Gary Logan remembers when his father used to park an old yellow Chevrolet in front of his restaurant on Glover Street in Twisp during hunting season, their pet deer in the back.
While Logan may not be bringing back the decoy, he is reclaiming some family and town history at Logan’s Steakhouse, the new restaurant he and his wife, Diana, are opening in the same building. Gary’s father built the building, where he ran a bustling restaurant, also called Logan’s, for about 15 years, from 1949 through the mid 1960s.
Gary and Diana and their core crew have been doing renovations—painting, adding new floors, and making some upgrades to the kitchen—in preparation for opening this weekend or early next week in the space next to BJ’s Branding Iron Saloon (it most recently housed the Hoot Owl Café).
Along with head cook Shantelle Bennett and manager Lisa Priest, they are developing menus for breakfast, lunch and dinner. They will open each day at 6 a.m. for “the coffee crowd” and will offer eggs and omelets, pancakes, biscuits and gravy, and breakfast steaks. The lunch menu will feature sandwiches, soups and salads, and hand-pressed burgers and gourmet buns, said Priest.
“People are already coming in wanting to eat,” said Priest, whose most recent stint in the food business was at the now-closed Antlers Saloon & Café, where she waited on tables, cooked and tended bar. Among Bennett’s recent cooking stints were the dinners that accompanied music nights at Twisp River Suites.
While details of the menu are still being worked out, they expect to offer weekly and seasonal specials and seafood on Fridays. Steak will be a specialty. The dessert list is also under development, but Diana has already put in her request for bread pudding.
They have applied for a license to sell beer and wine, and expect to be able to offer full meals to customers at the Branding Iron through a pass-through in the shared wall, said Gary.
For Gary, who was born and raised in the Methow Valley, having a restaurant is a long-held dream, but he has been waiting for the right time and place. Gary said his dream took shape when Antlers closed at the end of last year, making it an excellent time for a new restaurant in town. They were able to hire some former staffers from Antlers.
“To me, I have had a wonderful experience growing up here, so I want to start a business and put people to work,” said Gary, who retired to Carlton 20 years ago after a career in education as a teacher, principal and superintendent in Western Washington.
Gary worked at his father’s restaurant when he was young. In a photo of his stepmother and one of the cooks now hanging on the wall of the new restaurant, you can see the original glass-block windows from his father’s eatery, which are still on the storefront.
“This place was packed,” said Gary. “The mill was still going and all the mill hierarchy came in for coffee before their shift.” That’s the sort of comfortable place the Logans envision, where people can get traditional, homemade food in the heart of Twisp.
Logan’s plans to serve three meals a day, seven days a week, but will start with breakfast and lunch as they get things up and running, said Diana, who will help serve in the dining room. The back room, warmed by an electric fireplace, will be available for meetings or parties.
Hours for the first month or so will be 6 to 11 a.m. for breakfast and 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. for lunch. Logan’s Steakhouse is at 123 Glover St. The phone number is 997-0633.
