New chef and new wayward Georgie are the talk of Dallas

Conventional wisdom says that if you want your restaurant to get noticed, you should hire a famous chef. Georgie, an upscale bistro just off Knox Street, is trying the opposite approach. It seems like every Dallas food lover is talking about Georgie's comeback after ditching the TV star.

The restaurant opened in late 2019 as Georgie by Curtis Stone. This was the first business in Dallas for the Australian chef known for his endless TV appearances and straight-out-of-bed dirty blonde hair. Now that he's gone, I can confess. I had never heard of Stone when Georgie opened. I missed all his cooking shows and the real kitchen working under Marco Pierre White at London's landmark Quo Vadis. After gaining wide recognition on American television, Stone opened a two-Michelin-starred restaurant, Maud and Gwen, in Los Angeles. Georgie's, his third kitchen, did not create a Wikipedia page.

Georgie eliminated him equally ruthlessly. Due to a non-disclosure agreement, the restaurant cannot publicly comment on Mr. Stone's departure, but the chef he hired to open Georgie, Toby Archibald, currently runs Quarter Acre, and last summer Mr. Stone's own name was removed from the branding.

Georgie's owner Stephan Courseau and Travis Street Hospitality's corporate chef Bruno Davaillon decided to reinvent the kitchen, which previously combined bistro and steakhouse elements. New executive chef RJ Yoakum, fresh from the French Laundry, a California restaurant legendary for its technical prowess and chef pedigree, has become a museum-quality restaurant among frequent fliers. It is also known for its clever presentation and notorious for feeling heavy in the stomach after dinner. But Yoakum's work at Georgie combines the skills and high degree of experimentation he learned at his French laundry with a certain rebellious tendency that suggests his own personality, and even a sense of humor.

It seems like every Dallas food lover is talking about Georgie's comeback.

He loves to turn classics on their head. Forget beef tartare. Instead, there's a trout tartare, topped with trout roe on top of chicharrón made from fried trout skin, allowing him to see the same ingredient from three different perspectives. The final touch is horseradish cream frozen into small pellets. A fun garnish, the horseradish isn't overly strong.

Yoakum's churros are made from potato dough and are full of flavor. This sacrifices a little crunch on the edges, but it makes for a satisfying combination of creamy, sauce-like, sophisticated caramelized onion “dip” and potatoes. He also uses potatoes to make flat discs of dough, like tortillas, with coriander leaves pressed into them for decoration. These “tortillas” are served with some of the best-cooked octopus in the city (sous vide tenderized and then grilled) and pepita-based mole.

The ultimate flipped dish is Georgie's French Onion Soup. What we have here is an old classic that will be satisfying, no matter how dusty, as long as the cook makes sure the bread on top is crispy under the broiler. Instead of that standard crouton, Georgie replaces it with a cheese-flavored pain perdu, which means “lost bread” in French, and, pun intended, hides the lost bread at the bottom of the bowl. It's topped with caramelized onions, soup, and finally a layer of fluffy cheese that's been whipped until it forms a cloud.

After the appetizers, my table was worried that Georgie would fall into the trap common in Dallas' fine dining restaurants: a meal without acid or spice. Many smart restaurants tend to serve rich dishes that lack balance and subtlety. But Yocum is now one of the Dallas chefs most passionate about adding chili and spiciness to haute cuisine, along with Regino Rojas, Dean Fearing, and Misty Norris.

For example, he's not joking about adding harissa to his roasted carrots. The mushrooms are served with another hot sauce, this time made with preserved summer carrots and Fresno, guajillo, red bell, and Espelette peppers. Tangled fennel escabeche lends bite and acidity to the homemade sausage appetizer. (The sausages are made with leftover pork and poussin, or young chicken.) Spicy pesto enlivens a dish of sea bream with a crumb-like crust of potatoes, butter, cheese, and lemon zest, and amberjack ( Amberjack) brings out the seasoning. Pepper au Poivre — Happily, it turns out to be a hot sauce with a fancy name. On this winter menu, frozen horseradish is back on top of a mushroom cavatelli pasta bowl with duck confit and Madeira cream sauce.

RJ Yoakum is one of the Dallas chefs most passionate about adding pepper and spiciness to haute cuisine.

I think everything coming out of Georgie's kitchen right now is exactly what cooks want. Dry-aged duck breast has a deep flavor and extra-crispy skin that comes from aging. The scallops were perfectly cooked, golden brown on the outside and delicious with the taste of the sea, almost raw on the inside. The seasoning and presentation are equally strong, but be careful as the scallops are served in their shells, so if the shells tip, the sauce will spill out.

The only issue with the menu is a style issue. It's a meat-rich place, so you can't order as much as you want. Things may change slightly in the spring. Perhaps diners will trust Yoakum enough to support a menu of appetizer bites, as they do at Mr. Charles. Tasting menu options also offer opportunities. It currently serves as a greatest hits tour for the rest of the menu, but could blossom into a more interesting off-road culinary adventure.

Georgie's dining room remains one of the most stylish and comfortable places in Dallas, with its glowing sepia tones and cozy booths dominated by old-fashioned curved panels on the ceiling. It can be a little noisy during peak times, but if you visit mid-week it's quiet. As before, the service is sophisticated and attentive. Yoakum personally delivers food to many tables. (The managers acknowledged me, and Yoakum even rushed over on a holiday night to watch over my dinner, but I also saw him talking to all the other tables.)

The drinks program remains largely unchanged, which is not so lucky. The house cocktails, while well-made, are a bit too complex, forcing Georgie's excellent servers to frequently use descriptions that begin with “Here's our twist…” My favorite is the Bad Bunny with rye, tequila, ginger, and carrots. It's rare that pun-style drinks can be so much fun.

The wine list includes expensive library vintages from Napa and France's most famous regions. This focus suits serious connoisseurs with deep pockets and knowledge of great vintages, but leaves fewer options for the more adventurous wine lover or the more frugal wine lover. Now that Georgie has changed his culinary focus from Australian steaks to more sophisticated French cuisine, we hope to see more versatile, food-friendly bottles in the cellar instead of over-the-top Cabernet. On the other hand, if you're looking for a bottle under $150, look for white wines from Austria, Greece, and the Jura. Red wine from Spain. Pinot noir from Oregon.

I hope this is just the beginning. Yoakum studies the Texas seasons and convinces the Knox Street patrons to forget about their old TV star patrons. His combination of precise French technique and stylish invention is something Dallas hasn't enjoyed since Davaillon left Bullion in early 2020. There are other reasons to expect continued improvement. During a recent visit, even the bread service petit baguettes became fresher and hotter. , even crispier dough. I hope the drinks program catches up with the food, but this place has already turned into a restaurant. Ditching the celebrity billboard was the best decision Georgie ever made.

This story originally appeared in the April issue of the magazine. D Magazine with headings “Recast the lead.” Write destination [email protected].

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Brian Reinhart

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Brian Reinhart became D Magazine's dining critic in 2022 after six years writing about restaurants for the magazine. dallas observer And that Dallas Morning News.