The Back 40 Kitchen is scheduled to open on July 6th 2015!
This will be a summer modern farmhouse style restaurant, with an organic mission on Greenwich Avenue in Greenwich CT.
The Back 40 Farm Group will open Back 40 Kitchen, a modern farmhouse restaurant bringing sophisticated organic, local, and seasonal dining to Greenwich Avenue this summer. The restaurant’s healthy “real food” menu and relaxed setting will be available for lunch, dinner, catering and takeout beginning early July 2015.
Yup. The Back 40 Kitchen will be the real deal!
REAL FOOD: ORGANIC. LOCAL. SEASONAL.
Central to the Back 40 Kitchen dining experience, is a changing menu dedicated to “real food” with organic, seasonal, and local origins. At Back 40, this means healthful dishes constructed with a range of local organic vegetables, ancient grains, wild fish, and heritage and humanely-raised meats. Complementing the menu’s sustainably sourced ingredients is a modern barn-inspired setting.
The second story dining room has been thoughtfully renovated with reclaimed wood, a wall-mounted herb garden, and a new soaring cupola, lending the light-filled space an authentic vibe.
“We want to be the place where you can enjoy a full dinner - or bring one home - and feel 100% confident about what you are feeding your family. Everything on our menu is organic. We long forward to a time when being ‘organic’ is once again redundant.”
- Jen Demarsico, Back 40 Kitchen Manager
Back 40 Kitchen will source the majority of its produce from Back 40 Farm, the owner’s 85-acre family-owned organically managed farm in Washington, CT, as well as other regional farms and purveyors, including but limited to: Fleishers Meats in Westport; Dancing Dog Farm in Ridgefield, CT; Blooming Hill Farm in Blooming Grove, NY; Gaia’s Breath Farm in Jordanville, NY; Cato Corner in Colchester, CT; Beltane Farm in Lebanon, CT; and Red Bee Honey in Weston, CT among others.
THE BACK 40 KITCHEN TEAM
Back 40 Kitchen is owned by Greenwich residents Lesley and Bill King, who also own Back 40 Farm in Washington and Back 40 Mercantile in Old Greenwich. They have tapped husband and wife team Jennifer and George Demarsico to manage the restaurant and its kitchen. Jennifer is an organics enthusiast who will manage the front of house and George, the former executive chef for Peter Kelly’s award-winning New York restaurant Xaviers, will lead the kitchen’s modern take on farmhouse cuisine.
“My approach is to take things that are perfect to begin with and make them shine. Everything I do is very technique-driven, given my fine dining background. Back 40 will be all about simple food, very well executed.”
- Chef George Demarsico
THE MENU
The menu has been crafted for a range of appetites, diets, and tastes – with the unifying element that every aspect – from the spices to the dairy, from the vegetables to proteins – is organic and healthful without risking sophistication.
On the lighter and smaller side, are snacks and small plates such as Heirloom Popcorn with smoked paprika, Green Eggs with Crispy Ham, and a Lobster and Avocado Toast.
For bigger appetites (like mine!), a range of creative and hearty entrees are anchored by a variety of both vegetables and proteins: a house-made veggie burger to a honey-brined pork loin that is served with black lentils, swiss chard and cherry mustard.
Not to be missed is the classic Back 40 Burger, paired with bacon, cheddar and popcorn on a brioche bun. For those who imbibe, the bar will celebrate “drinking healthy” with organic fine wines,
Non-GMO spirits, and cocktails carefully selected and crafted by Beverage Director Michael Galluccio, formerly of the Inn at Pound Ridge, NY.
LOCATION
Back 40 Kitchen is located at 107 Greenwich Avenue in Greenwich, CT.
Regular hours are Tuesday through Saturday for Lunch and Dinner, Monday is Lunch only.
BACK 40 KITCHEN PROJECT TEAM
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Construction: Western Connecticut Craftsmen
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Design: Marcia Tucker Interiors
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Architecture: Rudy Ridberg
CONNECT WITH BACK 40 KITCHEN NOW!
Web: back40kitchen.com
Instagram: instagram.com/back40kitchen
Facebook: facebook.com/back40kitchen
Twitter: twitter.com/back40kitchen
ABOUT THE BACK 40 FARM GROUP
The Back 40 Group started, as most great things do, on the farm. Back 40 Farm is a family-owned 85-acre organic farm in Washington, CT that has since expanded to include Back 40 Mercantile, a modern take on an old-fashioned general store, Back 40 Kitchen in Greenwich, and Mill Street Bar & Table Restaurant in Byram (opening August 2015).
George DeMarsico - Chef
Experience: Doral Arrowwood in Purchase, N.Y., Farm Neck Golf Club in Martha’s Vineyard; Harvest Bistro in Closter, N.J.; Relish in Sparkill; Bedford Post Inn in Bedford; X20 in Yonkers.
Cooking style: “It’s a bit humble and intuitive. My approach is to take things that are perfect to begin with and make them shine. Everything I do is very technique-driven, given my fine dining background.”
Back 40 Approach: “The menu will change depending on seasons, and the farms we are sourcing from, certainly Back 40 Farm. It is in constant fluid motion with the surrounding environment.”
Ingredient you can’t live without? Pork. There is not one part of the animal I don’t love.
If you weren’t a chef you’d be? A farmer.“Back 40 will be all about simple food, very well executed.”
Nichole Norby & Alexis Barbalinardo - Back 40 Farmers
“Norby” is an electrical engineer turned organic vegetable farmer and a graduate from the Stone Barns Center for Agriculture’s Farmer’s Apprentice program. She went on to run a large CSA program on a farm in New Jersey and returned to Stone Barns to work before joining the Back 40 Farm team. She is passionate about flowers, has expanded the Back 40 beehives, and is devoted to propagating the best tasting organically grown produce.
Alexis is a naturalist, educator, and farmer with a passion for good food and connecting people to our earth. She has grown vegetables and flowers in Northern California, worked as a cow-herder and cheese maker in New Jersey, coming to Back 40 Farm most recently from two years as a greenhouse grower and propagator at the Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture.
Bill & Lesley King Back 40 Kitchen Owners
Lesley & Bill have been together since high school but never envisioned owning a farm or a restaurant. Amidst long careers on Wall Street however, they threw themselves wholeheartedly into the organic food movement and the local food scene, beginning by co-founding the Old Greenwich Farmers Market. As these passions grew, both began contributing in an array of other community and health related organizations.
Lesley works with Partners In Health and Village Health Works on issues of Social Justice, and is a board member of the Perrot Library, Old Greenwich.
Bill is an active board member of the Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture, The Greenwich Land Trust, as well as Trinity Church in Old Greenwich. Their mutual commitment to chemical-free food for themselves, their families and their community, along with farming and a whole lot of entrepreneurial spirit -- helped carve the way for the Back 40 Farm, Back 40 Mercantile and Back 40 Kitchen
