Magnolia’s Contemporary Southern Bistro moving to south Kansas City

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About 10 miles separate chef and restaurateur Shanita McAfee’s original Magnolia’s Contemporary Southern Bistro, at 2932 Cherry, from her uncompleted new venue, at 9916 Holmes. Yet the two spaces seem worlds apart. 

When McAfee opened her first restaurant in a cramped, 55-seat space in 2012, she was doing most of the cooking herself in a kitchen hardly bigger than a closet. The heat, the stress and the long hours took a physical toll on the young chef (who went on to win national attention last year by winning the competition on Food Network’s Cutthroat Kitchen).

McAfee blames the hot, cramped quarters for the premature birth of her youngest daughter, Jorja, last year. And when Jorja was sick this past February, and McAfee and her husband, Mark Bryant Jr., took the infant to Children’s Mercy Hospital, McAfee suddenly reached a decision. One of her employees had called her cellphone and told McAfee that Magnolia’s was out of grits.

“I can’t repeat what exactly I told him at that moment,” McAfee says, “but I made the decision to close the restaurant that day.”

With the Cherry site shuttered, McAfee and Bryant spent most of the spring looking for larger quarters, finally settling on a spacious storefront in the Gomer’s Plaza development at 99th Street and Holmes. It was last occupied by Groove Station Bar & Grill (and, long before that, a steakhouse called Sherlock’s). The new space is 4,500 square feet, with a kitchen at least seven times the size of the one on Cherry.

But the space needed a lot of work.

“It’s not in good shape,” McAfee tells me, sighing. “But we’re interviewing contractors, and the whole family is working on it. I even had my older kids on the floor, scraping off old carpeting.”

The new restaurant will continue to be a family affair once it’s open. The kids won’t be working, but McAfee will operate the bistro with her husband and her sister Chelle.

“Mark, who I call ‘Mr. Charisma,’ will take over the front of the house, and my sister will handle the bookkeeping,” McAfee says.

When the new Magnolia’s Contemporary Southern Bistro opens — in late September, McAfee hopes — the dining room will seat 145 (including a 50-seat private space), the bar will be stocked with liquor (McAfee has applied for a liquor license), and a jazz stage will be ready for musicians. 

“We’re definitely planning on a jazz brunch,” McAfee says.

Last week, one of McAfee’s neighbors in the Gomer’s Plaza Center, the fast-casual Never on Sunday Greek restaurant, stopped serving breakfast — the owner tells me that he was tired of getting up so early — so when Magnolia’s opens later this year, she’ll have the morning business to herself.

“I read all my online restaurant reviews,” she says. “I know what the constant complaints were: too slow, too small, uneven service. My new restaurant will allow me to answer all my critics. It was impossible to have speedy service using the tiny kitchen of the old place. In our new kitchen, I’ll have at least five other cooks in the kitchen with me.”

She adds: “Our dining room will be spacious, and I’m going to hire the best possible serving staff I can get.”

McAfee says her husband is also designing the dining rooms for the new Magnolia’s.

“We want our customers to feel like they’re walking into the dining room of our own home,” she says.