteer Odyssey president/CEO, is grateful for Marable and Lumpkin. “If I did not have their support and expertise, it could not have happened,” she says. “They have such big hearts and they’re really good at what they do.”
The previous Mix Odyssey was the last, or close to the last, big fundraiser before Covid hit in March 2020, Norris says. “We just want to make sure that people remember how much fun it it is. And they can come and vote for their favorite bartender.”
And, she says, “With each ticket you get a couple of votes. And with each donation you get another vote. You can cheer on your favorite bartender and support work to build capacity for our hundreds of nonprofit partners to provide technology platforms, recruiting, and best practices to manage their volunteers.”
Nick Lumpkin (Photo: Rachel Mary Harris)
Bartenders come up with their own cocktails with spirits provided by Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits. “Each bartender will basically be crafting their signature cocktail to compete.”
Guests get six tastings. Snacks will be provided by Paradox Catering & Consulting, thanks to owner Jimmy Gentry, who also is chef/owner of The Lobbyist. Beer and wine also will be available.
Norris says, “The whole event is to celebrate the end of Global Volunteer Month,” which begins April 1st.
Barksdale's restaurant at 237 Cooper Street is coming back
Sunny side up, everybody! Barksdale’s will reopen Monday, April 14th.
The iconic eatery at 237 Cooper Street that closed after a fire in June, 2024 will be back in action with breakfast and lunch. It will be open from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. seven days a week, says Ryan Glosson, one of the owners along with Bryant and Heather Bain. They also are the owners of Bain Barbecue down the street at 993 Cooper Street in Cooper-Young.
Heather and Bryant Bain and Ryan Glosson at the recent A Taste of CBHS (Credit: Michael Donahue)
The walls will feature “lots of memorabilia from before,” Glosson says.”We got the (Ameican) flag that’s back up in the hallway. New flooring, new ceilings, new booths.”
As for the food, Bryant says, “It’s the same type of food, it’s just updated to be fresher and scratch made every day. Some new items on the menu, but I don’t know what they did on their daily lunch menu off the top of my head. Just tell people to come in and eat.”
Asked in an earlier interview why they wanted to buy Barksdale’s, Bryant said, “We’ve all eaten there. And it’s been in the community for so many years.”
They weren’t going to let Barksdale just belong to the ages. They wanted it open again. It was “Hey, if we can do something about it, we’re going to,” Bryant said.
Kelly English has added a new business to his roster of eating establishments, which include Restaurant Iris and Second Line.
Meet “Rocket Greens & Things.”
Think “salad food truck.”
I asked English a few questions about this new endeavor.
What made you decide to open a salad food truck?
“We saw an opportunity to put our company and our employees in a better position filling what we found to be a voice in Midtown. There are plenty of places to get a salad, but no spots that center around salads.
We named the truck “Rocket Greens & Things” because we all love arugula, which means ‘rocket.’ The salads will come out fast like a rocket.”
What’s on the menu? Is this an ever changing menu or will it stay the same? Anything other than salads on the truck?
“We have a bunch of different signature salads and a build-your-own option. We plan to add a lot more in the coming weeks. Including non-salad items. That is where the ‘& things’ comes in. Those are the ‘things,’ but we are starting with salads because that will always be our core.
“Our guests will dictate by what they buy with what stays and what evolves. But we expect to have a good solid handful of mainstays with lots of seasonal options.”
What makes these salads special? How will they stand apart from other salads?
“They are special because we spend days talking about just salads. And we have personal nods to people and places that mean things to us on the menu.
What color is the truck?
“Our colors are green and orangey red.”
Where will the food truck be located?
“We are located at the corner of Cooper and Linden behind CVS and across Cooper from Fresh Market.”
Will this be in operation daily?
“We are open for lunch and dinner Monday through Friday and lunch on Friday and Saturday and open into the afternoon but not for dinner on Saturday.”
Is there a Website people where people can find menu items and where the truck will be?
“The truck won’t move, so that is easy. Our menu will be on Instagram at @rocketgreens.”
Who is doing the salad preparation? Are you going to ever be working on the food truck?
“Derk Metzler will oversee it along with the Swamp Bar and Second Line. Derk is such an important part of our entire company. And I feel so lucky he is on our team. I worked there both days this weekend and am scheduled there during lunch this Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday. So, yes. Sometimes.”
Is this the first food truck you’ve ever done?
“This is the first food truck in this restaurant group (Iris Restaurant Group), yes.”
Jimmy Gentry with bartenders Mitchell Marable and Austin Weisendorm (Photo: Michael Donahue
The spacious patio on the south side of The Lobbyist restaurant was where the Donahues used to swim back in the 1960s. My parents were members of The Variety Club, which was housed at the old Chisca Hotel, where the restaurant is now located. Members could use the hotel pool.
The Lobbyist’s chef/owner Jimmy Gentry has now added an impressive-looking outdoor bar to that beautiful patio at The Chisca on Main. “It can seat eight at the bar, but it’s capable of handling that whole patio area,” Gentry says.
As for patio seating, he says, “Depending on configuration I can put almost 70 people out there.”
The Lobbyist patio (Credit: Michael Donahue)
Gentry says he built it so servers wouldn’t be “running cocktails from the main bar to the patio. You can have a bar outside and not worry about how long it takes or anything like that.”
The bar is slated to officially open probably in about two weeks, he says. “It has been open, but we haven’t necessarily officially opened the patio this season.”
Gentry showed me the bar when I ate at The Lobbyist last week. Red fish with greens, couscous, and pot liquor was my dinner choice. It was so delicious. I wish I had another one right now. And I can’t get enough of the yams Gentry serves.
Red fish at The Lobbyist (Credit: Michael Donahue)
But after eating at the restaurant many times, I never knew why the restaurant was called “The Lobbyist.” I thought it had something to do with politics. But, Gentry says, “That whole space used to lead into what was the lobby.”
So, he did what he did with his former restaurant P. O. Press in Collierville. “I tried to tie the restaurant into the space like I did the P.O., which originally was the post office in Collierville and then turned into the newspaper, P. O. Press. Paying homage to the space itself.”
Hence, The Lobbyist. “Instead of calling it ‘The Lobby,’” he says, adding, “‘The Lobbyist’ makes you think twice about it.”
But Gentry says he still gets people coming in the restaurant thinking it’s the “lobby of the hotel.”
The Lobbyist is at 272 South Main, Suite 101, in The Chisca on Main
Memphis’ Cxffeeblack has announced a partnership with COMOCO Cotton, a sustainable textile company, to release a limited-edition T-shirt with the phrase “God Don’t Make No Junk. Cxffee Don’t Need No Cream” printed across the front. This partnership, in turn, has created what they say is COMOCO’s and the world’s first Black-owned cotton supply chain.
“This collaboration is about more than a product. It’s about shifting the narrative — reclaiming what was once stolen and turning it into a tool for our collective liberation,” Bartholomew Jones, hip-hop artist, educator, and co-founder of Cxffeeblack, said in a press release.
“Coffee’s a $465 billion industry, and it’s the most traded good for third-world countries after oil and is the most drunk liquid on the planet after water,” Jones said in a previous interview with the Flyer. “Amidst all of those things, the people who discovered coffee, which are people in Africa, receive less than 1 percent of that revenue.”
Bartholomew Jones and Stephen Satterfield, owner of COMOCO Cotton (Photo: Courtesy Bartholomew Jones)
Cotton, likewise, is another historically charged material for its role in slavery and sharecropping. “COMOCO is helping to reframe that narrative and reclaim cotton as a source of pride, empowerment, and prosperity,” its website reads, as the business works exclusively with Black farmers to address “the historical and ongoing marginalization of Black farmers and farms.”
In this way, as the press release states, “Through this partnership, coffee and cotton, once tools of oppression, are transformed into symbols of resilience and creativity, owned and driven by Black hands.”
The cotton T-shirts are dyed with the coffee company’s Guji Mane, sourced directly from Ethiopian farms. These shirts are limited only to those who invest or return to invest in Cxffeeblack’s WeFunder, the goal of which is to build a permanent headquarters as a community space and to establish the world’s first all-Black coffee supply chain connecting Africa to Memphis. Recently, the company has celebrated passing its halfway point to $1.2 million on capital raised.
“Investing in this collaboration means investing in a future where Black ownership is not the exception — it’s the standard,” Stephen Satterfield, owner of COMOCO Cotton and host of Netflix’s High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America. (Satterfield met Jones when he visited Cxffeeblack’s shop, the Anti Gentrification Cxffee Club, during a stay in Memphis. Ever since, Satterfield has supported the Memphis-based company.)
“Black creativity is the foundation of so many industries, yet we rarely own the means of production,” Jones said. “This collaboration proves that we don’t have to ask for a seat at the table — we can build our own, from the soil up.”
The Memphis In May World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest (MIM) is adding steak to its competition list with a top prize of $3,000.
MIM announced the addition of the Steak Cookout Competition Thursday morning. It’s a partnership with the Steak Cookout Association and a first for MIM.
“For 47 years now, the World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest teams have continued to bring excitement and immense competition during the Memphis in May International Festival celebration,” said Mack Weaver, MIM president and CEO. “We are thrilled to partner with the Steak Cookoff Association (SCA) to expand opportunities for our teams to earn more cash and notoriety.”
The total purse for the steak contest is $6,000. The prize money is broken down like this:
• 1st place – $3,000
• 2nd place – $1,500
• 3rd place – $1,000
• 4th place – $500
Winners also earn an automatic entry into the Steak Cookoff Association World Championship in Fort Worth, Texas.
“It’s long been a goal of ours to have an SCA Cookoff at Memphis in May,” said SCA founder Ken Phillips. “The cooks and judges are very excited about the opportunity. I look forward to a long and successful collaboration.”
The Steak Cookoff Competition will take place during the Memphis in May International Festival on Thursday, May 15, 2025, at Liberty Park. Cost for teams to compete is $150.
Mahogany Memphis in Chickasaw Oaks Mall is closing in late February, says owner Carlee McCullough.
But her other restaurant, Mahogany River Oaks, will remain open.
Mahogany Memphis is “only open for special events through February 28th,” McCullough says.
Discussing the closing, she says, “I said, ‘You know what? Let me close it and focus all my energy on River Terrace,” adding, “We were doing everything we could to drive traffic to it. But it just wasn’t there. Once we opened up River Terrace, everybody’s there.”
Mahogany Memphis, which is at 3092 Poplar Avenue Number 11, opened in November 2018. It features “upscale Southern with a dash of Creole.”
Mahogany River Terrace, which opened in October on Mud Island, features “upscale Southern with a dash of Creole, and with an emphasis on seafood.”
Mary Oglesby and Paul Gilliam (Credit: Paul Gilliam)
Paul Gilliam and Mary Oglesby, owners of Cameo and Mary’s Bar of Tropical Escapism, are the new owners of the spaces formerly occupied by Knifebird Wine Bar and The Public Bistro.
“We did not buy their businesses,” Gilliam says. “We are opening new businesses in their spaces.”
Where Knifebird was located at 2155 Central Avenue will now be home to an establishment to be called “No Comment.” — with a period.
Why that name? “We thought it was fun. Kind of sassy. We like fun stuff,” Gilliam says. “Knifebird was a wine bar. And we are going to keep that space a wine bar.”
“The changes will mostly be vibe based and cosmetic,” Oglesby says.
“Fawn” will be the name of the restaurant in the space formerly occupied by The Public Bistro at 937 Cooper Street. Gilliam says they just liked the name. “It sounded warm and cozy.”
“We thought it would fit the vibe of what we’re doing,” Oglesby adds. “We’re very vibe oriented.”
Fawn will be the pair’s first restaurant. “Mary and I are both bartenders, so the places we have opened in the past have been very bar-driven businesses,” Gilliam says. “And this will be a very chef-driven business.”Asked when they will open, Gilliam says, “I would say first half of 2025.”
Oglesby says, “We are aiming for the first half of 2025, but all of that is alway up to licensing and all of that. So, a lot of that is out of our control. So, we just wait on when we’re told by the state that we can open.”
“Memphis Chef Jimmy Gentry’s Corn Mash Makes New York Times List Today.”
It was named one of 26 Best Dishes Across the United States by The New York Times.
It makes me very, very happy, actually, because this is my all-time favorite dish at Gentry’s The Lobbyist restaurant at 272 South Main in The Chisca on Main.
It’s so good. The ultimate comfort food. Just reading this email at 9:44 a.m. makes me want a big helping of this super delicious dish right now.
The menu describes the dish, which is listed as “Corn Mash/Roasted Squash/Bacon Jus,” as “a bowl of decadently stone-ground grits topped with roasted squash with a bacon jus, drizzled with burnt-in oil, and topped with pepitas.”
The is what Brett Anderson of the Times wrote about it: “Jimmy Gentry built his reputation in Memphis for cooking Southern food that pushes vegetables in the center of the plate. This helps explain why there are twice as many vegetable dishes as there are protein dishes on the menu at the Lobbyist, the intelligent, accessible modern Southern restaurant he opened last year. It’s hard to say which is the star of this signature dish: the coarse Delta Grind Grits, made from Tennessee corn and enriched with mascarpone, or the roasted seasonal squash mounted on top of them.”
So, I called Gentry, who I’ve known for years, to tell me about the dish.
Jimmy Gentry (Photo: Jay Adkins)
“Everybody wants to know where it came from,” Gentry tells me. “The way it goes, my daughter growing up always loved my shrimp and grits. Right?”
But he transformed the dish when he was restaurant instructor at the old L’École Culinaire. “Everybody was doing shrimp and grits. It became the staple of the world.”
Gentry didn’t want to do what everybody else was doing, so he began making flat iron steak with the same grits and andouille sauce. His daughter loved it. “She would request it every year for her birthday. When we got ready to open P.O. [Press Public House & Provisions in Collierville, Tennessee], she looked at me and goes, ‘You have to put that flat iron thing on there.’”
Gentry told her he wasn’t putting that on the menu. “You know when you make something over and over again you get burned out on it?”
And he didn’t think it was “a showcase item.” It was good, but it wasn’t amazing, he says.
So, Gentry got fancier.
“I love the old French way of making sauces in pans,” he says. “We start off with squash, our house-made bacon. You deglaze with chicken stock, add shaved garlic, fresh thyme, and, after it reduces, we mound it with butter.”
He also uses “turkey neck and chicken feet to make it more gelatinous.”
“Place the roasted squash in the grits [mash]. Then spoon the sauce on top. Garnish with burnt onion oil and roasted pepitas.”
Gentry added his Corn Mash when he opened The Lobbyist, which will celebrate its second anniversary in January.
And I don’t need to worry about Corn Mash not being on the menu next time I visit Gentry’s restaurant. “I haven’t been able to take that thing off since we had P.O.”
