Restaurant business runs in the Kerrs' blood

The restaurant, simply known as Nanna Kerr's Kitchen, serves up the kind of meals Miranda and her brother, Matty, enjoyed as children.

"Matty will do well," the family matriarch, Anne Kerr, said of her restaurateur grandson.

"The business is in our blood, we opened up a business in Gunnedah, Stetson's Steakhouse, and no other business has come near it since."

Anne was raised by her grandparents on Nerang Street at East Maitland.

From age eight she worked in the family business, Harry's Fruit and Vegetables on Lawes Street.

 "I left East Maitland to go to Gunnedah with [husband] Peter," she said. 

So it was a homecoming of sorts when she stepped into the restaurant at Rothbury.

In more ways than one, since the restaurant borrows a few styling cues from the Gunnedah grandmother’s home which was destroyed in 2011.

“We lost that family space when it was struck by lightning,” Matty said.

“I wanted to recreate a space where our family could come together, and strangers too. Nanna always said that strangers were people that we just hadn’t met yet.”

The official opening, in support of Kids Helpline, attracted about 90 people, many of them family.

While Miranda was unable to attend the event raised more than $600 for a cause close to her heart.