Antique photos and books cover the bookshelf at Pillar, an American bistro in the Bishop Arts District from chef-owner Peja Krstic.
“We wanted to bring in some soul, like Pillar had existed already,” he said. The antiques picked by his wife, Silvana, match the charm and history of the 98-year-old building in Oak Cliff, now a neighborhood full of restaurants.
Lofty Idea is a cocktail at Pillar in Dallas made with Irish whiskey, apple brandy and fig.(Azul Sordo / Staff Photographer )
In its past life, this restaurant space was French bistro Boulevardier and Spanish eatery Cafe Madrid. Under Krstic’s watch, Pillar is a bright, airy bistro with no culinary boundaries.
There’s little culinary crossover between Pillar and Krstic’s other restaurant, Michelin-awarded Mot Hai Ba in Lakewood. But he found ways to add Asian ingredients anyway, like the punch of fish sauce in Pillar’s braised collard greens served with fried chicken. That’s Krstic’s favorite dish, and you can sense the care that went into it: It’s a half chicken cooked in coriander schmaltz and buttermilk fried with curry and turmeric. It’s served with Nduja cream sauce, the aforementioned collards and a side of cornbread brioche and honey butter.
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It’s so tender, Krstic cuts it with a fork. And while customers might say “mine, all mine,” the owner hopes customers order chicken for table and share it. Pastry chef Diana Zamora’s bread is good enough to get friends reaching across the table without permission.
If it seems like Pillar is a Southern restaurant, given the fried chicken dish, it isn’t. It’s an American restaurant with not a lot of rules — a retelling of the Serbian-born chef’s story.
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The building that houses Pillar is nearly 100 years old. The design for this new restaurant has checkered booths and dainty wallpaper. Exposed brick shows age and charm.(Azul Sordo / Staff Photographer)
He immigrated to Dallas 20 years ago after visiting a family member who moved to Texas. Krstic had plans to become an attorney, but he always worked in restaurants part-time, at home and in Texas, to pay the bills. He was a great chef from an early age.
His two decades in Texas include chef jobs at Arcodoro Pomodoro, Jasper’s, Fuse, Chamberlain’s, Standard Pour and more — that’s Italian food, American, Asian fusion, steak and upscale bar food.
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“I like to combine cuisines,” he said.
Inside Pillar, Dallas’ newest restaurant in a historic building
An early favorite at Pillar is the beef tartare ($20), which looks more like a stuffed mushroom than a plate of raw meat. It’s neither: Krstic stuffs little cups of crispy hashbrowns with beef, kimchi mayo and chives. They’re rich and small, just right.
Beef tartare is a standout appetizer at Pillar.(Azul Sordo / Staff Photographer )
Also on his menu is tuna carpaccio ($22), a plate that might look like the expected beef tartare but is in fact a “sheet” of raw tuna with lump crab remoulade hiding underneath.
Roasted beets and grilled leaks are two seasonal dishes that would make Mom proud — “eat your vegetables!” — but with the finesse few get to experience at home. The beets ($16) are braised in hibiscus tea and served with ricotta, toasted hazelnuts and dill. The leeks ($19) come with butter-poached crab.
The rest of the menu includes dishes you know — pillars in any American restaurant, you could say.
Examples include a double-patty cheeseburger with brisket pastrami ($19), pork rib cassoulet ($29), shrimp and grits ($27) and a delicious-looking duck, leek and bacon pot pie ($28). The agnolotti filled with ricotta and caramelized onions and grilled short rib ($28) is another one of Krstic’s favorites.
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The name “Pillar” came to Krstic after he visited Ernest Hemingway’s House in Key West, Florida, and saw a photo of the author’s boat, Pilar. Krstic set out to open a seafood restaurant named after Hemingway’s boat, but the restaurant seemed more natural as an American eatery. Pilar became Pillar.
On the wall walking in, designers hung portraits of important historical figures — pillars — from George Washington and Abraham Lincoln to investor Nikola Tesla and civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr.
The cocktail menu keeps up the “pillar” theme. The Prima Donna is a “spiced and spicy” mezcal drink with a house-made hibiscus-beet mixer, explained Naomi Bombardier, the cocktail consultant who co-created Pillar’s drinks. It’s named for a fiery redhead, Lucille Ball.
The Zero Degrees, a classic gin martini served extra cold, is named for Tesla, the scientist who never got a college degree.
The only menu item that will be repeated from Krstic’s other restaurant, Mot Hai Ba, is the chocolate cake. It’s a tall slice, a play on red velvet with mascarpone, chocolate mousse and more.
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“It’s the best chocolate cake in Dallas,” he said, without even a smirk. Try it.
Pillar is at 408 N. Bishop Ave., Dallas. It opened Dec. 8, 2024. Reservations recommended. Closed Mondays.
For more food news, follow Sarah Blaskovich on X at @sblaskovich.
A woman and the person suspected of killing her are dead after an incident led to an officer-involved shooting near Town East Mall in Mesquite on Saturday.
The Dallas Police Department (DPD) responded to a shooting call in the 9000 block of Markville Drive at about 10:15 a.m. A woman was found shot and taken to a local hospital where she died from her injuries.
DPD determined that the suspect fled the scene.
Around 11:45 a.m., Dallas Police said Northeast Division officers were conducting surveillance and located the suspect in a vehicle near the 18500 block of LBJ Freeway in Mesquite, which is right outside Town East Mall.
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Police said when they attempted a traffic stop, the suspect got out of the car armed and shots were fired.
They said no officers were hurt, and the suspect died on scene.
The shooting gave many busy mall shoppers some pause.
“I was just afraid about everybody else here, you know, like, there’s a whole bunch of families out here Christmas shopping, something else could have happened, you know,” said Alexander Evans.
“My friend and her kids are supposed to be meeting me here, so I kind of told her, I was like, ‘It might be best if you don’t.’ Just to be safe,” said Abby Rather.
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Mesquite Police are now investigating the officer-involved shooting, since it happened within their city.
Dallas Police said they are still investigating the homicide case.
They also said the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office responded to the OIS scene and will conduct their own investigation.
Dallas Police said The Office of Community Police Oversight also responded.
ANAHEIM, Calif. (AP) — Jason Robertson had two goals and an assist, and the Dallas Stars beat the Anaheim Ducks 8-3 on Friday night for their third straight win.
Roope Hintz and Thomas Harley each had a goal and an assist, and Oskar Bäck, Sam Steel, Ilya Lybushkin and Adam Erne also scored for the Stars. who are an NHL-best 13-2-4 on the road. Mikko Rantanen and Miro Heiskanen each had two assists, and Casey DeSmith had 23 saves.
Ryan Poehling, Beckett Sennecke and Mikael Granlund scored for the Ducks, who have lost four of five. Lukas Dostal gave up four goals on seven shots before he was pulled with 5:41 left in the first period. Petr Mrazek came on and stopped 14 of the 18 shots he faced the rest of the way.
The Stars’ eight-goal output tied a season high, matching their 8-3 win at Edmonton on Nov. 25, and was the most the Ducks have given up.
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Bäck gave the Stars a 1-0 lead with a short-handed goal 2:37 into the game after the Ducks turned the puck over behind their net.
Poehling tied it 55 seconds later, scoring in close on the rebound of a point shot by Radko Gudas.
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Hintz put Dallas back ahead at 4:42, getting a pass from Robertson in the slot, sliding backwards and firing a shot past Dostal for his 11th.
Steel pushed the Stars’ lead to 3-1 with 7:19 left in the first, scoring past Dostal while crashing into the net and dislodging it. The goal was confirmed after a review.
Harley made it a three-goal lead 1:38 later as he got a pass from Rantanen and scored from the right circle.
Robertson scored in front on a power play with 8:50 remaining in the second, and then put a backhander past Mrazek from the right circle 4 minutes later to make it 6-1. It gave Robertson a team-leading 22 goals.
Erne made it a six-goal lead with 1:30 left in the middle period.
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After Sennecke pulled the Ducks back within five 1:01 into the third, Lybushkin got his first of the season 41 seconds later to extend the Stars’ lead to 8-2. Granlund capped the scoring with 5:38 remaining.
Up next
Stars: Host Toronto on Sunday.
Ducks: Host Columbus on Saturday.
Find more Stars coverage from The Dallas Morning News here.
Don Stone, a Dallas civic leader and strong supporter of the arts, died on Sunday. He was 96.
Angela Stone, Don’s youngest child, said her father was one of a kind, a rare mix of sweet and tough.
“He was just the most wonderful man I ever knew, just generous to a fault, smart, charming. He influenced so many people,” she said.
Stone gave widely across North Texas, including $500,000 to endow college scholarships for musically gifted Dallas ISD students. Stone also held leadership positions at several North Texas arts organizations, including the Dallas Public Library, Voices of Change, Dallas Black Dance Theatre, Fine Arts Chamber Players, Orchestra of New Spain, the Greater Dallas Youth Orchestra, Shakespeare Dallas and Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts.
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“He just believed that all of our lives would be so much poorer without music, art and theater. He said in our country we have the freedom to support whatever we want and that we needed to support the arts so that they would continue to exist,” Stone said.
Stone, a businessman who lived in Turtle Creek, worked for Sanger Harris, which later became Macy’s. He was a 2018 TACA Silver Cup Award honoree for his arts and culture advocacy in North Texas.
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Maura Sheffler, president and executive director of The Arts Community Alliance (TACA), said in a statement that Stone’s legacy will continue to inspire the local arts community.
“We are deeply saddened by the passing of Don Stone, a devoted champion of the arts whose leadership and generosity,” she wrote.
Stone’s wife of over 72 years, Norma, died in June. She was the one who first got her husband involved in the arts, according to their daughter Angela.
Michelle Miller Burns, the DSO’s president and CEO, said the Stones had a profound impact on the DSO.
“It is with such a heavy heart that I received news of Don Stone’s passing earlier this week. Don was a devoted patron, a donor and a board member of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, and his leadership and generosity really have helped shape the Dallas symphony across five decades,” she said.
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In 1980, Stone served as DSO’s chairman of the Board of Governors and helped launch efforts to raise $80 million for Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center and secure architect I.M. Pei.
In 1997, the Stones launched the Norma and Don Stone New Music Fund and committed $1 million to continuously support new works. Some of the works supported through the fund include this year’s world premiere of Angélica Negrón’s requiem For Everything You Keep Losing. The fund also supported a Grammy award-winning violin concerto by Aaron Jay Kernis co-commissioned with the Seattle Symphony, Toronto Symphony and Melbourne Symphony.
“I think it is rare for a couple who so firmly believes in the future of classical music and creating opportunities for new musical voices to be heard to really put support behind that in a meaningful way to fuel that process, to ensure that it can come to fruition,” Burns said.
She said the DSO will continue the Stones’ legacy by commissioning new works through the Norma and Don Stone New Music Fund.
Stone is survived by his children Michael, Lisa and Angela, six grandchildren and six great-grandchildren. The family will have a private funeral.
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