When the temperature rises in Dallas, weird things can happen. People drop blocks of ice into their hot swimming pools, or poach salmon in the shallow end. Neighbors stop by unbidden to mow your lawn while you're on vacation. (Yes, this really happened to me, bless my neighbor's heart.)
BEN TORRES/Special Contributor
Maple leaf farms duck breast
Restaurant Information
Rating:
(Very good)
Average meal price:
(Appetizers, soups and salads $6 to $10, pizzas $9 to $12, main courses $14 to $29, desserts $6 to $9)
Service:
Friendly and attentive, professional yet casual
Ambience:
A very casual dining room with a retro-chic feel
Location:
2323 N. Henderson Ave., Dallas; 214-821-9333; www.horneanddekker.com
Hours:
Tuesday-Thursday 5 to 10 p.m., Friday-Saturday 5 p.m. to midnight; Sunday brunch 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Payment Information:
All major credit cards
Special Features:
Wheelchair accessible. No smoking area. Full bar.
For me the summer weirdness started when I headed to Horne and Dekker, a new restaurant on trendy Henderson Avenue, about a month after it opened, in mid-July. The amuse was a shot of hot chicken consommé. OK, it was only in the 90s that night, but what were host- owners Shawn Horne and Flynn Dekker thinking?
Deviled eggs topped with smoked salmon followed, but then we veered back into the twilight zone. "Crudités" with curry dip was about as good as your Aunt Minnie's, if Aunt Minnie loved the I Hate to Cook Book. The celery and carrots were cut up with all the finesse of a 12-year-old in a hurry.
Yet it made a weird kind of sense: The concept of the restaurant was Horne's family recipes, faithfully executed not by a chef who might impose his own ideas and improvements on them, but by an obedient "kitchen manager."
Rubbery, soggy-crusted veal Milanese came next, topped with a patchwork of garnishes in red, white and green. The Italian flag? The best thing that night was a glass of rosé Horne brought over. He had recognized me as a critic, so now I'd be known in the house on all my visits.
I dreaded going back, but when I did, I was delightfully surprised.
First came a much better liquid amuse: a cold cucumber agua fresca.
I knew we weren't in Aunt Minnie's kitchen anymore when I tasted a salad of watermelon, pickled tomatoes, romaine lettuce and mild ricotta salata cheese. It was lighthearted and sophisticated, with tomatoes pickled gently enough so they worked with the sweet watermelon.
Roast duck breast was simple, yet perfectly executed, served with mashed potatoes and luscious greens braised with bacon. What a great deal at $16. A thick-cut barbecue pork steak was gorgeously cooked to a light rosy pink; its mango barbecue sauce gave it a happy brightness. With earthy sweet potato purée, that was another $16 bargain.
So what happened between that first awkward visit and the second? A couple of things. The kitchen manager left, and Corey Smith, who had worked with Horne at Dish, stepped in to take his place. (Smith was sous-chef at Dish; Horne was general manager.)
Now Horne is giving Smith much freer rein than he apparently gave the first kitchen manager; it's not just Mom's recipes anymore, and as a result, Horne and Dekker is shaping up into quite a pleasant place.
There's not much to the decor; the servers' groovy plaid shirts are the most striking design elements. There's a long, comfortable banquette, flattering lighting and a laid-back, welcoming warmth.
The service is just what you'd want in such a place: friendly, casual, relaxed and attentive. It may have been the first time I've ever been offered fresh ground pepper only after I've had a chance to taste the salad.
The jokey-retro cans of vegetables on the tables now seem fun, rather than silly. Read the fine print, and you learn you're a geek for reading the fine print. Servers line them up on the table and set down platters of golden mini-biscuits with honey butter or side orders of peas and carrots or fire-roasted corn.
Horne has been a longtime fixture on the Dallas restaurant scene; besides his stint at Dish, he ran the front of the house at Five Sixty when it opened, he owned Kitchen 1924 and worked at, among others, Abacus and the Green Room. The latter, which reopened recently after disappearing for four years, has brought back the "feed me, wine me" option that was so popular there. Horne has introduced something similar, "grape and grub," at Horne and Dekker, so next time I stopped in, that's what my table ordered.
Tell the server if you have any allergies or dislikes, and then the kitchen comes up with four custom courses at $38 per person, plus another $20 if you want wine.
I assumed that meant the chef, er, kitchen manager would cook something specially for us that wasn't on the menu, and that we'd all get the same dishes. But that's not the way it worked.
First came three appetizers for the three of us. A bowl of littleneck clams with sausage and broth made a nice change from the ubiquitous mussels, and these were sweet and nicely briny, though including pallid slices of Italian sausage seemed wrong. Something with a similar flavor but a bit more intensity, like chorizo or pancetta, would have tasted and looked better. The broth, meanwhile, was delicious – how about some crusty bread, or at least a big crouton, to soak it up?
Chorizo did appear, on a pizza with poblano chiles and charred tomato. The crust could have been crisper, but I liked the topping, and the pizza has improved on every visit.
Then there was an odd, sort of mushy duck confit concoction with potatoes and bacon.
The next course, salads, took a wrong turn. A chopped salad and a chickeny, ranchy "not your mama's salad" were fine, but no more interesting than what you'd get in a good diner. A green salad with peaches and berries was maddening, though. What's the point of an undressed salad? The thickly unappealing strawberry balsamic dressing served on the side made matters worse.
A crackly crusted, succulent fried chicken (half a big bird) led the parade of main courses, along with a generous, great-looking bone-in rib-eye and a decent but forgettable grilled mahi-mahi. The nicely seared, well-seasoned steak was even better than the chicken.
Three desserts wound things up, my favorite of which was brownies, simple and perfect, their dark chocolate heightened with a sprinkle of flaky sea salt. The menu also offers buckeyes, a charming Ohio sweet. They're like tiny, eyeball-shaped Reese's cups. Coconut cream pie and a caramely cheesecake embedded with peaches were compelling, too.
The "grape and grub" wine pairings were decent, if uninspired.
In the end, I don't really see why you'd order "grape and grub" unless you're the kind of person who can't figure out what to order. It's more like a crapshoot than a degustation. On the other hand, it costs less than you'd spend for four courses.
But altogether, Horne and Dekker is kicky, homey and friendly, with extremely reasonably priced food that's mostly quite good. And the affable hosts know how to put the whole room in a great mood.
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