The Drake Kitchen + Bar recently opened its brand-new downtown Orlando dining room and gathering place featuring a curated, locally sourced menu of elevated global tapas and hand-crafted cocktails.
Chef-owner Heberto Segura, who runs the restaurant with his pastry chef wife, Rona tells us, “Ours is a restaurant for the community where everyone is invited to join us for good times, delicious food, and the hospitable service you’d expect in a favorite gathering spot,” Segura says. “We have an adventurous passion for sourcing and presenting inventive seasonal dishes that we procure locally whenever possible with due credit to our local crafters and producers.”
More from the press release:
The Drake menu will be eclectic and fun with a nod to the farmers and crafters, growers and fishmongers whose products are on the menu, Segura says. Snacks and starters will range from the Broken Egg, a fried duck egg with potatoes, garlic aioli, and Lady Edison ham to Gulf Coast Cobia with Tomato Mignonette and plantain chips. Vintage cheeses and artisan-cured and smoked charcuterie will be served with home-baked rustic breads and accoutrements.
Creative main dishes featuring Prime Aged Beef NY Strip Steak and Madeira Beach Red Fish sit side by side on The Drake menu with vegetarian options like Fungi John Mushroom Risotto. Arroz de la Costa, which serves two, is a seafood lover’s dream with lobster, octopus, giant prawns, black rice, and green chickpeas.
Desserts by Chef-owner Rona Segura will promise a sweet ending, from Goat Cheese Pan Basco with roasted seasonal fruit to Chocolate Budino—double chocolate cream, hot coffee caramel and sesame tuile.
And the drinks menu pays tribute to many local brewers, distillers, and small batch producers who share the Segura family’s passion for creating their products with love. The signature 36 Barrels crafted cocktail of Gunpowder Gin and Garden Party green apple & thyme liqueur is a nod to the restaurant’s borrowed theme of old-fashioned community and revelry.
The Duck & Drake and The Drake restaurants’ monikers originate with the lost-to-history Duck and Drake Inn once located just off the Strand in London, where co-conspirators gathered in May 1604 to plan the infamous Gunpowder Uprising. At that time, it was deemed a safe place for revolutionaries to gather, and The Drake Kitchen + Bar will promote its peace-loving, hospitable dining environment with decorative elements that hark back to that legendary plot, with gunpowder barrels included and displayed above the bar. Design elements include a Community Wall promoting diversity where “everyone is welcome, everyone is equal,” Segura says. A Sky Wall is an ode to the restaurateur’s mantra, “blue skies and chill vibes.”
The Segura family’s dream to open a fine-dining restaurant in Orlando began to take shape in 2017 with their gourmet food truck that checked all the culinary boxes—fresh local ingredients, global flavors, creative fare, and sharing portions that earned kudos from diners and critics. The Duck & Drake Kitchen, with its celebrated menu of gourmet tapas, is in residence at Digress Wine in College Park. It will remain in its College Park location as a sister restaurant to The Drake Kitchen & Bar, located at 361 N. Rosalind Ave. Suite 1, Orlando.
Heberto, who attended the Florida Culinary Institute at Lincoln College in West Palm Beach, Fla., met Rona in Las Vegas, where he was executive chef of New York-New York Hotel and Casino. He also served as executive chef and culinary consultant of restaurant development for The Harwell Group and had asserted his skill in the kitchens of the Boca Raton Resort & Club and The Mandarin Oriental before seizing the Las Vegas opportunities. He was executive chef of Raglan Road Irish Pub & Restaurant in Disney Springs, Orlando, before striking out to launch his Duck & Drake Kitchen food truck in residence at Digress Wine in Orlando.
Rona, a consummate self-taught culinarian who loves to bake and create pastries, rose through the ranks of renowned kitchens of the Venetian Hotel and The Palms Casino Resort before joining Caesar’s Palace. There, she took on roles at the much-heralded Rao’s Italian and Payard Patisserie & Bistro. In Orlando, she was on the culinary team at Roy Yamaguchi’s Dr. Phillips’ area restaurant, Roy’s.
Located on the ground level of the Radius Apartments, the 100-seat restaurant features
a main dining room, bar, parlor, and covered patio.
The Drake Kitchen + Bar
361 N. Rosalind Ave., Suite 1
Orlando, FL 32801
Tuesday-Saturday: 11 a.m. – 10 p.m.
Sunday Brunch coming soon
