‘Huge success’: Popular Lee’s Summit restaurant to expand with location off the Plaza

Third Street Social is taking the former Nick & Jake’s spot just south of the Country Club Plaza.

Local restaurateurs Andy Lock and Domhnall Molloy, along with their culinary director Po Wang, have been searching for a second location since shortly after they opened Third Street Social in Lee’s Summit in 2016.

“It has been a huge success for us since the early days,” Lock said. “It’s a scratch kitchen. We have a diverse menu — from flat top burgers to house-made chicken pot pies — that appeals to a lot of people.”

They searched from the River Market to Brookside, looking for a unique building that had long been in the neighborhood, like their location in Lee’s Summit.

The freestanding 6,500-square-foot two-story brick building, at 5031 Main St., has its own parking lot with about 50 spaces and a patio seating about 30 people. The second floor will be used for overflow and as an event space.

“The restaurants that are successful don’t miss on any piece — building, menu, service,” Lock said.

They plan to remodel it for an early 2021 opening.

The menu includes Hawaiian rib-eye, chicken and spinach lasagna, slow-roasted prime rib sandwiches, shrimp and grits, Korean steak tacos, fried chicken mac-and-cheese, burgers, soups and salads, and specialty cocktails.

It also will have “Blue-Plate Specials” at lunch, happy hour specials, and Saturday and Sunday brunch.

In April, Nick & Jake’s owners announced that the south Plaza location would permanently close. They still have locations in Overland Park, Parkville and Shawnee.

Lock and Molloy’s Summit Group also closed their Boru Ramen Bar in Waldo in June due to the “current economic environment.”

They have since focused on Third Street Social, their Summit Grill locations in Gladstone, Lee’s Summit and Waldo, South of Summit Taqueria & Tequila in Waldo, and Pearl Tavern in Lee’s Summit.

During the pandemic they have offered contactless payment, curbside pickup, family meal packs to go and stepped-up online ordering.

“We’re optimistic. But If we are still in pandemic world in early 2021 we will have social distancing,” Molloy said.

The Greater Kansas City Restaurant Association honored Lock and Molloy with the 2017 Restaurateur of the Year award, its highest honor.

This story was originally published September 17, 2020 at 10:57 AM.