The Half Shell’s second location at 9091 Poplar Avenue, Suite 101, is slated to open at the end of March.
And, yes, they’ll still sell oysters on the half shell just as they do at their location at 688 South Mendenhall Road.
And, yes, the toucan mascot is back — in many forms, including statues and paintings.
And, yes, the second location still feels like the Half Shell, which people have known and loved for a half century or so.
But customers are in for some surprises.
“I think it’s comfort chic, with a little play in the seafood scene,” says John May, COO of Forest Hill Partners, the umbrella group that includes Forest Hill Grill and both locations of the Half Shell. Gene and Rhonda Barzizza are the majority stakeholders in the partnership. “It looks nice. But it’s not too uppity, per se. It’s nice enough where you still feel comfortable. We just wanted to up our game a little bit as far as a local food dive.”
Forest Hill Partners already owns the nearby Forest Hill Grill, so, when former owner Danny Sumrall decided to sell the Half Shell, they decided to buy it, May says. “We were always interested in Half Shell because we love the seafood concept. We don’t think Memphis has enough seafood readily available.”
May was general manager for Flying Fish at one time. “I have a little history on that end. When Danny reached out to us — he was getting ready to retire — we wanted to pick up his legacy and run with it. We knew it had a great brand, had a great following.”
But, May adds, “As much as we love the legacy of Danny Sumrall, we want to pave our own legacy.”
Part of the new legacy was brightening up both places, beginning with the Poplar location. The Half Shell on Mendenhall has “the dark and local dive hole” look, May says. “But I think it’s time to turn the page and put our little touch on it, making both restaurants feel the same way, which includes the look and the menu.”
The second location “is not so dark and gloomy. I think that’s a little bit of what older restaurants used to look like in the early ’90s. We just updated.”
The color scheme is now neutral colors of brown and tan. Light fixtures, which resemble jelly fish, hang from the ceiling. Lots of paintings and artwork, including a tall wood carving of a mermaid, are featured.
Along with toucan images, the new Half Shell also has netting on the walls, including in the bathrooms, as well as gecko figurine lamps and a ceiling light fixture shaped like a whale.
“It’s almost the size of the Mendenhall location, but it’s more open. It’s about 3,600 square feet. Instead of all the little nooks and crannies that Mendenhall has, this is just a square block.”
They converted the area, which formerly housed Mike Miller’s golf simulators when he owned the Let It Fly sports bar, into a private dining hall that can seat 55 people.
As for food, the Poplar location will still offer the popular Monte Cristo sandwich, but only on the brunch menu, May says. They won’t sell the popular steak sandwich, but it will be available on Mendenhall’s menu.
And never fear: The lobster bruschetta remains on the menu.
The new slant? “Taking a lot of the old recipes — what people are familiar with as far as the flavor of the Half Shell — and putting our little twist on it. Putting our touch on it. Having the old and new combined. The recipes are the same.”
The menu at Mendenhall is six pages. “All we’re doing is compressing it. We’re able to offer the majority of the same menu items.”
Both locations will eventually feature the same items, May says.
Sumrall recalls how he got involved in the Half Shell.
The restaurant used to be on the corner of Poplar Avenue and Mendenhall, where Belmont Grill is now located, then moved to its current South Mendenhall Road location in 1983, Sumrall says.
The late founder of Huey’s, Thomas Boggs, was the instigator. “He said, ‘We need to buy a restaurant,’” Sumrall says. “And then he calls and says, ‘How about the Half Shell?’ I said, ‘I’ve never been there in my life.’ I said, ‘Let me go check it out and I’ll let you know.’”
By then, the restaurant had already moved to South Mendenhall Road.
Sumrall had been in the restaurant business for some time. He opened the old Captain Bilbo’s, which overlooked the Mississippi River and is now fondly remembered for having hosted shows by such luminaries as jazz guitarist Garry Goin and singer Wendy Moten, back in the 1980s.
Sumrall and his wife went to eat at the Half Shell. “We ordered some dinner. And I noticed the server just dropped off the food and ran away. And when I tasted the food I knew why.’”
The food wasn’t very good. Sumrall thought, “Well this is an easy fix. I can fix the food.”
They brought in chef Darrell Smith to rework the menu. Smith, who “improved the quality,” worked at the Half Shell until he retired about five or six years ago.
Around 2003, Sumrall opened the second location of the Half Shell at 7825 Winchester Road. That location is now closed. “It was declining in sales,” May says. “The lease was up for renewal and we didn’t want to re-sign.”
Sumrall finally decided to retire. He thought, “It’s time for me to put it down and take a break.”
He enjoyed his years at the Half Shell. “I got to know all the customers and their kids and their families,” Sumrall says. “We had families that started coming here when they were dating or before they were married.
“They had kids. Now these kids have graduated from college.”
But there is one thing Sumrall experienced that won’t change at all at either location of the Half Shell. “We really cared about the guests. Wanting them to have a good experience. And it was about the quality. I wanted the food to be really good.”