Like the tree in its name, Magnolia & May is branching out.
The restaurant at 718 Mt. Moriah Road now has a food truck on the road. Or, to be more accurate, a coffee truck that serves food items.
“We opened it in August,” says Chip Dunham, who, along with his wife, Amanda, owns the restaurant and coffee truck.
Monkeygrass Mayhem is the coffee truck’s name. “Our son, before he was born, we called him Monkeygrass,” Chip explains.
They’re doing specialty coffees, Amanda says. “We’ve got mocha on the truck,” she says. “We’ve also got chai tea, house-made lemonade, and stuff like that.”
As for the food, she says, “We’re also making bagels and muffins for the trailer. So, right now, we’ve got a banana bagel and an ‘everything’ bagel.”
The everything bagel includes garlic, dried onion, and a little bit of salt.
She and Chip always wanted to own a coffee shop, Amanda says. “Chip and I wanted to make coffee and bagels.”
“Amanda and I both really enjoy coffee,” Chip adds. “When we were living in New York, we’d always get bagels and bagel sandwiches and enjoy them together. It’s like a comfort food thing for us.”
Chip’s dad, Jeffrey Dunham, who owned The Grove Grill restaurant, already had the Airstream trailer, but he wasn’t using it, Amanda says. She and Chip thought it would be perfect instead of opening a brick-and-mortar coffee shop.
They’re using J. Brooks Premium Coffee Roasters and Lavazza Coffee. “J. Brooks is a local roaster,” Amanda says. “We like working with them. We use them at the restaurant as well.”
Lavazza, an Italian brand of coffee, is nostalgic, she says. “My family is Italian. I was always more geared for Italian espresso at home.”
They originally parked the coffee truck in front of the restaurant. “To kind of get our feet wet and work out the kinks.”
Fall coffees included their Pumpkin Patch PSL made with pumpkin, caramel, and cinnamon; Butter Beer Latte made with hazelnuts, brown butter, toffee, caramel, and cold foam; and Gilmore Girl, which includes apple butter, extra dirty chai, and steamed milk.
Fall is in the air at Magnolia & May restaurant as well. “Right now, we’ve got all our fall flavors going on. We’ve got a couple of fun things. For example, Chip’s been doing a lot of stuff with apples from Jones Orchard.”
Like Apple Jack Griddle Cakes, which she describes as “frilly, big, chubby pancakes filled with all kinds of good stuff. Lots of apples, cinnamon, toasted walnuts — really fun fall flavors forward.”
For brunch, Chip is making a sourdough cornmeal johnnycake with a brown butter apple compote and a coffee cake crumble on top.
For lunch and dinner, he’s making a caramelized pear salad. “We poach the pears in allspice and toast it like you would a crème brûlée,” Chip says. “And then toss in some local lettuce in red wine vinaigrette, put in the pear, and toast it with bleu cheese and walnuts.”
A “grilled Home Place Pastures pork chop with potato purée and brown butter apple compote” is one of Chip’s fall dinner items.
The Dunhams are known for going all out for the holidays. They ushered in Halloween on September 30th with lavish decorations, Halloween movies, and specialty cocktails at their Halloween pop-up at the restaurant. “I’m looking into tarot card reading for one Sunday night,” Amanda says.
They will feature their over-the-top Christmas pop-up beginning November 28th at Magnolia & May.
The Monkeygrass Mayhem coffee truck will be open Mondays and Fridays at Clark Tower from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m., Sundays at Germantown Community Library at 1925 Exeter Road 7 a.m. to 1 p.m., Saturdays at Overton Park 8 a.m. to 2 p.m., Wednesdays at Sea Isle Park 7 a.m. to 1 p.m., and at a yet-to-be announced location on Thursdays.
They still might open a brick-and-mortar coffee shop one day, Amanda says. “We keep tossing the idea back and forth.”
But, she adds, “Right now, we enjoy having it on the road a little bit. It’s giving us a little bit of flexibility.”
