photographs by Justin Fox Burks
Before heading downtown, we get dressed up. I wear my flowered skinny skirt and insist my husband pull out the new sweater I gave him for Christmas. At the restaurant, other people are also well-heeled and celebratory, like guests at a wedding reception awaiting the bride and groom.
Behind the cocktail bar — 20 seats and crafted from white-gray marble — bartenders hustle with élan, pouring drinks like the “Confluence,” a mix of gin, vermouth, lime, amber-colored brandy, and a cap of egg whites, whipped and frothy. Across the lounge are views of Front Street, along with a raw bar with stools, where shuckers keep the oysters coming: Sweet Petites from Martha’s Vineyard and Alabama’s own Murder Points, plump and buttery and served with horseradish, cocktail sauce, and red wine mignonette. From the dining room windows, the Mississippi River looks dark and a little foreboding, but the lights on the Hernando DeSoto Bridge twinkle in the rain.
Like everyone else, we are excited, and why not? The rollout of The Gray Canary feels like the party of the year, even though the calendar hasn’t flipped yet to February.
Located downtown in Old Dominick Distillery’s renovated warehouse, The Gray Canary is the fifth Memphis restaurant for chefs Michael Hudman and Andrew Ticer. The vibe is both classy and casual with crystal chandeliers and textured finishes in blue and gold. The restaurant’s food showcases a similar dichotomy. Although complex to prepare, the cold and cooked plates feel friendly, riffing on flavors from a backyard grill.
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The restaurant’s lounge includes a curved raw bar; parsley and garlic chips garnish a T-Bone; wood-fire cooking drives the kitchen’s heartbeat; oysters sourced from Canada, New England, and the Gulf Coast are served with dipping sauces. Executive chef de cuisine Ryan Jenniges, above, and server Alex Grant at work in The Gray Canary.
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The restaurant’s lounge includes a curved raw bar; parsley and garlic chips garnish a T-Bone; wood-fire cooking drives the kitchen’s heartbeat; oysters sourced from Canada, New England, and the Gulf Coast are served with dipping sauces. opposite page: Executive chef de cuisine Ryan Jenniges, above, and server Alex Grant at work in The Gray Canary.
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The restaurant’s lounge includes a curved raw bar; parsley and garlic chips garnish a T-Bone; wood-fire cooking drives the kitchen’s heartbeat; oysters sourced from Canada, New England, and the Gulf Coast are served with dipping sauces. Executive chef de cuisine Ryan Jenniges, above, and server Alex Grant at work in The Gray Canary.
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The restaurant’s lounge includes a curved raw bar; parsley and garlic chips garnish a T-Bone; wood-fire cooking drives the kitchen’s heartbeat; oysters sourced from Canada, New England, and the Gulf Coast are served with dipping sauces. Executive chef de cuisine Ryan Jenniges, above, and server Alex Grant at work in The Gray Canary.
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The restaurant’s lounge includes a curved raw bar; parsley and garlic chips garnish a T-Bone; wood-fire cooking drives the kitchen’s heartbeat; oysters sourced from Canada, New England, and the Gulf Coast are served with dipping sauces. Executive chef de cuisine Ryan Jenniges, above, and server Alex Grant at work in The Gray Canary.
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The restaurant’s lounge includes a curved raw bar; parsley and garlic chips garnish a T-Bone; wood-fire cooking drives the kitchen’s heartbeat; oysters sourced from Canada, New England, and the Gulf Coast are served with dipping sauces. Executive chef de cuisine Ryan Jenniges, above, and server Alex Grant at work in The Gray Canary.
Hudman and Ticer, who frequently cook together at home, did in fact develop recipes on their Big Green Eggs for dishes now prepared in The Gray Canary’s giant brick hearth, the heart of the restaurant’s open kitchen. Exuberant about the possibilities of wood, smoke, embers, and ash, the restaurant, they say, is a dream come true that mixes the whimsy of play with the bravura of fire cooking.
“This is the most fun creatively we can have with food because there are no boundaries,” Ticer explains. “This is everything we are as diners and cooks right now. We want oysters and rosé. We want roasted meats over embers. We want cocktails and crudos, ceviches and tartares.”
Notably missing from The Gray Canary are pastas, menu cornerstones at the chefs’ other restaurants in Memphis and New Orleans. Instead, the new menu, executed by executive chef de cuisine Ryan Jenniges and chef de cuisine Ysaac Ramirez, is influenced by the Mediterranean, but more vegetable-forward and liberated from constraints.
With its chilled seafood and crackling kitchen fire, The Gray Canary embodies a bold American spirit, not unlike the country’s iconic chophouses from the 1960s. Think Four Seasons, but au courant, less pricey, and way more fun.
Perhaps the restaurant’s can-do attitude is why we decide on reinterpreted American classics for our first meal: A mixed greens salad called Misticanza, wilted on the edges and dressed with buttermilk dressing and Pecorino cheese; butterball potatoes cooked with brown butter, lemon, garlic, and parsley, finished over coals, and warmed with Raclette, a melted Swiss cheese; a scrumptious T-bone, sprinkled with garlic chips and sliced perpendicular to the bone; and Maitake mushrooms grilled in their coral-like clusters and destined to become a signature dish.
On a subsequent visit with friends, we explore the menu more fully. “Just decide what you want to eat and let me worry about how to serve it,” our server Kaitlyn says, and so we do: Kohlrabi, a stout cabbage cultivar transformed by its roast in the hearth’s hot coals; a hearty platter of country ham, dusted with cornbread panna gratta and grated Gruyere; and steamed clams, chopped and folded together with ham and celery root puree, scooped back into their petite shells, and garnished with tarragon, crispy sunchokes, and peanut sprinkles. My, oh, my!
We settle into our comfy banquette with a pinot noir from Willamette Valley as more shared plates arrive: spinalis, the tender end cap of a ribeye served with leeks and black pepper confit, and piccolo farro — the world’s smallest and oldest cultivated grain — transformed by a short ferment in mash from the distillery next door. (“It brings out the grain’s funky nature,” Jenniges explains.) For dessert, we order a dressed-up s’more made with frozen fior di latte (“flower of the milk” ice cream) and marshmallow fluff scorched on the edges like Baked Alaska.
Service at The Gray Canary is smart and efficient, thanks to its veteran team. Director of operations Nick Talarico has been with Enjoy AM Restaurant Group since its start and equates The Gray Canary to an “Alice in Wonderland” moment: “When you step in, you are transported.”
Wine director and sommelier Ryan Radish praises the Canary’s large basement where he will keep cellar wines: “We finally can store vintages for two, three, or four years and wait for the right time to put them on the list.” And restaurant general manger Praveena Anandraj, who relocated from Los Angeles, is happy to call Memphis her new home: “Memphis has a sense of community, and that’s what drew me here.”
Pam’s Pics: Three to Try
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The Revelry: With its gorgeous copper color, sparkling apple cider, and hometown roots, the Revelry is about doing something slightly unexpected. Explains Nick Talarico: “The fresh citrus from the Honeybell Vodka and the tart apple just make sense.” ($11)
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Parker House Rolls: Brushed with lard and crispy onion crumbles, pastry chef Kayla Palmer’s Parker House rolls are reinterpreted from their Boston roots and a hands-down table favorite. Pro tip: Don’t share. You need a roll to call your own. ($6)
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Scallops: Even in the clutch of winter, The Gray Canary’s scallops, roasted along with radishes on the fire’s embers, feel like spring. The plate’s pretty accoutrements add to its allure: sorrel, pineapple sabayon, and green apple slices. ($18)
The Gray Canary
301 S. Front Street
901-249-2932
★★★★
Extras: The restaurant’s name, The Gray Canary, embodies the canaries that were traditionally carried underground with miners to help monitor the oxygen levels.
Up next: Weekend brunch is on tap, along with artwork that plays off the restaurant’s original inspiration from the children’s book, Where the Wild Things Are.
Prices: Oysters and raw plates ($3.50 to $15); shared plates from the hearth ($6 to $27); desserts ($7 to $9); cocktails ($12 to $14); wines by the glass ($9 to $17).
Open: The lounge opens at 4 p.m. followed by dinner service at 5 o’clock Tuesday through Sunday.
