
frank.food company closed its Kent, Conn., location during the COVID-19 pandemic but new larger version is now open in West Cornwall — and becoming a social hub as well as popular restaurant. Photo courtesy Frank Way
Frank Way has found success in his newest venture, called simply frank. It opened May 12 on the West Cornwall, Conn., property that was known for many years as the Pink House (although it is now a more subtle shade of cream).
The new eatery is in a barn space/carriage house behind the formerly pink building; its owner is a former New York City “branding” executive whose first food venture was frank.food on Main Street in Kent, Conn.
Previously a creative director for major brands, living in California and New York, Way decided he “wanted to do something with more integrity, something more related to being in Connecticut.” So, when a friend suggested Way open a food shop in Kent, he did.
“I’d never owned a shop like that before,” he said. “But, I was just building a brand, and I’d done that my whole career.”
In 2017, frank.food company opened its doors as a breakfast and lunch place and was a wild and immediate success, with long lines out the door. The restaurant maintained its popularity even as the pandemic closed down other restaurants and put an end to “dining out.” With COVID-19, Way adapted by reducing the size of the staff and by catering gourmet meals.
“We survived the pandemic by reinventing ourselves so did not close as a result of it,” Way said.
“I ended up closing the location after Thanksgiving last November because Kent became an over-saturated market. And that gave me the time to fully focus on getting the restaurant open.”
Moving to West Cornwall
In the time before frank.food closed down, the West Cornwall Development Group had asked Way if he’d like to open a restaurant in West Cornwall. He did and began planning for the new, larger eatery.
But as with all renovations during the pandemic years, there were supply chain interruptions that kept pushing back the date of the restaurant opening.
A particular refrigeration glue from China never seemed to come, for example.
However, Way said, “I just got really patient and focused on building the space and making it beautiful.” All in all, he said, “there were delays, but only for about 3 months.”
When you enter the new frank.food, the space opens to a high vaulted ceiling with a welcoming 3-foot tall “HI” in carved letters. Taxidermy and hooked rugs hang on the whitewashed barn walls. For Way, it’s “very eclectic, homey and bright.”
A walnut tree cut down during construction has been transformed into gorgeous wood tabletops.
“I love the local story,” said Way. “We were able turn a tree we had to lose into something really precious.”
Along with 35 seats around the walnut tables, there are eight bar seats. Outside, on a flagstone patio perched above the Housatonic River, there are an additional 36 seats.
The long-awaited opening proved worth the wait, apparently. “I’m doing probably three full seatings each a night,” Way said. “Which is ridiculous.”
Happily, his staff has risen to the challenge. “I’m taxing my kitchen like nothing else, and they’re really performing well.”
John Carlson is the chef for frank.food. Some of the other staff are new to the restaurant world, and are learning together. But they’ve learned enough to stay open for a Memorial Day brunch that had to end at 1 p.m., when the restaurant ran out of food.
First, there is pizza
So, what’s on the menu? Way said, “We wanted to keep the menu really accessible.”
This starts with a Neapolitan-style pizza program, featuring three $16 pies: the classic margherita with just basil, mozzarella and tomatoes; soppressata with hot honey and oregano; and white pizza with lemon ricotta, asparagus and peas.
One favorite item on the menu is the kale salad ($13), which has had rave reviews.
“It was kind of how I paid my rent in Kent,” Way said of the winning appetizer.
Main course choices include the burger on brioche, made with grass-fed beef from Cornwall’s Hurlburt farm ($19); wild cod and chips ($24); and a buttermilk brined chicken ($24).
To finish, Way keeps his customers on their toes, often switching the dessert menu around. He said, “I’ll make devil’s food cake one week or High Five Pies another.”
Brunch keeps the local burger, adding a French toast casserole, avocado toast, a quiche of the day and an omelet of the day. Way plans to soon add a grain bowl with farro, spinach and a poached egg.
For now the restaurant is only open Thursday through Saturday for dinner; and Saturday and Sunday for lunch. The full future vision is to increase hours, and offer a coffee service, perhaps with a light breakfast or a lunch.
For now, Way is focused on establishing the restaurant’s rhythm and spreading the name.
“I feel it’s important that people understand that ‘frank food’ is not about my name,” Way said. “It’s about what it is to be sincere and honest. My food is honest to goodness food, it’s elevated home cooking.”
frank.food company is open for dinner Thursday through Saturday, 5 to 9:30 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Learn more at www.frankfoodco.com or call 860-248-3250.
SHARON — Angela Derrick Carabine, 74, died May 16, 2025, at Vassar Hospital in Poughkeepsie, New York. She was the wife of Michael Carabine and mother of Caitlin Carabine McLean.
A funeral Mass will be celebrated on June 6 at 11:00 a.m. at Saint Katri (St Bernards Church) Church. Burial will follow at St. Bernards Cemetery. A complete obituary can be found on the website of the Kenny Funeral home kennyfuneralhomes.com.
Sam Waterston
On June 7 at 3 p.m., the Triplex Cinema in Great Barrington will host a benefit screening of “The Killing Fields,” Roland Joffé’s 1984 drama about the Khmer Rouge and the two journalists, Cambodian Dith Pran and New York Times correspondent Sydney Schanberg, whose story carried the weight of a nation’s tragedy.
The film, which earned three Academy Awards and seven nominations — including one for Best Actor for Sam Waterston — will be followed by a rare conversation between Waterston and his longtime collaborator and acclaimed television and theater director Matthew Penn.
“This came out of the blue,” Waterston said of the Triplex invitation, “but I love the town, I love this area. We raised our kids here in the Northwest Corner and it’s been good for them and good for us.”
Waterston hasn’t seen the film in decades but its impact has always remained present.
“It was a major event in my life at the time,” Waterston said of filming “The Killing Fields,” “and it had a big influence on me and my life ever after.” He remembers the shoot vividly. “My adrenaline was running high and the part of Sydney Schanberg was so complicated, so interesting.”
Waterston lobbied for the role of the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for years, tracing his early interest to a serendipitous connection while filming in England. Even before Joffé’s production was greenlit, he had his sights set on playing the role. “I knew I wanted the part for years even before it was a movie that was being produced.”
What followed was not just critical acclaim, but also a political awakening. “The film gave all of us an intimate acquaintance with refugees, what it is to be a refugee, how the world forgets them and what a terrible crime that is.”
In Boston, at a press stop for the film, two women asked Waterston a pointed question: now that he knew what he knew, what was he going to do about it? “I said, ‘Well, you know, I’m an actor, so I thought I’d go on acting.’ And they said, ‘No, that’s not what you need to do. You need to join Refugees International.’” And join he did, serving on the organization’s board for 25 years.
Both Schanberg and Dith Pran, whose life the film also chronicles, were “cooperative and helpful … in a million ways,” Waterston said. Upon first meeting Pran, Waterston recalled, “He came up to me, made a fist, and pounded on my chest really hard and said, ‘You must understand that Sydney is very strong here.’ He was trying to plant something in me.”
There were more tender gestures, too. Schanberg used the New York Times wire to relay that Waterston’s wife had just given birth while he was filming in Thailand, adding to the personal and emotional connection to the production.
Though “The Killing Fields” is a historical document, its truths still resonate deeply today. “Corruption is a real thing,” Waterston warned. “Journalism is an absolutely essential part of our democracy that is as under siege today as it was then. It’s different now but it’s the same thing of ‘Don’t tell the stories we don’t want heard.’ Without journalists, we are dust in the wind.” Waterston added, “Democracy is built on the consent of the governed but the other thing it’s built on is participation of the governed and without full participation, democracy really doesn’t stand much of a chance. It’s kind of a dead man walking.”
When asked what he hopes the audience will take away from the screening, Waterston didn’t hesitate. “This is the story that puts the victims of war at the center of the story and breaks your heart. I think that does people a world of good to have their hearts broken about something that’s true. So, I hope that’s what the impact will be now.”
Tickets for the benefit screening are available at www.thetriplex.org. Proceeds support Triplex Cinema, a nonprofit home for film and community programming in the Berkshires.
Scott Reinhard, graphic designer, cartographer, former Graphics Editor at the New York Times, took time out from setting up his show “Here, Here, Here, Here- Maps as Art” to explain his process of working.Here he explains one of the “Heres”, the Hunt Library’s location on earth (the orange dot below his hand).
Map lovers know that as well as providing the vital functions of location and guidance, maps can also be works of art.With an exhibition titled “Here, Here, Here, Here — Maps as Art,” Scott Reinhard, graphic designer and cartographer, shows this to be true. The exhibition opens on June 7 at the David M. Hunt Library at 63 Main St., Falls Village, and will be the first solo exhibition for Reinhard.
Reinhard explained how he came to be a mapmaker. “Mapping as a part of my career was somewhat unexpected.I took an introduction to geographic information systems (GIS), the technological side of mapmaking, when I was in graduate school for graphic design at North Carolina State.GIS opened up a whole new world, new tools, and data as a medium to play with.”
He added, “When I moved to New York City, I continued that exploration of cartography, and my work eventually caught the attention of the New York Times, where I went to work as a Graphics Editor, making maps and data visualizations for a number of years.”At the New York Times, his work contributed to a number of Pulitzer Prize winning efforts.
In his work, Reinhard takes complex data and turns it into intriguing visualizations the viewer can begin to comprehend immediately and will want to continue to look into and explore more deeply.
One method Reinhard uses combines historic United States Geological survey maps with “current elevation data (height above sea level for a point on earth) to create 3-D looking maps, combining old and new,” he explained.
For the show at Hunt Library Reinhard said, “I knew that I wanted to incorporate the place into the show itself. A place can be many things.The exhibition portrays the exact spot visitors are from four vantage points: the solar system, the earth, the Northwest Corner, and the library itself.” Hence the name, “Here, Here, Here, Here.”
He continued, “The largest installation, the Northwest Corner, is a mosaic of high-resolution color prints and hand-printed cyanotypes — one of the earliest forms of photography. They use elevation data to portray the landscape in a variety of ways, from highly abstract to the highly detailed.”
This sixteen-foot-wide installation covers the area of Millerton to Barkhamsted Reservoir and from North Canaan down to Cornwall for a total of about 445 square miles.
For subjects, he chooses places he’s visited and feels deeply connected to, like the Northwest Corner.“This show is a thank you to the community for the richness that it has brought to my life. I love it here,” he said.
The opening reception for the show is on June 7 from 5 to 7 p.m. On Thursday, June 12, Reinhard will give a talk about his work from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at the library.“Here, Here, Here, Here” will be on display until July 3.
Scott Reinhard’s 16-foot-wide piece of the Northwest Corner is laid out on the floor prior to being hung for the show. L. Tomaino