A First Look at 3TEN

By: Erin Oliver

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Purple sweet potato cocktails and rice-flour fried chicken. Heated bar countertops and polaroids of your table to take home. This is just a glimpse into the lively menu and warming novelties that make up iconic duo chef Jonathan Lundy and TJ Cox’s most recent endeavor, 3TEN—the Pacific Rim inspired restaurant broadening Lexington, Kentucky’s palate.

The owners first met in 2007 in Lexington, where Cox ultimately became a bartender and manager at chef Lundy’s former restaurant, Jonathan at Gratz Park. “I had been working in restaurants for about seven years, and to be offered a job at Jonathan’s was a pinnacle of my career,” Cox says. “It was the kind of job you dreamt about in the industry here in Lexington. I was in school at the time and could really only work on weekends, which they allowed me to do.”

After graduation, Jonathan entrusted Cox to operate Jonathan at Gratz Park while he applied his skills to Latin cuisine. When the restaurant closed in 2014, the two solidified their partnership in taking on the venture of bringing hip, Latin cuisine to Lexington, and opened the wildly successful Corto Lima in 2017.

While Corto has thrived on West Short Street for nearly a decade, their latest tiki-chic joint, 3TEN, was a long time coming. “Over the years, Jonathan and I have always found ourselves talking tiki,” Cox says. “During the COVID-19 shutdown, we kept Corto Lima open for pickup service but thought it might be nice to offer some variety. One of our pop-up takeout themes was tiki. We did a Pu Pu platter with mai tais and other tropical concoctions. It was so well received that we thought maybe this could work as a concept in Lexington.”

The team began to scout the perfect location and build recipes for more Pan-Asian popups. Chef Lundy even transformed his home into a tiki haven (some of his personal decorations now adorn the walls of 3TEN). The group scored 310 W Short Street in 2024, and have since refreshed the downtown dining scene.

The vast menu offers something special for every kind of eater. Think: pillowy bao buns filled with coconut shrimp and bright tofu lettuce wraps to hearty tiki chicken masala and sticky ribs with mac and cheese. You can always pick a dish from each category of the menu—start with the black garlic salt edamame, end with the crispy duck fried rice—for a complete experience.

To say 3TEN is changing the way Lexington takes on a cocktail is an understatement. Sure, you can enjoy a classic mai tai or dirty martini and be totally satisfied, but take advantage of the wildly creative elixirs. Take the Plum Potatoes cocktail, which makes magic with a lemongrass shochu, ume liqueur, and purple potato simple syrup—not to mention it’s downright adorable. Or, really set your watch to island time with their seasonal Hude and the Blowfish, a rum, orgeat, and orange amaro delight, which of course arrives in a blowfish mug with a crazy straw.

Zero-proof drinkers are not left out of the fun. Give the bartender two adjectives you like in a drink—smoky, tart, refreshing, herbal—and they’ll deliver a custom mocktail that is just as playful as the real deal.

It’s clear the closeness of Lundy and Cox’s partnership doesn’t end with the owners—or even 3TEN. Lead bartender Jake Parry acknowledged drinks created by other bartenders on staff that embody the menu. The menu’s design was even done in part by longtime 3TEN bartender Raph Ware. Manager Terri King even offers a curated list of nearby local restaurants and bars for guests that encourages supporting downtown Lexington past their visit to 3TEN.

When asked what it’s like to balance two thriving restaurants, just down the street from each other, the co-owner and certified sommelier’s response was humble. “We have tremendous teams at both restaurants that are dedicated to bringing the best products and experiences to our guests,” says Cox. “The culture that has been developed by our staff at Corto Lima over the years provided us with the framework to build at 3TEN.”

He continues, “Lexington has been so kind to us and we are eternally grateful for the support of the community. All those smiling faces we see every day, and guests that have literally stood in the rain waiting to get in, have given us confidence to keep going and keep growing. I could never thank our guests enough.”

Make your reservations at 3TEN here. And catch happy hour—the first and last hour of opening—for discounted cocktails and half off select small plates.