While most operators begin with an idea for a restaurant and its menu before looking at a location, Fort Worth chef Marcus Paslay flips the script, finding the location first, then decides what’s missing in the neighborhood. In Paslay’s opinion, every restaurant he opens needs to stay true to place.
From Scratch Hospitality’s growing slate of restaurants in Fort Worth includes Clay Pigeon Food & Drink, Piattello Italian Kitchen, Provender Hall, and Walloon’s. Each of them cater to their respective neighborhoods — Foundry District, Waterside, Mule Alley, and Magnolia Village, respectively.
Paslay has covered a lot of ground during his nearly 20 years in the hospitality industry. After graduating from the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York, he embarked on a culinary tour around the country. It began with some time at Rough Creek Lodge in Glen Rose, before he became what he calls “a working tourist” in Alaska and Washington state (where he worked at the James Beard Award-winning Canlis in Seattle), on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi, and eventually Colorado, where he helped open the Four Seasons Resort in Vail. When he and his wife, Emily, started their family, they moved back to their hometown of Arlington, and Marcus took the lead as executive chef at Neighborhood Services in Dallas.
Food getting ready to be taken to tables at Provendar Hall. From Scratch Hospitality
In 2013, Pasley opened Clay Pigeon, the first restaurant of his own, in Fort Worth’s Foundry District (before that area had a name). The real estate investment firm M2G Ventures began redeveloping the largely forgotten industrial area two years later.
The focus at Clay Pigeon is on regional and seasonal fare, including its famous grilled bone marrow, and fan favorites like grilled duck breast and steak frites.
His second restaurant, Piattello Italian Kitchen, opened in 2017 as one of the inaugural tenants in the Waterside development. Piattello’s menu is hearty, authentic, rustic, and seasonal, with scratch wood-fired pizzas and handmade pastas. Popular dishes include calamari with fried olives, eggplant Parmesan, and the pasta dish Sunday Gravy — only available on Sundays, as its name suggests.
A cook prepping a pizza at Piatello. From Scratch Hospitality
“We want to serve the community, but also, it’s just the way we like to eat,” Paslay says. “Clay Pigeon is a great example. It’s accessible to the high-end neighborhoods that surround it, so we cater to that clientele. And Piattello has become a family-friendly experience, with our patio opening to the Grove at Waterside, where parents can watch their kids run around while enjoying a glass of wine and a casual meal.”
Likewise, Provender Hall which opened in June 2020 in the newly restored Mule Alley in the Stockyards, is where local horse and cattle raisers dine side by side with tourists. The menu includes ranch-style dishes like smoked trout dip, fried green tomatoes, cowboy-cut rib-eyes, grilled trout, fish and chips, and a slow-smoked beef rib for two — providing a taste of Texana.
Paslay’s most recent opening was Walloon’s located in the 701 on Magnolia Avenue. The Chicago-style eatery is housed in a former bank, with its historic vault now serving as a private dining room and wine cellar. The urban interior houses a raw seafood bar, and a sophisticated U-shaped cocktail bar. At Walloon’s, you’ll find dishes like a rare Italian beef sandwich and moules marinieres.
“The restaurants can’t be about our ego or what we want to serve; they have to be about what our customers need,” Paslay says. “In the case of Walloon’s ― Magnolia was lacking a casual seafood spot, so we gave it one.”
From Scratch Hospitality purchased the Mercado Juarez Mexican franchise in April 2023. The 42-year-old restaurant concept has two locations, one in Fort Worth and another in Arlington, and Paslay plans to open more locations in the near future, offering what he calls “the same hospitality at a lower price point.”
Executive chef and owner Marcus Pasley at a Paslay Foundation event. From Scratch Hospitality
For Paslay, hospitality extends beyond his restaurants. In 2021, he founded the Paslay Foundation, which benefits local charities that focus on testing and treatment of learning differences among underserved students. Paslay says that school was often a frustrating place for him, and he knows the hit a child’s self-confidence can take when they fall behind their peers. “I was fortunate enough to have the testing, diagnosis, and resources I needed to succeed,” he says. But testing alone can cost parents thousands, which is out of reach for too many families. “It was a no-brainer for us to get involved with providing the resources for testing and tutoring for kids who are struggling. We don’t want kids to be discouraged because they aren’t keeping up in school.”
Since its inception, the foundation has donated more than $500,000 to local organizations and professionals who support Fort Worth students with learning differences. The biggest benefactors to date have been Hill School, LinkED, and Literacy United.
Over the past 12 years, From Scratch Hospitality has grown from the Paslays to include executive chef Scott Lewis, directors of operations Kellen Hamrah and Russell Kirkpatrick, and director of finance Ben Klipfel. To keep up with the growth, the company has gotten serious about benefits, including contributing to its staff’s medical insurance premiums and offering voluntary dental, vision, life, accident, and critical illness coverage.
Additionally, employees who are interested in growing in the company are given training and planning to develop a career path with From Scratch Hospitality. Currently, 90 percent of the group’s salaried management has been promoted from within, Paslay says. Some employees even have a decade of tenure with the company.
Paslay says Clay Pigeon’s current general manager, James Noel, was hired as a barista at Piattello. This is the goal, but he understands it doesn’t always work out that way. “We have to be a growing hospitality group to promote from within. And, sometimes when our employees are ready to take their next step, the timing doesn’t match, and they have to explore other restaurants. When I go to dine at another local restaurant and run into people who used to work for us, that feels good,” Paslay says. “We’ve done our part in elevating the local landscape.”
One neighborhood at a time.
Diners eating at Provendar Hall. From Scratch Hospitality