Crawford and Son

The Restaurant

Crawford and Son opened at 618 North Person Street in October 2016, in a quiet stretch of the historic Oakwood neighborhood about a mile north of downtown Raleigh. Chef-owner Scott Crawford had previously held senior kitchen positions at the Umstead Hotel and Spa in Cary and at Standard Foods in Raleigh before opening his own neighborhood restaurant, a deliberate counterweight to the formality of his hotel-kitchen years. The dining room seats about seventy across a warm, intimate space with exposed brick, low pendant lighting over hardwood tables, leather banquettes along one wall, and a small open kitchen pass at the back. The covered side patio along Person Street opens through the warm months and remains one of the most pleasant outdoor rooms in the city.

Crawfords project at Crawford and Son is product-driven Modern American with a clear bias toward technical discipline. The menu rotates regularly but holds a recognizable spine: the smoked trout rillettes with grilled milk bread, the manchego-herb biscuits that have become the room's most-requested opener, the pork schnitzel with preserved-lemon aioli, the seared duck breast with rainbow chard and stone-fruit, the pan-roasted halibut with brown butter and capers in season, and a wood-grilled hanger steak with seasonal vegetables. The Sunday brunch menu, when it runs, extends the neighborhood-restaurant grammar with a country-ham benedict, a buttermilk fried chicken biscuit, and a hash that has built its own following. The desserts read as the unselfconscious tail of a kitchen that has earned the right not to chase trend: the warm chocolate cake, the seasonal galette with house-churned ice cream.

The wine list is approximately one hundred and fifty references, selected with a clear bias toward small producers and natural winemakers across the Loire, Burgundy, Sicily and Oregon. Crawford has built a reputation for one of the most thoughtfully edited mid-priced lists in the Southeast, and the markups are deliberately modest for an Oakwood neighborhood restaurant. Crawford himself remains at the pass most services. He has been a five-time semifinalist for the James Beard Best Chef Southeast and a 2025 nominee for Outstanding Restaurateur; his Raleigh empire now includes Crawford and Son, the French brasserie Jolie next door, the Adriatic-focused Brodeto in North Hills, and Crawford Brothers Steakhouse downtown. For a Raleigh dinner that wants warm, considered, technically serious cooking without formality, this is the room.