Joel Antunes, the high-profile executive chef at the Capital Hotel, 111 W. Markham St., Little Rock, left in mid-January and has decided to move on, says a hotel spokesman.
A new executive chef has apparently been hired but not yet named — an announcement is expected in coming weeks — and while he is in the process of "getting his organization situated," including a new menu, the hotel's high-end restaurant, One Eleven at the Capital, is now only serving breakfast — 6:30-11 a.m. Monday-Saturday, 6:30-10 a.m. Sunday, plus Sunday brunch, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Target for the changes to be in place is April 1.
The hotel’s Capital Bar & Grill is continuing to serve lunch and dinner daily.
Antunes, a James Beard Award winner who previously was consulting chef at the eponymous Kitchen Joel Antunes at the Embassy Mayfair Hotel and Brasserie Joel in the Park Plaza Westminster Bridge Hotel, both in London, joined the hotel in 2013. His hiring, when it was announced in December 2012, was considered a major coup for hotel co-owner Warren Stephens. The status of his as-yet unidentified successor remains to be seen.