If you have lived in McDonough for more than a couple of years, you probably still think of the Square as the answer to "where should we eat tonight." That instinct made sense in 2019. It is starting to miss the story.
The most talked-about openings of the last twelve months have not landed on Griffin Street or Macon Street. They have landed a mile and a half west, on Jonesboro Road, in the kind of retail bays that used to draw shrug-and-drive-past reactions. That is worth paying attention to, because it changes the practical question of where you take out-of-town guests, where you meet a client for lunch, and where the next wait-list-only Friday night is going to be.
The center of gravity has quietly moved off the Square
Here is the thesis in one sentence: McDonough now has two food districts, and the newer one is on Jonesboro Road.
The Square is not shrinking. It still has the best patio seating, the most walkable dinner-then-drinks combinations, and the anchor names most residents will list first. What has changed is that the new capital, new chefs, and new franchise leases are going somewhere else. If you only ever eat inside the loop around the courthouse, you are now missing half of what is happening in your own city.
What has landed on Jonesboro Road
The clearest signal came in March 2026, when award-winning chef Todd Richards debuted his new restaurant, Que-riosity, at 1931 Jonesboro Road, offering Southern-inspired barbecue with an upscale dining experience. Richards is not a local operator testing a first concept. He is a self-taught chef and four-time James Beard semifinalist who has worked in some of the best kitchens over a 25-year career, and he serves as executive chef at Waldorf Astoria Atlanta Buckhead.
That biography usually opens restaurants in Buckhead or on the BeltLine. It opened one in McDonough. The concept itself is deliberate. It focuses on a modern approach to barbecue that honors the history and techniques of Black pitmasters while utilizing fresh, locally sourced ingredients. In Richards' own framing, "keeping true Southern barbecue traditions alive means giving them the same care and attention you'd see in a fine-dining kitchen."
For a resident, the practical read is simple. You now have a fine-dining barbecue room, open Thursday through Monday from 3 p.m. to 10 p.m., sitting in a corridor that used to be a drive-through-only stretch.
Que-Riosity is not the only Jonesboro Road move. In February 2026, Super Chix inked a lease for another franchise location in a 2,500-square-foot space at 982 Jonesboro Rd, Suite 200, with local franchisee Missy Moon, who operates several locations in the Atlanta area, bringing this new location to McDonough. The fast-casual franchise already has locations open in Dunwoody, Peachtree City, Marietta, Kennesaw and Newnan, and is known for its chicken, hand-cut fries and frozen custard. An opening timeline for the McDonough location has not been made public.
The Dunwoody-Peachtree City-Marietta list matters more than the menu. Franchisees pick markets that pencil out against the strongest suburbs in metro Atlanta. McDonough is now on that shortlist.
The Square is doing something different now
Once you accept that the Square is no longer the exclusive site of the "new," the Square gets more interesting, not less. It is settling into a role: the destination for the anchor experiences that a fast-casual corridor cannot replicate.
The clearest example is Pandora on the Square. It is a refined dining destination in historic McDonough, where Southern soul and Lowcountry heritage meet global culinary influences, helmed by award-winning Chef Carlos Brown, with a menu that showcases bold flavors, elegant presentation, and a thoughtful blend of cultural influences. Lunch runs Tuesday through Friday, brunch on Saturday and Sunday, and dinner runs Tuesday through Thursday and later Friday through Sunday. If you have never used the Sunday brunch slot to host visitors, that is the easiest single upgrade to your standing dining routine.
Crust & Craft, also on the Square, is redefining how Georgians enjoy pizza, beer, and cocktails in the heart of McDonough, located here on the McDonough Square. It reads as the counterweight to the fine-dining rooms: a table you can walk into at 8 p.m. on a Thursday.
The Square is also becoming useful for the reason a food scene needs, which is a place that is not a restaurant. Story on the Square, at 19 Griffin Street, has quietly grown into a small events engine, running book clubs, storytimes, and craft evenings alongside food and drink programming. As one example on the calendar, it hosted a Fall Line Brewing Co. craft beer tasting with curated small bites, featuring a guided tasting of five selected beers. That kind of programming pulls foot traffic to the Square on weeknights, which then feeds the surrounding restaurants. It is the same flywheel that made Decatur Square work fifteen years ago, at a smaller scale.
What is coming, and what to actually watch for
A few names to file away rather than rush out for tonight:
- Smoke Friendly BBQ, a family-run barbecue concept, is opening a new McDonough location at 59 Macon Street, building on the success of their original Covington restaurant. Macon Street matters because it puts a second serious barbecue room within a short walk of the Square, right as Que-Riosity anchors the corridor a mile away. Two credible smoke programs in one small city is not the norm for south metro suburbs.
- Volcano Steak and Sushi has McDonough on its planned expansion list, alongside Dawsonville and Marietta, per manager Jenny Lin.
- Leo's Cafe completed a move to 148 John Frank Ward Boulevard, a larger space east of McDonough Square, previously occupied by Baby Jane's Home Cooking. The relocation is small news on its own. It is bigger news as a pattern: the immigrants of the local independent scene are trading up in square footage rather than closing.
Set against those, the day-to-day rotation of the Square remains steady. Kirby G's Diner on Macon Street is still the burger room, with hand-patty burgers such as Ike's "I Like Cheese" Burger, the "Ole Blue Eyes," and "The Duke," alongside fried dill pickles and a Philly cheese steak. Gritz Family Restaurant, on the Square, remains the breakfast-and-lunch anchor where breakfast is served all day, every day.
How to actually work this into your week
The point of all of the above is not that you need to try everything. It is that a resident's default rotation probably needs one edit.
- Move one weekly meal to Jonesboro Road. If you are a Square regular, book a Que-Riosity dinner in the 3-to-10 p.m. window on a Thursday or Sunday, when it is easier to get a table. This is where you take the in-laws.
- Use Pandora for the occasion, not the weeknight. Weekend brunch, birthday, closing celebration. Chef Carlos Brown's kitchen is set up for that mode, and it is where the Square distinguishes itself from the corridor.
- Treat Story on the Square as programming, not a bookstore. Check the calendar the way you would check a small venue's. The beer tastings and craft nights are the reason to be downtown on a random Tuesday.
- Track the lease news, not the ribbon cuttings. The Super Chix lease at 982 Jonesboro Road is the more useful signal than any single opening night, because it tells you what national operators think the corridor will look like in three years.
What this says about McDonough more broadly
Restaurant openings are a lagging indicator of a lot of other things: rooftops, disposable income, commute patterns, retail confidence. A four-time James Beard semifinalist choosing 1931 Jonesboro Road, and a national fast-casual chain choosing 982 Jonesboro Road within a month of each other, are not two disconnected stories. They are the same story, told twice, and they tell you the corridor has crossed a threshold that operators pay attention to.
If you already live here, that mostly means the answer to "where should we eat tonight" is going to keep getting better. If you are hosting someone from outside the city, the honest recommendation has changed. Take them to the Square for the walk, take them to Jonesboro Road for the meal, and let them figure out on their own that they were not expecting either.
If you are thinking about buying or selling in McDonough and want a read on what the growth along Jonesboro Road means for your street specifically, ATL Property Pro works this market every week. Schedule a Free Consultation and we will walk through what is changing near you, block by block.
