Almost nine months after leaving the kitchen at Bethesda’s Food Wine & Co., chef Michael Harr has reemerged in the Kentlands.
Harr is renovating and rebranding Largent’s Restaurant and Bar in the Gaithersburg community into a new concept he’s calling Kentlands Kitchen.
In an interview last week, Harr said the plan is to tone down the establishment’s sports bar atmosphere and turn the restaurant into a neighborhood eatery.
“This community needed a thriving idea,” Harr said. “I believe Kentlands Kitchen is going to be a standout restaurant.”
Harr’s new concept will feature the American cuisine he cultivated during his three-year tenure at Food Wine & Co. There will be a focus on fresh, seasonal ingredients and dishes that he popularized at the Bethesda eatery such as the truffle burger, lamb burger, fried tater tots and hush puppies.
The dining room of the 8,000-square-foot restaurant has already been repainted and new lighting has been installed. Harr plans to take out some of the TVs to create a “warmer” ambience. He’s planning to continue to bring in live music acts to perform on the restaurant’s second floor.
The chef, a Rockville resident, also hopes to include the neighborhood in the rebranding process, which he plans to complete by the middle or end of summer. He wants to know what kind of dishes local customers want and what prices they’ll be willing to pay in order to capture the “essence of what the neighborhood is about.”
He’s also creating new dishes—right now he’s experimenting with chicken wings coated in a chili garlic, pepper and cilantro sauce as well as a pickled strawberry salad.
Harr brings a culinary reputation to his latest endeavor. Washington Post food critic Tom Sietsema lauded the chef’s menu in a 2013 review of Food Wine & Co. and gave the restaurant a good/excellent rating. In June 2014, the restaurant’s truffle burger was featured on the cover of Washingtonian’s “25 Best Burgers” issue.
Harr said he left the Bethesda restaurant in August to pursue new opportunities.
“I wanted to explore my own path,” Harr said. “I kind of felt like I was getting into the same routine. For my own growth, I really wanted to branch out.”
He said he took over at Largent’s when he was approached by a group that operates the restaurant, which was interested in revamping the sports bar.
Harr is taking over at a challenging location. Largent’s Restaurant & Bar opened in 2013 at 654 Center Point Way. The location has had significant turnover—four other restaurants have occupied the space over the past dozen years, according to the Montgomery Gazette.
“We’re going to learn from whatever mistakes happened in the past to make sure we accommodate the neighborhood need,” Harr said. “That’s my goal, to create a signature restaurant that people can call their home.”
Largent’s is expected to remain open through much of the rebranding process, but the chef says the restaurant will probably close for a few days before it reopens as Kentlands Kitchen.
