Poke eatery Poke Nooke in north Buckhead has closed after about nineteen months in business. The restaurant, located in a 1,200 square foot space in the Publix-anchored Chastain Square shopping center, opened February 6, 2018, and closed as of August 29, 2019. The restaurant, which occupied a corner space behind Swoozies, will not stay vacant for long, with signage indicating it will soon reopen as a PONKO Chicken franchise. Poke Nooke owners Alex & Linda Lam will own the new venture under a franchise agreement with PONKO.
The new PONKO Chicken opens in a center adjacent to a popular Chick-fil-A, across the street from a Zaxby's and down the road from a Popeyes. PONKO promotes its chicken as "small batch" and "antibiotic free," but does cost more than typical fast food. That said, the chicken has proven quite popular with consecutive wins in 2017 and 2018 for "Best Selling Taste" at Taste of Atlanta.
Fast casual eatery PONKO Chicken, with two locations open and others planned, describes itself as an "Ameri-Asian" restaurant, where "eats meets west." The restaurant is most well known for their chicken tenders, but also caters to vegans and vegetarians by also providing tofu tenders and vegan patties as well as vegan and vegetarian sides.
In 1998, sisters Reiko Clark and Maggie Antoine opened Food Ease on Stone Mountain Highway in Stone Mountain. The restaurant developed a following around Antoine’s panko crusted, sweet soy sauce drizzled “Amer-Asian chicken tenders.” Eventually they changed the name to PONKO Chicken, but after the economy tanked in 2008, they closed the restaurant.
In 2017, Dr. Patrick Sallarulo invested in the business and opened a Chamblee restaurant that October. The Chamblee location basically reflected a completely new identity for the concept with branding and design to match. In 2018, the concept, still with just the one location, started franchising. The first franchise, owned by Johnny Esposito Jr. (son of the founder of Buckhead landmark Johnny's Hideaway) and business partner Shane Godfrey, opened this past April on West Peachtree Street in Midtown, replacing Mulavi Mediterranean Kitchen in the ground floor of the Alta apartment building.
In July, the company announced that Kaitlyn Sallarulo, daughter of Dr. Patrick Sallarulo, CEO and Chairman of PONKO Franchise Corporation, will become the second franchisee, with her upcoming location at the Marietta Square Market, just off the square in Marietta.
A release announcing the Marietta location said "PONKO Franchise Corporation currently has agreements to open over 20 stores in various locations throughout the Atlanta Metropolitan Area."
A source familiar with the restaurant's plans tells ToNeTo Atlanta that the Buckhead location should open by the end of September, with the Marietta location expected to open by the end of October.
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| Founders Maggie Antoine and Reiko Clark at the Chamblee PONKO |
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