The owners of Lemon Grass will expand on their restaurant background to open Citronelle, a fusion banquet and restaurant location.

Max Chutinthranond and and his wife, Pook, owners of Lemon Grass, recently got their paperwork approved to begin working on the space. The business will be housed on the first floor of the former Onondaga Music Co. building, formerly the home of Daisy Duke’s. The space will be connected with an adjacent parking lot. 

Citronelle’s space is on the corner of South Clinton and Walton streets and is adjacent to where Lemon Grass currently resides. It is projected to open in the spring of 2018.

Straying from Lemon Grass’s popular Pacific Rim Thai food, Citronelle will offer American food with influences from French, Italian, Spanish and Middle Eastern cuisines. It will serve as a mid-size catering hall and will also open as a restaurant for dinner five days a week.

The idea behind Citronelle was to have a space large enough for people to have events and parties. The three dining rooms in Lemon Grass only hold about 100 people, which doesn’t always work for larger special events. Citronelle’s event space will offer Lemon Grass’s menu in addition to its own.

“Not a lot of people are doing a wedding that is less than 100 people,” said Ploy Chapman, Citronelle’s project manager. “We have people asking for rehearsal dinners, for weddings, and there’s no capabilities to do it (at Lemon Grass).”

Answering customer demands, Citronelle will provide customers with a more versatile, casual dining spot. Every two weeks, Lemon Grass has to decline requests for large events with more than 100 to 150 guests because the business cannot accommodate groups of that size, Chutinthranond previously told The Daily Orange. 

“People think of Lemon Grass as a place where they only come to for special events, but Citronelle is a place where there’s a bar, draft beers, a place to come for a happy hour after work,” Chapman said.

With 9,300 square feet and a 60-foot-long bar, Citronelle will be open for dinner Tuesdays through Saturdays. The restaurant will be staffed with a new wait staff and chefs to create modern dishes for its patrons. These dishes will range from $18 to $25, but can vary depending on specials.

“Even though the food over there is not the same cuisine as here, you can have Lemon Grass cater your event if you want to use Citronelle’s space,” Chapman said. 

Published on October 22, 2017 at 10:35 pm

Contact Sarah: srslavin@syr.edu