photograph by michael donahue
The new restaurant on Mud Island offers magical views of the Mississippi River.
I remember drinking champagne with a friend at the old River Terrace Yacht Club restaurant on Mud Island back in the ’90s. She and I had a window seat facing the Mississippi River. The sun was setting. The view was breathtaking. As far as I was concerned, nothing would ever compare to that dining experience
Well, I discovered I can go home again. Mahogany River Terrace, which opened last fall in the former River Terrace space, is already creating memories for diners.
photograph by michael donahue
Owner Carlee McCullough
It was dark when my sister and I recently had dinner there, but the view of the lights, shimmering onto the water from the Harahan Bridge, was magical.
General manager Brian Bailey brought out a selection of dishes for us to sample, and everything we tasted was delicious. A must-try is the “Mahogany Johnny Cat,” which is blackened catfish topped with shrimp, lump crab, and crawfish. Another is the crab bisque, which reminded me of “Crabmeat Justine” from the legendary Memphis restaurant, Justine’s.
I had remembered the River Terrace Yacht Club as a rather stark space with a lot of bare stone. Not anymore. The decor is elegant, but not intimidating — no white tablecloths here. There is no formal dress code, but I noticed every diner was dressed to the nines.
photograph by michael donahue
General manager Brian Bailey
“I think they just automatically assume that there is a dress code and they dress accordingly,” says owner Carlee McCullough, who also owns the Mahogany Memphis restaurant at 3092 Poplar Avenue in Chickasaw Oaks.
They didn’t enforce a dress code because they get a lot of tourist traffic with casually dressed people, McCullough says.
Mahogany River Terrace isn’t McCullough’s first classy venture. A native Memphian, she also owned a restaurant in the antebellum building that had housed Justine’s, considered the epitome of elegance and fine dining from the 1950s to the mid-1990s.
McCullough was living in Houston after graduating from Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, when Willie Herenton asked her to return to Memphis. She had met the former mayor years earlier at a fundraiser in California, and says, “Dr. Herenton brought me back to run the office of contract compliance. In addition to working, I was going to start a nonprofit.”
But her friends had other ideas, telling her, “We need you to solve some of our entertainment woes.” Meaning, they wanted more places to eat.
photograph by michael donahue
The mezzanine overlooks the main dining room.
So, in 2000, McCullough bought the iconic Justine’s, a fine-dining restaurant that already had had one new owner since Justine Smith closed it and sold the house and grounds in the mid-1990s. McCullough says she named the new establishment “The Ivy” after The Ivy restaurant in Beverly Hills, and because Justine’s “used to have ivy all over the front of it.”
Her version of “The Ivy” was a private club, but the restaurant, which served upscale Creole fusion cuisine, was also open to the public. After she closed The Ivy in 2003, McCullough hoped to open a restaurant in the vicinity of the National Civil Rights Museum. She missed out on the location on East Butler which became Central Barbecue, so she shelved that business plan for a while.
photograph by michael donahue
Crab bisque
In 2018, McCullough began thinking about opening a new restaurant in the recently opened Crosstown Concourse. But someone at the management company told her she might want to look into the Chickasaw Oaks location, which had formerly been the Just For Lunch restaurant. “I went there in 2018,” she says, “and I’ve been there six years.”
She began considering the River Terrace location about two years ago. McCullough and Carol Coletta, former president and CEO of Memphis River Parks Partnership, began chatting about the venture during an event at Mahogany Memphis. Buying it just worked out for both parties, she says.
After years of dormancy, the building on Mud Island wasn’t in great shape. It required new windows and the roof needed to be replaced. McCullough remembers, “Everywhere, it leaked.” But she had a vision and signed the lease in 2022.
She didn’t want the restaurant to be a carbon copy of her Chickasaw Oaks restaurant. “I think that we wanted Midtown to be modern upscale but somewhat eclectic. And downtown we still wanted modern, somewhat eclectic, but we wanted it a tad more elegant.”
photograph by michael donahue
Designer Mary Bonnie Yates
McCullough brought in Mary Bonnie Yates to design the interior. She had previously worked on The Ivy and Mahogany Memphis.
When she looked at the place for the first time, Yates immediately thought, “I can’t do it. This is too much.” Her first impression was that it was enormous. “The building is four stories — just a humongous place. Everything was brick and stone, and it was just so cold. It had this cold, abandoned look.”
But, she changed her mind. “We just charged into it. We took it area by area.”
She kept all the brass, including the railings, but over two years she replaced just about everything else inside. The bar area had vintage paneling dating to when River Terrace opened in the 1980s. All the floors were brick, which she replaced with tile. She put in a new bar and also added a fireplace, and the area went from being all brown to all white, a fresher approach, she says.
photograph by michael donahue
“Strawberry Fields”
The main dining room was next. “The floors were a reddish dark brown hardwood. We sanded it and redid the floors.” She wanted the mezzanine to be a “comfortable lounge area,” where people could sit and watch the river. “I played with texture up there. A lot of pony hair.”
Her color scheme for the restaurant was “multi-color.” They used a wallpaper with a “reptile texture.” She wanted the overall look to be “comfortable and elegant. I didn’t want it to be stuffy.”
McCullough also brought in an old friend, Raymond Neal, who had been a server at Justine’s as well as The Ivy and Mahogany Memphis. McCullough says Neal told her, “I need to come out of retirement to help you get this right.”
Neal oversees the wait staff to make sure they’re doing everything correctly. McCullough didn’t want identical menus at the two restaurants. She describes the menu at Mahogany Memphis as “upscale Southern with a dash of Creole.” Meanwhile, Mahogany River Terrace is “upscale Southern with a dash of Creole and with a concentration on seafood.”
photograph by michael donahue
A view from the terrace, looking south towards the old bridges.
The menu includes everything from braised oxtails with cheese grits to the “Seafood Tower,” which, according to the menu, features “lobster tails, shrimp, crispy Cajun chicken and Belgian waffles, beignets, and champagne.” Depending on what champagne or sparkling wine you get with your Tower, the price ranges from $250 to $1,000.
In general, however, entrees are considerably more affordable, with prices running from $25 to $150.
The rooftop, with its view of the river, both lighted bridges, Bass Pro Shops at the Pyramid, and the Memphis skyline, is a big draw for patrons. “We share that with River Parks Partnerships, so that’s not part of our lease. But if I want to use it, I let them know so we don’t book it at the same time.”
She already has plans for the roof. “In the spring, we’re going to show movies up there.”
McCullough also has ideas for future Mahogany restaurants, including a Mahogany spin-off serving only plant-based food. “My son calls me a ‘serial entrepreneur,” she says with a laugh.
Mahogany River Terrace is located at 280 Island Drive on Mud Island.
