New Bird Café chef, menu ready to take flight in Sundance Square

Bird Café is getting a fresh set of wings.

Chef Scott Curtis, 29, an original Bird staffer since the 2013 opening, is the new executive chef.

Curtis says what all new chefs say: Don’t worry, he won’t change anything, particularly not the busy weekend brunch.

But then he lays out a few ideas that are exactly what Bird needed for summer: fresher and simpler choices, with more emphasis on local farm vegetables and less of a meaty, beer-hall menu.

For a hint, look at Bird’s new pastry chef. Laurel Wimberg of the popular Lark on the Park at Klyde Warren Park in Dallas is now also doing Bird’s desserts. (Maybe Bird needs to be more like Lark on the Park these days instead of its format as the gastropub twin of Dallas’ Meddlesome Moth.)

New items include a griddled quail with succotash ($18 at lunch) and a fish entree, crispy-skinned Mediterranean-style branzini with chili-poached tomatoes and olives ($23 at dinner).

There’s a bone-in, 1-pound pork chop for two with grilled-peach barbecue sauce ($28). Instead of chicken-fried steak, there’s chicken-fried veal sweetbreads ($13).

The salad portion of the soup-and-salad lunch ($12) is made with goat cheese and pecans. The soup of the day on one day this week was a classic Texas beef chili, although it changes.

(Bird is a quiet and airy choice for weekday lunch on the Sundance Square Plaza patio. If you haven’t adapted to the nighttime small-plates menu, go at lunch.)

Gone are the more adventuresome meat dishes such as offal, squab and goat necks.

Curtis said gently: “We took off some things that people weren’t sure about.”

Curtis, a Colorado native, has been on Bird’s staff since the 2013 opening. He succeeded founding chef David McMillan, who moved to a Virginia yacht club.

(Former pastry chef Bria Downey is now at Winslow’s Wine Cafe.)

Bird opens at 11 a.m. weekdays, 10 a.m. weekends, and serves until midnight most nights, 1 a.m. Saturdays; 155 E. Fourth St., 817-332-2473, birdinthe.net.

Know your Cerritos

El Cerrito is moving into the former Vance Godbey’s in Lakeside, and I learned about the history of El Cerrito.

The Rangel family opened the original El Cerrito in Reno, north of Azle, but then moved to the new El Cerrito Cantina in Springtown.

The Garcia family took over the Reno location and will move it to Lakeside. Other associates run the similar Mezcales Mexican Bar & Grill in Sansom Park.

Between El Cerrito, Mezcales, Arizola’s in Lake Worth, El Paseo in Sansom Park and La Choza in Lakeside, the Texas 199 area will be well-stocked with enchiladas and margaritas.

The Goose is ready

Blue Goose Cantina is supposed to open by mid-week, bringing a legendary Dallas margarita stop to Grapevine on the circle at Grapevine Mills mall.

It’s the seventh Blue Goose, with the mothership on Greenville Avenue in Dallas. The Grapevine location is at 2455 E. Grapevine Mills Circle, a former seafood restaurant; 817-251-3303, bluegoosecantina.com.

This story was originally published July 12, 2016 at 4:15 PM with the headline "New Bird Café chef, menu ready to take flight in Sundance Square."