OWNER-FOUNDER-CHEF MARK WOMBLES, center, with Midway Mayor Grayson Vandegrift, left, and Versailles Mayor Laura Dake celebrate the 20th anniversary of Midway’s iconic, award-winning Heirloom Restaurant on July 30. (Photo by Scott White)
HEIRLOOM’S famous crisp, tender Kentucky chicken livers with housemade ricotta ravioli and a savory lemon-herb crème fraîche. (Photo provided by Heirloom Restaurant)
By Scott White
Woodford Sun Staff
Report for America corps member
Twenty years ago, on July 6, 2006, Mark Wombles opened the Heirloom Restaurant on Main Street in Midway. It just celebrated its 20th anniversary at a Woodford County Chamber of Commerce event on July 30. It is one of Woodford County’s true hospitality icons.
In 2006, Midway was just starting to reinvent itself as a culinary destination.
Places like Holly Hill Inn, Black Tulip (before it morphed into the Goose and Gander), Bistro La Belle, Darlin’ Jeans and Heirloom brought a new dining-out sensibility to Midway and its “quaint hometown” Main Street.
And Heirloom, like the others, was instrumental in creating a vibe for the critical tourism dollars that have contributed to Woodford County’s robust economy over the last 25 years.
But, in 2006, there was no equivalent of what was happening in Midway, including Lexington, of a similar grouping of “buzz” restaurants. It didn’t just appear out of thin air – the Bourbon Trail only had seven stops, with Woodford Reserve the sole Woodford County distillery, and most horse farms did not allow or seek tourists.
According to both a “Driving: Following the Fences” feature published by the New York Times in 2005 and a Midway Messenger feature published in 2008, these restaurants were starting to attract a sophisticated and discerning clientele from Hollywood, society, the monied equine set and political powerbrokers from D.C. and Frankfort.
But, as Wombles remembers, Midwegians and other Woodford Countians were on board from the start, supporting these businesses, spreading the word.
But when Wombles opened Heirloom, the risk of a new restaurant failing was very real . . . if anything, given the size of Midway, it was a roll of the dice in an industry where longevity is scarce. Though Midway was on the road to becoming a destination, it had yet to achieve that status. Heirloom, still in business, thriving and receiving awards 20 years later, is no mean feat.
But why Midway? The answer, like so much around here, starts with family.
Though born in Florida, Mark, at 5, moved to a small farm with his family on Redd Road, on the Woodford-Fayette County line. His father, Henry, was a native of Perry County. His mother, Jeanne, worked a large garden and gave him his love of cooking and, before it was a thing, the concept of farm-to-table— even becoming a recipe source for him.
After a short stint at the University of Kentucky, he discovered his passion working as a prep cook at the renowned Merrick Inn in Lexington, which led him to the Culinary Institute of California. Wombles caught the famous Bay Area Chef Michael Mina at the beginning of Mina’s career working at the groundbreaking restaurant, Aqua.
As he told the Sun, Wombles had the chance to take an externship at Jules Verne, the Michelin-starred restaurant atop the Eiffel Tower in Paris, but “was in a long-distance relationship with a Kentucky girl” and so moved home. Now a professional chef, Wombles has cooked at the Maisonette in Cincinnati, Jonathan’s in Lexington and then Midway’s Bistro La Belle.
“Growing up just a few minutes away, we went to Midway all the time when we were kids,” he recalls. “There was an ice cream spot we went to, and (we) just came over and walked around as a family.”
The emerging Midway scene, then, was not out of the question for him.
“I wanted to go out on my own, and my father kinda pushed me. Just out of the blue one day, (he) called me and said, ‘Hey, you know, there’s this building for sale in Midway. I think that we can make a restaurant out of it,’” This was before Midway was really known as a culinary destination, but he wanted me to take a look at it. I said, “Dad, this is too small. I mean, there’s no way we’d do a restaurant in there.’”
But, with a bit of a nudge, Wombles jumped in full tilt.
“We got this idea, and we kind of pushed forward with it, and we said, ‘You know what? Let’s give it a shot.’ And we gave it a shot, and, you know, that was back in 2006. I was 29 years old when I opened. Most nervous, I think I’ve ever been in my life. You know? And we opened it, and it just took off like gangbusters after that.”
Doing lots of the work themselves, it took Wombles and his father about a year to get everything completed . . . getting the permits, developing a menu, sourcing local producers and hiring staff.
All the work paid off – he opened on July 6, 2006, and hasn’t looked back.
And his creativity, skill and welcoming hospitality have been rewarded, and his humility is such that he credits his staff and chefs who’ve worked under him as the reason for the many accolades. Including the one which Wombles said was really special: Heirloom was named one of the Top 100 Restaurants in the U.S. by OpenTable, the only Kentucky restaurant to ever be so honored.
Wombles’ father, Henry, passed away in 2020, but Wombles credits him with much of the restaurant’s success.
“You know, my father was, like, a patriarch. He got to know everybody. He would sit on the side of the street out there in a chair on the sidewalk before we got really going, and he tried to pull people in,” Wombles smiled. “Yeah, he was smooth. And he was a talker. And you could show him anyone, and they’d get along. He and Sam Shepard (the late playwright and actor who moved to a farm outside of Midway, where he passed away in 2017) became close, and he and Sam ate here two to three times a week. I mean, I give the secret to our success partially to him.”
There has been no shortage of the famous who’ve enjoyed a stunning, creative meal there – from every Kentucky governor since Brereton Jones, to world-famous horse trainers and jockeys, to Hollywood types like Johnny Depp or Jessica Lange, and thousands of Woodford Countians.
Asked to name some of his favorite dishes he’s conceived of over the years, Wombles demurred, “You know, that’s a hard question, because when I do a dish, I’ll pretty much do it once, as a special or quick run on a menu or something, and, you know, everything’s kind of like, to me, everything is on the same level. I want to make it as great as I can, but I get bored easily, so I’ve got to change it. There are probably dishes that people have loved that I can’t even remember doing because I’ve done so many. You know, it’s like something new every day.”
Maybe so, but ask many regulars, or not so regulars, and the name of one dish, the only one that remains on the menu since 2006, comes up: the chicken livers as a starter or main, which pairs crisp, tender Kentucky chicken livers with housemade ricotta ravioli and a savory lemon-herb crème fraîche. Oh, my.
As Wombles says, you either love chicken livers or you don’t, but if you do, these are heaven on a plate.
And there are lots of heavenly plates at 125 E. Main Street in Midway. Enjoy.