Food Briefs: Slaughter's Hall and WSKY Lounge new chef, Guyutes serves lunch, MIO store is bigger and more 

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• Garett Fisbeck
• Chef Jonathan Groth, new executive chef of Slaughter's Hall and WKSY Lounge, poses for a photo in Oklahoma City, Monday, Sept. 14, 2015.

New chef

Chef Jonathan Groth is the new executive chef of Slaughter’s Hall and WSKY Lounge in Deep Deuce.

Groth, who worked at both the Tasting Room and Lobby Bar as part of Kurt Fleischfresser’s Western Concepts Restaurant Group, said he loved working for one of Oklahoma’s most-decorated chefs, but that the time is right for him to strike out on his own.

“Outside the Box, which owns Slaughter’s and WSKY, [has] goals to expand in the future and I want to be involved in expansion possibilities,” Groth said. “I want to make a run at the Oklahoma City market, stand on my own and make my food sing.”

At Slaughter’s Hall, he will fine-tune recipes and techniques while refining the menu. He will add menu items to WSKY, including a trio of sliders, fried macaroni and cheese balls and fresh pretzel sticks, which will enhance the bar’s stellar alcohol service.

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• Garett Fisbeck
• April Noriega, bartender, poses for a photo at Guyutes in Oklahoma City, Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2015.

Phish phood

After a month in business, Guyutes, 730 NW 23rd St., now serves lunch, too.

Owners Wayne Perotka and Jarrod Friedel wanted to make sure the venue was ready to accommodate expected crowds.

“We always planned on opening for lunch,” Perotka said. “We just needed to ease into it.”

The jam-band inspired eatery, with menu items including Catphish Wontons and St. Stephen salad, took two years of construction to complete before opening in late August.

Now open from 11 a.m. to 2 a.m., Guyutes already has a hit dish from head chef Patrick Hart. Tequila Sunfryz are “like nachos, but made with waffle fries and topped with pulled pork and a fried egg,” he said.

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Home made

Oklahoma State Fairgoers will find twice as much to love at the Made in Oklahoma (MIO) Store this year thanks to a big sales surge at last year’s event.

“In 2014 … we hit [our] sales goal by the first Sunday, just four days into the fair,” said Kerry Barrick, an Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry market development coordinator. “We went on to almost double the goal.”

That success means this year’s store is now housed in a 10-by-60-foot booth that includes two demonstration stations, located at the front of Oklahoma Expo Hall.

MIO also expanded its selection to include gift items in addition to food, Barrick said.

The MIO program is a part of the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry, which works with state agribusinesses to promote retail, institutional and gourmet sales.