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Justin Fox Burks
A renovation at the Dixon pairs the new cafe Park and Cherry with gift shop 20twelve.
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Justin Fox Burks
Outdoor seating is plentiful in the Dixon’s formal garden.
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Justin Fox Burks
Try quinoa salad made with arugula, cranberries, and pickled pears.
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Justin Fox Burks
Along with lunch, the cafe also serves an assortment of espresso drinks and house-made pastries.
Lunchtime at Park and Cherry, the new café at The Dixon Gallery and Gardens, presents me with only one dilemma: Where should I sit and eat? Do I head for the Mallory/Wurtzburger Gallery to munch and learn, settle in the courtyard at a glass-top table that reflects the summer sun, or wander into the cutting garden to eat under a trellis canopy of vining clematis?
Happily, any decision I make is a good one when paired with the café’s soups, salads, sandwiches, and pastries, all house-made. Operated by Wally Joe and Andrew Adams, the team at nearby Acre, the café showcases the chefs’ expertise in a scaled-back menu suitable for its museum setting. Try quinoa salad with arugula, cranberries, and pickled pears, or a pan bagnat — tuna salad, tomato, hericots verts, sliced hard-boiled egg, and a lovely tapenade. (Think niçoise salad on a fresh baquette.) Or, chase away a chilly morning with pureed lentil soup, smoky and satisfying from cumin and bacon.
A more filling option, the cafe’s beef brisket Reuben served on marbled rye, is smoked in Acre’s Big Green Egg and layered with Swiss and sauerkraut. The scrumptious end pieces of short rib leftover from Acre’s more elaborate entrees also turn up at the café, reinvented as a short rib Panini layered with cheddar cheese.
“We will switch things up as we go and find our groove,” Joe explains. “We want to keep the food simple to fit the space, whether it’s lunch or something to snack on for an afternoon break.”
Lunch service at Park and Cherry runs from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., but espresso coffee drinks, grab-and-go sandwiches like truffle pimento cheese, cold bottles of soda such as pomegranate Izze, and triple chocolate brownies easily satisfy the inner voice that begs between meals for a little something.
4339 Park Ave. (901-761-5250) $
