New England is famously dotted with grassy town centers that date back as far as the 1630s. It’s a familiar Connecticut story: Over centuries, town greens evolved organically from utility spaces to places of leisure, losing the market stalls and tombstones and stocks and pillories along the way. But can you, in this century, just build stores and restaurants and apartments around a patch of grass, cluster some Adirondack chairs, schedule outdoor yoga and call it Downtown?
The makers of Quarry Walk think so. The development bills itself as “Oxford, Connecticut’s Dynamic Downtown,” on a piece of land that, little more than a decade ago, was a defunct quarry separated from Route 67 by a rock wall.
Quarry Walk doesn’t quite tick all the boxes—prominent parking lots, for example, accommodate visitors from the largely rural-suburban surrounds—but it does feel like an echo of New Urbanism, the movement Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk (both Yale Architecture ’74) helped hatch toward the end of the last century. The goal: more connected and contented communities, through walkability, mixed-use development and other tenets of “human-scale” design. The proof of concept was Seaside, Florida, built in the 1980s and 90s, a planned community so idyllic it was used as the set of The Truman Show.
This neighborhood, which broke ground in 2016 and promises “all-in-one luxury living,” has healthcare facilities, an ice cream shoppe and enough pet-related retail along the western walkway that you might call that side the dog district. I spotted a pitbull and his owner sharing a beer by the outdoor fireplace at The Sitting Duck Tavern. If I had a dog, I’d definitely take it to a training facility called Sit Happens before promenading along the green space, which is helpfully accessorized by baggie dispensers reminding folks to “Do Your Doo-ty.” Available onsite apartments start at $2,485 a month for a one-bedroom. The pet policy seems generous, though.
A short stroll takes you past a bra boutique, a conveyor-belt sushi bar and an honest-to-God independent bookstore, Teddy’s Best Reads, named for the owners’ dog but aspiring to a reach beyond the pet-pampering constituency with plans for D&D nights and local author book signings.
While the anchor of the village may technically be Market 32, a Price Chopper with a major glow-up, the crown jewel is definitely “Italian-inspired” restaurant Char and Lemon, which has a Truman Show polish but also a very real buzz of fun, including in its commitment to its concept. The decor, including two giant wood-fired ovens, is sunny yellow and lacquered black, and the menu makes it possible to construct a meal entirely on-theme: a smoked cocktail with lemon garnish, infinite variations on lemonade, calamari with lemon aioli, bucatini limone, lemon chicken pizza, lemon sorbet.
That was my original plan, but I had misgivings about an Italian dinner with no red sauce, and my commitment to the bit evaporated further when I saw the surprising specials that day. Our table ended up trying the Arancini special ($13), prepared with those old Italian staples of corn, cilantro, manchego and honey chipotle aioli, and the Crostini of the Day ($12), which started with fresh bread, then veered off into macerated strawberries, white balsamic vinegar, whipped ricotta and pistachios. The former was perfect with a round of custom lemonades, while the latter might’ve worked better as breakfast.
I also did not expect to be drinking a Banana Old Fashioned. In my house, the last pieces of Halloween candy left calcifying in the bottom of the treat sack come Christmas are likely to be the banana variant of Laffy Taffy. But the Banana Old Fashioned at Char and Lemon ($14) put in the work to win me over. The cocktail involves a laborious fat-washing process, cooking banana in butter and alcohol for 18 hours at low heat, then freezing the result so that the solids can be removed and the flavor retained. The rye-based drink is mixed with a dash of bitters and some simple syrup, poured over an ice cube, garnished with a cherry and lemon peel, then lightly smoked on its way to the table with a nifty hotbox that fits atop the glass. The flavors were layered but harmonious, the mouth-feel silky. No trace of Laffy Taffy.
For the main course, our table split a pasta and two pizzas. The Short Rib Gnocchi ($26) met my red-sauce requirement and then some. The housemade potato pasta was almost at a 1:1 ratio with the melty, dreamy, pot-roasty meat.
For pizza, we had to try the signature Char and Lemon ($20), a white pie with bufala mozzarella, mascarpone, arugula and lemon slices. Thinly sliced and baked at cellulose-melting temps, the lemons were soft enough that you barely notice you’re biting into one until you get its welcome pop of tartness against the super rich mascarpone. We also tried the Spice of Life ($20), featuring an excellent tomato sauce, fresh mozzarella, fresh jalapeños and housemade spicy sausage with a drizzle of hot honey. On both pies, the rim was pillowy and breadstick-thick, while the interior was so thin that a supportive serving utensil was needed to prevent topping sloppage. The dough was delicious and just the slightest bit sweet. It’s easy to see how it does double-duty for pizza and the calzones on the dessert menu, which come in Nutella and S’more flavors ($14), though we opted instead for an absolute mountain of the Zeppole ($14), dusted with cinnamon sugar and served with a bowl of chocolate chip-studded cannoli cream.
You don’t have to go to Quarry Walk to experience this menu; Char and Lemon recently opened a scene-y sister restaurant next to the Guilford Green. That’s certainly a more storied bit of communal land, which, like New Haven’s, was used as an early burial ground. But does it really take colonial skeletons under your feet to make a town square feel, you know… real?
According to The Velveteen Rabbit, when someone “loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.” Seven years into its tenancy at Quarry Walk, Char and Lemon has clearly earned a lot of love. Even on a stormy Wednesday night, there was a 15-minute wait for a four-top. Families, couples and friend groups packed the place, buzzing congenially, toasting martinis, watching the pizza dough somersault through the air—a Dynamic center of community, Downtown or not.
Written and photographed by Sarah Harris Wallman.
