LITTLE ROCK — When last we visited Terry’s Finer Foods — The Restaurant on Kavanaugh Boulevard in the Heights, Patrick Herron held sway in the kitchen and on the floor.
Chef Herron, formerly of La Scala and Beechwood Grill, found the long hours were taking him away from his young son, so a few months ago he gave notice and walked away without another job prospect in sight. (He’s landed on his feet, by the way — he’s now working at the Governor’s Mansion.)
So in the spring, the “slightly French bistro” acquired a new manager, Peter Donovan, formerly of the Capital Hotel, Country Club of Little Rock and Chenal Country Club. And Herron’s successor as chef is Trey Adams, late of House of Blues in New Orleans, DeVito South Beach in Miami and Libby’s Cafe & Bar in Sarasota, Fla.
However, very little has changed physically inside the restaurant, which owners Lex and El- len Golden about two years ago grafted on to the side of their legendary Heights gourmet grocery store, where once there was a Sue’s Pie Shop. It has a separate front entrance from, but inside access to, the grocery. (If you go by at just the right time, usually toward the end of the week, a nice hickory smell wafts from the smoker out front.)
The cozy dining room still seats about 50, with overflow seating in the grocery. The decor has not changed, although the arrangement of some of the tables has, creating more two-tops that can be shoved together to form larger table groupings. On the tables: pastel yellow tablecloths over white ones. The wickerwork chairs have tight-woven plastic backs and seats that are at least as French as the menu, if not more so. (They’re imported from a genuine French furniture maker, and each one has a brass plaque on the back to prove it.)
There’s plenty of artwork depicting French scenes. Somebody, possibly the Goldens, consumed the many thousands of dollars of wine that used to fill the fancy (empty) wine bottles that Terry’s uses as sideboard gracers and (literal) window dressing, including several French first-growths Chateau Margaux, Chateau Latour and Chateau Lafitte. No, Terry’s new wine list, which still stresses French wines but has some California newcomers, doesn’t carry them, and you probably wouldn’t be able to afford them if they did.
The menu is slightly more “French” than it used to be, in that most of the dishes now have French names, even the ones that had previously been slightly or entirely Anglicized. Otherwise you may not notice a lot of change; it’s still what Donovan describes as “French comfort food ... still classic French dishes, [but] nothing snooty.”
Things do change, however, sometimes from week to week — for example, the St. Jacques Gulf Shrimp in Sweet Vermouth Mushroom Cream Sauce that had been on the lunch and dinner menus, and to which we had been looking forward for our second-visit entree, gave way in the interim to another shrimp dish. But since it was an old favorite, the Crevettes Provencal (which used to be called Shrimp Provencal, now $12 lunch, $19 dinner), we were not too disappointed.
The dish features about a half-dozen plump, mediumsize shrimp stewed with tomatoes, garlic, mushrooms and olives, and it was at least as tasty as we remember it. The sauce has a nice garlic-and-herb kick to it, but isn’t flame-fiery. And whereas once upon a time, the shrimp came with the tails on, now the kitchen takes them off, a boon and blessing to diners with only one napkin.
From the lunch menu we can recommend the a la Francais-named Poulet et Champignons crepes with brandy cream sauce ($14), a pair of tasty wraps, somewhere between tortillas and pancakes, filled with surprisingly moist chicken in a rich, savory sauce lightly tasting of brandy and teeming with sliced mushrooms.
And if you’re a fan of smoked salmon, don’t miss the Smoked Salmon With Caper and Onions Tartine ($13), plenty of lox-style, dill-sprinkled salmon served open-faced with capers on toasted, imported-from-France Poilane bread. (We got our red onions on the side and never touched them.) It comes with a side salad lightly coated in what appeared to be a champagne vinaigrette that Intrepid Companion did not think much of.
One thing that has changed at Terry’s, and for the better, is the expanded list of appetizers, at the head of which is the superb Onion Soup Gratinee ($6). It’s actually an improvement over what the restaurant used to serve, and we liked the old one plenty. To begin with, under the rich melted cheese blend on top, there are lots of onions (in fact, if it’s possible to have too many onions in an onion soup, this would be it) and much less crouton in a sweet and, as we got closer to the bottom, a bit red-wine-y broth.
Pate fans will enjoy the Pate Du Maison ($6.50), a generous slab of not-too-coarse, not-too-fine, liver-based pate, served with baguette slices for spreading and a pot of Dijon mustard for accent, plus a fistful of pickle-like cornichons on the side.
And we also enjoyed the Mussels, $10 for a generous helping of small bivalves in a light, not-too-garlicky garlicbutter broth with a little spinach for texture and color.
Even though we were almost entirely full, we did save a little room for dessert, a surprisingly light bread pudding with caramel sauce ($6) and a generous side of possibly kitchen-made whipped cream.
Just for sitting down you get a basket of slices of baguette and the thicker, denser Poilane bread, along with water poured from a generic green glass wine bottle into low and little glasses. No, it’s not bottled water, or at least it wasn’t bottled anywhere but in the kitchen, but it does add a small touch of class to the process.
Service was uniformly good on both visits, though on our second, our waitress was so eager to clear plates that we wondered whether the kitchen might be running low.
Terry’s Finer
Foods — The
Restaurant
Address: 5018 Kavanaugh Blvd., Little Rock
Hours: 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Monday-Saturday, 5:30 p.m.-9:30 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday
Cuisine: French bistro
Credit cards: V, MC, AE, D
Alcoholic beverages: Full bar
Reservations: Yes, and a good idea for dinner; email restaurant@terrysfin erfoods.com
Wheelchair accessible: Yes
Carryout: Yes
(501) 663-4154
Weekend, Pages 29 on 09/06/2012