New chef brings fresh, simple menu to Backyard

The use of fresh, local ingredients might be a popular practice among East End restaurants, but at Backyard at Solé East Resort in Montauk, new executive chef Larry Kolar believes he has taken the concept of homegrown freshness to another level.

True to its name, Backyard utilizes ingredients from a small outdoor garden, just steps from its kitchen door, and the seasonal restaurant’s entire menu is based on items found either in the garden or at local docks and farm stands, Mr. Kolar said.

“We grow the herbs out back,” Mr. Kolar said. “It’s all about keeping it fresh.”

The restaurant’s dinner menu—Backyard serves breakfast, lunch and dinner—is built around “Off the Grill” dishes, which highlight grilled pieces of local fish rubbed with herbs from the restaurant’s garden. The dishes are paired with a diner’s choice of sides, most of which utilize fresh produce from the North Fork.

In keeping with the restaurant’s aims for freshness, Mr. Kolar also said he and his kitchen staff prepare the muffins, croissants and granola for breakfast, and bake focaccia bread on-site to be served at lunch and dinner.

A resident of Huntington who has relatives on the East End, Mr. Kolar said it was important to him when planning the restaurant’s new menu last spring to draw upon the entire area’s offerings, for food and drink alike.

For example, Mr. Kolar said Backyard primarily serves wines from local wineries by the glass.

“I love the North Fork,” he said. “And here we’re trying to bring together the North and South.”

Backyard marks Mr. Kolar’s first restaurant venture on Long Island. He has more than two decades of experience in Manhattan kitchens, at such restaurants as Bolivar, The Quilted Giraffe and Sign of the Dove, and recently launched a catering company, LK Catering, that also emphasizes fresh, simple ingredients.

And though Mr. Kolar took over the kitchen at Backyard from a previous chef, the restaurant’s décor seems to match his vision of natural simplicity. The walls and tables are predominantly white. Generous windows allow sunlight to stream in, and double doors lead from the restaurant’s bar area to the resort’s pool and gardens.

Backyard’s breakfast menu is continental-style, Mr. Kolar said, offering an assortment of croissants, muffins, fresh fruit, yogurt, granola, hard-boiled eggs, cereal, coffee, tea and juices for $14. Diners can add French toast, blueberry granola pancakes or eggs and bacon to all the other choices for $18; and such beverages as cappuccino, $5, hot chai latte, $5, and mimosas, $12, are also available.

The lunch menu ranges from Backyard salad, with mixed organic greens, roasted red peppers, toasted pine nuts, roasted garlic and a sherry vinaigrette for $10 to “Lobster Roll” sliders served with North Fork potato chips for $16. Other lunch items include a chicken sandwich with roasted red peppers, arugula and pesto on focaccia for $14 and ropa vieja, a pulled brisket “sloppy joe” for $14, as well as cheeseburger or monkfish sliders, both served with North Fork potato chips and both offered for $14.

The dinner menu begins with appetizers, ranging from wild arugula, with fennel, spiced walnuts and shaved Piave cheese, $10, to Long Island duck tacos, with a crunchy shell, dock confit and fixings, $14. Other appetizers include fluke ceviche, $12, scallop tiradito, $13, and a smoke plate, with smoked pork, brisket, beef short ribs, Montauk bluefish and grilled bread, $12. Mr. Kolar said that all of the meats are smoked on-site.

The “Off the Grill” menu includes Montauk monkfish, $24, Montauk mahi mahi, $25, Montauk mako shark, $26, Montauk swordfish, $28, Montauk scallops, $28, and a 12-ounce skirt steak, $28. Sides, all $6, include local bok choy, Backyard salad, mashed potatoes, baked black beans, French fries, escarole, creamed corn and roasted beets.

Backyard also offers cannelloni, broccoli rabe, lobster, roasted Roma tomatoes and garlic that can be served as an appetizer for $14 or an entrée for $28. Beef ragu with papardelle is also available, $12 for an appetizer and $24 for an entrée, and monkfish with fettuccini and pesto for dinner for $25.

The restaurant’s desserts, all $7, include passion fruit panna cotta, lavender crème brulée, flourless chocolate espresso torte cake, seasonal fruit cobbler and brownie sundae.