One eatery at a time, Ogden families serve meals to generations
The new location of Warrens Craft Burger is on Historic 25th Street in Ogden on Monday, February 29, 2016.
The new location of Warrens Craft Burger is on Historic 25th Street in Ogden on Monday, February 29, 2016.
The new location of Warrens Craft Burger is on Historic 25th Street in Ogden on Monday, February 29, 2016.
Leigh and Kirk Dean pose for photographs in the new 25th Street location of Warrens Craft Burger in Ogden on Monday, February 29, 2016.
The current South Ogden Warrens sits on the site of Rusty’s, an eatery purchased by Keith and Evelyn Combe in the late 1960s. This photograph was taken in the 1950s.
Leigh and Kirk Dean pose for photographs in the new 25th Street location of Warrens Craft Burger in Ogden on Monday, February 29, 2016.
Leigh and Kirk Dean pose for photographs in the new 25th Street location of Warrens Craft Burger in Ogden on Monday, February 29, 2016.
Leigh and Kirk Dean pose for photographs in the new 25th Street location of Warrens Craft Burger in Ogden on Monday, February 29, 2016.
Owners Leigh and Kirk Dean pose at their newly opened Warrens Craft Burger on Historic 25th Street in Ogden.
Owners Leigh and Kirk Dean pose at their newly opened Warrens Craft Burger on Historic 25th Street in Ogden.
OGDEN – What was once a dream for Evelyn and Keith Combe is now reality for their daughter Leigh and her husband Kirk Dean as they run eight restaurants in Weber and Davis counties, including the newly opened Warrens Craft Burger on Historic 25th Street.
All in all, the Deans also operate four Warrens (two in Roy, one in South Ogden, one in Syracuse), two Dylan’s (Ogden and Kaysville) and Zucca Trattoria in Ogden.
The dream started just over 60 years ago when Evelyn and Keith Combe bought a burger shop called Mason’s Drive-Inn. The restaurant sat where Windy’s Sukiyaki on Riverdale Road in Ogden is now. Leigh said her parents worked very hard in that first venture, living in a trailer behind the restaurant. The two also opened a commissary where people could purchase fresh items for their own restaurants as well.
• RELATED: Warrens Craft Burger returns as family, sit-down restaurant
In the late 1960s, the Combes bought Warrens from Roy resident Doug Warren; it was originally called Rusty’s.
“It had a (good) reputation and my dad knew it could be a good thing,” Leigh said.
During that time Keith Combe also purchased several Arctic Circles. Leigh doesn’t remember exactly how many, but she remembers going to many grand openings when she was young.
“We would go for a family drive and go check the restaurants,” she said. “My dad would come out shaking his head sometimes and we would have french fries,” she added with a laugh.
“My dad used to always say it may take longer to get your food, but it will be fresh,” Leigh said.
Kirk agrees: “We use local products and we don’t use frozen beef,” he said. “Everything is fresh and we really like to keep it local.”
When Leigh and Kirk got married, he was working with his dad’s paint business, which he still helps run today, but he had a leaning toward the restaurant business. “My dad and Kirk just got along so well, it just worked out,” Leigh said.
• Story continues below photo
BRIANA SCROGGINS/Standard-Examiner
The new location of Warrens Craft Burger is on Historic 25th Street in Ogden on Monday, February 29, 2016.
In 1996, Kirk and Keith Combe built a 12th Street restaurant in Ogden with the agreement that Kirk would run it. After Leigh’s dad passed away, the couple changed the name to Dylan’s, after their son.
“It was a horrible time. My dad had just passed away and we had to change the name,” Leigh said.
“Everyone knew Warrens but they didn’t know Dylan’s,” Kirk said. They knew they had to change the name back and worked toward that. The location is now known as, “Dylan’s: A Warrens’ Family Restaurant.”
“One thing we know, we will never do that again,” Kirk joked about the name change.
In 2003 the Deans, who live in Ogden, bought all the Warrens from Leigh’s family. “We were able to approach my mom about it and she knew how my dad thought the world of Kirk and it has just worked,” Leigh said.
By 2007, Kirk wanted to try something new. He had taken some pizza dough home from one of the suppliers and brought up the idea of an Italian restaurant. He knew the head chef at Snowbasin, Elio Scanu, and said, “He did a great job and we got along pretty good.”
• Story continues below map to Dylan’s in Ogden
They opened Zucca Trattoria in October 2008 in South Ogden. It was close to the Dean home, which was a plus, but it was a lot of hard work.
“We stumbled a bit at first. It was a rocky start,” Kirk said.
He wanted the food to be fine Italian, but people didn’t totally understand the concept at first. The Deans kept at it and soon had a loyal following. Last year the opportunity arose for them to move to Historic 25th Street and they jumped at it. Business in the new location has been brisk, even though some of their loyal South Ogden clientele were a little upset.
“We came down here and everyone knew who we were,” Kirk said.
After Zucca, the Deans decided they wanted to create a more enhanced and fancy hamburger restaurant, thus Warrens Craft Burger was born and opened in February.
“We used the knowledge we had gained over the years and wanted to try this,” Kirk said as he looked around his newly-opened Craft Burger.
They first started in a bar on Ogden’s 24th Street but always knew they wanted it to be a more family friendly environment. When they knew the bar might be closing, they started looking for other options and found the old Bistro 258 on Historic 25th Street would be vacant.
“People are happy that it is now a family environment,” he said.
The couple laugh when asked about the cooking.
“I don’t do much of the cooking; we have such great employees, chefs and people we trust for that,” Kirk said. “But we do a lot of the cleaning,” Leigh joked.
She remembers that her kids would sometimes say they didn’t want to go to dinner at Zucca when it first opened because they always ended up doing dishes. “We aren’t afraid to get in and work when we need to,” Leigh said.
Leigh works in the office and Kirk oversees the restaurants as a whole. They have a general manager that runs all the Warrens.
The two agree that they have been really lucky to have terrific employees. “We have a lot that come and go of course, but we have some loyal employees that make all the difference,” Leigh said. Some of those loyal employees include their two children, Dylan and Katelyn, who Leigh and Kirk hope love the food business as much as they do.
Their favorite thing to eat? Both agree there’s nothing better than a good, fresh hamburger and, of course, onion rings and some fry sauce, another famous thing to come from Warrens.
What’s next? Continued hard work.
“The best part is also the hardest part, the day-to-day grind. I love it,” Kirk said.