Chef Kenny Mills to open burger restaurant in Arlington

by Teresa Gubbins

• Tweet
• Email
• Print
• 2 Comments

Menu of burgers plus chili and gumbo.

ARLINGTON — Chef Kenny Mills, who was most recently chef at Dallas Chop House in downtown Dallas, left the steakhouse and will open his own burger restaurant called Chop House Burgers in Arlington.

He says he hopes to be open by mid-November -- "looks like November 15, if not sooner," he says. "We already have it painted, we have the tables & chairs, we started on the kitchen last week."

Mills says he was frustrated working for other people. He chose Arlington because he lives in the mid-cities and wanted something closer than Dallas. He's on Park Row at Fielder, in what used to be an Asian diner.

He already has his website running, and that includes a working menu. It has a whole assortment of burgers, starting with the Chop House Burger, "char-grilled ground beef and slow roasted brisket topped with house made steak sauce, apple wood bacon, and smoked cheddar cheese." The Blacken Bleu Burger is stuffed with blue cheese and served on a buttered toasted baguette bun. The Texican has ground beef, tomatoes, jalapenos, onions, and cilantro mixed and char-grilled, then topped with avocado and pepperjack cheese.

Other options include a chili cheese burger and a "Carolina pork burger" mixed with smoked pulled pork and topped with Carolina-style BBQ sauce on a bun with garlic cole slaw.

He's also doing a white-meat fried chicken sandwich and a veggie burger made with mushrooms that's his own recipe. Salads include a Caesar and a chicken salad, and he'll have both chili and gumbo.

"My dressings and salads are all homemade, and I'm doing my own desserts -- it's just me in the kitchen having fun," he says.

Despite the similarity of the name to his most recent employer, they're not connected.

"You have 'chop house' everywhere -- I worked at the DC Chop House, I worked at the Denver Chop House," he says.

The location of his new place is in a residential area, and he'll go out and meet the neighbors one on one.

"I'm one mile away from Arlington High School and Pantego Christian Academy -- the UTA baseball field is two blocks from me," he says. "The first week I'm open, I'm going to put on my chef coat, walk door-to-door and introduce myself."