Jonathan Justus and Camille Eklof have come back to the Northland with their newest restaurant, The Parker Hollow, and the Northland couldn’t be more excited.
“It's been really different that we've been very embraced here, and people keep saying, ‘We're so glad that you came here. We're so glad that you're here,’” says Jonathan. “It feels nice to be able to feel wanted, rather than to feel that, ‘Why did you come here?’”
The husband and wife team, who ran the highly acclaimed chef-owned Justus Drugstore in Smithville, quietly opened The Parker Hollow in Parkville in October. The restaurant is located on the historic Main Street in a 175-year-old building that used to be Frank’s Italian Restaurant.
Since closing Smithville’s Justus Drugstore in 2018 after they received an offer they couldn’t refuse for the building, the two have been involved in a few different projects. Another one of their restaurants, Black Dirt on the South Plaza, closed after just two years in 2020, and the couple has been hosting pop-up dinners out of their home in Paradise.
It was actually while consulting on another Northland restaurant that Jonathan realized that maybe there was a hunger for seafood in the area that wasn’t being met.
“We were going through 80 pounds of mussels, 110 pounds of calamari, 120 pounds of shrimp, 65 pounds of salmon and 50 pounds of sea bass every five days,” says Jonathan of his consulting project. “At the time, I was like, there’s a dearth of seafood in the Northland. Our biggest selling item there was a cioppino and it was outselling our steaks.”
The vision for The Parker Hollow wasn’t just born out of a need for seafood in the Northland. It’s a natural fit for Jonathan and Camille, who spent the early part of their career in restaurants in France.
While The Parker Hollow is definitely not just a reimagined Justus Drugstore, it does apply many of the same philosophies that were present at the Smithville restaurant, which was a semifinalist for the James Beard Award’s Best New Restaurant in 2007 and where Jonathan was twice nominated for the James Beard Award for Best Chef: Midwest. While Justus Drugstore was known for its nose-to-tail cooking, you could say The Parker Hollow is fish-to-gill.
“I'm buying whole fish,” says Jonathan. “There are not many restaurants in Kansas City that are doing whole fish butchery.”
Despite the skepticism that can surround serving whole fish in the Midwest, Jonathan remains confident that diners are more open-minded than they’re given credit for.
“Over and over, again and again, people said, ‘People are not going to buy fish with bones in it — it freaks them out,’” says Jonathan. “I tell people that we're going to be serving species that you're not used to seeing, and we're going to be serving parts of fish you're not used to seeing, and people are genuinely excited about it.”
In addition to their rotating seafood offerings and Waygu burger, The Parker Hollow has a raw bar with a focus on West Coast oysters, served with a Norton verjus mignonette that came from grapes at Smithville’s Ladoga Ridge Winery.
“We have a dedicated oyster guy,” says Jonathan. “Brandon knows more about oysters than anyone I've ever met.”
Anyone who has eaten food prepared by Jonathan Justus — whether it was at Justus Drugstore or elsewhere — knows that, even if the food is unfamiliar, you just trust the chef.
"I used to get this a lot at the Drugstore, and to speak in the vernacular as it is often told to me, 'Your menu is "messed" up, but I've learned to trust you over time, because when I eat here, I've never had anything that wasn't good,'" says Jonathan.
Beyond just the food, Jonathan feels that The Parker Hollow is where it’s supposed to be and they’re excited to add to the community in historic downtown Parkville.
“We don't have any interest in being in a strip mall anywhere,” says Jonathan. “This building has so much character. The street has so much character. And I hadn't realized — people keep saying that how Parkville, compared to a year and a half ago, what it is right now, and how much more there is here. And I think that it's nice to be riding a crest wave somewhere that's just finding itself."
The Parker Hollow
100 Main Street, Parkville
(816) 569-0033
Open Tuesday-Thursday 4-10 p.m. and Friday-Saturday, 4-11 p.m.
Find reservations on Tock at exploretock.com/the-parker-hollow
“We have a dedicated oyster guy. Brandon knows more about oysters than anyone I've ever met.”
It's been really different that we've been very embraced here, and people keep saying, ‘We're so glad that you came here. We're so glad that you're here.'
“I'm buying whole fish,” says Jonathan. “There are not many restaurants in Kansas City that are doing whole fish butchery.”