The cuisine of the New South" was how Ben Barker once described it--a globally-influenced, richly-flavored style of cooking that draws entirely from locally-grown ingredients.
It's what Barker, along with his wife Karen, has been serving at Magnolia Grill on 9th St. since 1986. Barker, head chef and co-owner, has received such tremendous accolades for his work at Magnolia, now an institutional leader in fine dining in the South and beyond, they go without mention here. Rather, it is Barker's remarkable influence on his fellow chefs and the fine dining of the Durham-Chapel Hill area that instead attracts our critical gaze.
"We've got 21 people who've come through our kitchen and now have their own restaurant," Barker said. "We feel like we've either inspired them or taught them enough or given them enough confidence to let them go ahead and do what they wanted to do."
Though each chef establishes his own culinary aesthetic as he moves on, they all seem to take something of Magnolia with them. Barker's novel approach to food follows the philosophy of "La Cuisine du Marche"--or "Cuisine of the Market." It is reflective of a deep desire to create a gourmet experience based on authentic flavor and local expertise.
Ingredients like "heirloom tomatoes," "mustard spaetzle," "venison sausage" and "rapini" (a sort-of turnip)--from places such as the Carrboro farmer's market, the locally-renowned Celebrity Dairy and the region's local farmers and fishermen--that might seem awkward on menus outside the region reappear again and again on the entrée and appetizer plates in restaurants of the Durham-Chapel hill area.
"We try to have a fairly intricate balance and juxtaposition of flavors and textures on the plate," Barker said. "[Local ingredients have] always driven our menu.... When we began, the market in Carrboro was just in its infancy.... We'd see what was there that day and then create the menu for that day. Then, [we'd] rewrite the components of the menu every day based on what inspired us."
Indeed, that same methodology has inspired many of Barker's associate chefs; a family of sorts connects many of them in the area. Barker began his career serving as head chef at both La Residence in Chapel Hill and at the Fearrington House, Pittsboro's sublime prix fixe Relais & Chateaux property. Scott Howell, his sous chef at Magnolia during the period 1989-92 is now the proprietor of Nana's Restaurant in Durham--an establishment whose menu is an uncommon blend of creative ingenuity and unique ingredients, making for one of Durham's most innovative dining experiences.
Only a few short years after the founding of Nana's, the two chefs, Barker and Howell, joined with a third, Maggie Radzwiller, to open Pop's, "A Durham trattoria" located on Peabody St. behind Bright Leaf Square. The restaurant takes it cues from each of its parent chefs, rotating its menu on a daily basis and drawing from a wide range of fresh, locally-grown ingredients fused with a traditional Italian sensibility; its entire atmosphere--particularly the art--draws much from Nana's.
One mainstay of the Pop's menu is its "chicken cooked under a brick"; hence this writer's surprise when, walking by Elaine's on Franklin this weekend, I encountered the same item on its menu as well. Indeed, Elaine's--previously named best restaurant of Chapel Hill by this magazine--is yet another member of the Barker family. It is perhaps the most internationally-influenced of the Barker-protege establishments, featuring modern adaptations of items ranging from potstickers of the Far East to huevos rancheros from south of the border. Predictably, Elaine's owner and head chef Bret Jennings studied under the tutelage of Barker before making the move down 15--501.
"They're smart--all of them more talented than I am," Barker said of his offspring chefs. "Scott [Howell], for instance, uses a slightly different approach, has a different contingent of farmers. Bret [Jennings] is very market driven in the way he approaches his kitchen."
It was long ago in his work at Fearrington, however, that Barker first established his revolutionary "Cuisine of the New South." Though he has long sense departed the restaurant, it has since served as the launching pad of another fine Durham chef, Shane Ingram, of Four Square. Though his training differs from that of Barker and his associates, Ingram too relies on the market cuisine philosophy, sampling from a rotating array of seasonal ingredients to produce sophisticated dishes worthy of his restaurant's fine reviews. Four Square's extensive wine list--one of the best around--is governed by Maitre d'hotel Brandon Carr who came, perhaps not surprisingly, from La Residence.
Ultimately, the remarkable breadth and extraordinary quality of dining in Durham and Chapel Hill owe much to the efforts of a single chef whose philosophy seems uniquely suited to dining in the area. "There is a bright and demanding audience here--and it's a pretty vibrant food community." Barker commented. "The goal, one would hope, is that everybody fulfills their own dreams about what 'the restaurant' constitutes." Indeed, with a jolt from the "cuisine of the New South," more than a few dreams have been realized already.
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