Brookhaven Circle – Memphis Flyer

Frank Chin

David Krog, Amanda Krog, and chef de cuisine Zach Thomason at Dory.

Gastronomes will have to wait a little longer to sit at the sleek white oak tables and the black granite bar at Dory.

They can’t dine in, but they can dine.

“We’re just doing to-go right now,” says Amanda Krog, who, along with her husband, chef David Krog, are owners of the restaurant at 716 West Brookhaven Circle.

Dory

“Our take-out is geared more to family style. It’s the stuff we eat at home. Chicken dinner is David’s favorite meal to eat at home. A whole roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, and there has to be some bread. That’s on the menu now.”

Also included are pork tenderloin and sides, beef bourguignon with mashed potatoes and “things like that,” Amanda says. Everything except the chicken is cooled, but, she says, “We have re-heat instructions for everything.”

And everything is in “oven-safe” packaging. “Take it home, pop it in the oven.”

A family favorite — chicken dinner — is on Dory’s take-out menu.

Pick-up times for now are between 4 to 6 p.m Tuesday through Friday, but beginning January 11th, meals can be picked up at the same time Monday through Saturday.

They had hoped to open on New Year’s Eve, but they have to wait for their liquor license, Amanda says.

Describing the menu when the restaurant opens for dine-in, David said in a recent interview, “We’re Southern first. We’re almost 100 percent local farms on produce. So, Southern, definitely, but we are playing with some of the techniques here. I think the past few years personally I have grown more as a cook than I have in the past 10. Just because of having the opportunity to do our pop-ups (Gallery) and put whatever I want on the plate. Nobody was telling me what I should be cooking or even suggesting, for that matter.

“This was Amanda’s and my concept. So, I just cooked, and I cooked what I wanted to and what I could get locally. And designed dishes around some modern technique here, but we still operate in classic French technique. Where I come from.”

The Krogs are ready for the time when people can walk inside the restaurant and sit down at those white oak tables and at the black granite bar. “I can’t wait for them to be there all the time,” Amanda says.

Note: Online orders at dorymemphis.com are a day or more in advance, but if you would like to place an order for day of pickup, call the restaurant at 901-310-4290 by 1 p.m. that day.

Dory

Michael Donahue

Amanda and David Krog

It’s about to become a reality. Dory, the long-awaited restaurant owned by chef David Krog and his wife, Amanda, is slated to open this fall.

The restaurant will be located at 716 West Brookhaven Circle.

“We signed contracts this morning,” David says.

“A year and a half ago we wanted to open a restaurant,” Amanda says. That was after David left Interim restaurant as executive chef on January 1, 2018. “We wanted to do something for ourselves.”

The 3,500 or so square-foot house, which once was a medical office, will be completely renovated. “We will have private seating upstairs,” Amanda says. “We’ll have a private dining room downstairs as well. We will have four seats at the counter in the kitchen. Once a week, David will do a 8-to-10-course tasting and wine pairing at the chef’s counter.”

A bar will be separate from the dining room. And they will have an area for lounge seating.

As for the cuisine, David says, it will be “contemporary Southern” with “a French technique. We are focused on intentionally sourcing first generation farms — small farms, family-owned businesses within 100 miles.”

“Dory” is the name of David’s grandmother and his and Amanda’s daughter. “We named our restaurant and our daughter after his ‘Grammy,’” Amanda says.

They specifically wanted their restaurant to be in a house off Poplar in the 38117 area code. They were driving around one day looking for potential locations when their realtor called them with a house that had everything they wanted. It was perfect.

“I was about ready to throw in the towel and get a job,” David says.

The decor will be a combination of David’s taste and Amanda’s taste. “David’s style is more contemporary and modern. And mine is more Bohemian and rustic. And so we are working with somebody to meet in the middle.”

As for furnishings, Amanda says, “We’re going to have some very delicate pieces and some industrial pieces. And we have our friends at Iron & Design and CityWood helping with some focal points and doing our tables.”

“It’s a family-owned business,” David says. “It’s owned and operated by a husband and wife who most definitely want it to be a neighborhood restaurant. It’s a high-end restaurant, but it’s a neighborhood restaurant, too.”

David describes the kitchen as “a teaching kitchen” on the order of chef Erling Jensen’s kitchen at Erling Jensen: The Restaurant. “A lot of people have worked in that kitchen and a few really good business chefs and chefs who have left this town have come up in Erling’s kitchen,” he says. “The kitchen staff is already done. I’ve picked the first crew and there’s a couple of slots for new hires. That is the beginning of bringing in people we don’t know and see if they fit for us. It is important that we fit for them. We want a place where people can grow. And, being in a kitchen, we have to fit well together.”

David and Amanda will continue to conduct their Gallery dinners, which features David and other chefs cooking multi-course dinners at various locations.

And, Amanda says, “David cooks in some people’s homes and does dinner parties for people and other events. We still have that going on in the meantime.”

People will be able to follow Dory’s progress on the Facebook pages and Instagrams of David and Amanda. Their Website is dorymemphis.com.