Scarborough might be getting a dose of Southern hospitality as Cracker Barrel Old Country Store and Restaurant looks to make a home on Haigis Parkway.

New England Expeditions, developer of The Gateway at Scarborough shopping center where Cabela’s is being built, will have a respresentative at the town’s planning board on Monday to propose changes for two buildings in the development. One would be expanded from its original dimensions to accommodate the restaurant and adjoining general store. A tenant for the other building, which would also be expaned by 800 feet, has not yet been named.

The proposed expansion of the building, from 6,000 square feet to 10,100 square feet, is largely due to the general store that is part of all Cracker Barrel restaurants, according to a letter to Town Planner Dan Bacon from Stephen Harding, of Oest Associates, an engineering and arcitechture firm in South Portland working with New England Expeditions.

Cracker Barrel is based on Lebanon, Tenn., and has 560 stores in 41 different states. The Scarborough location would be its first in Maine. The closest Cracker Barrel is in Londonderry, N.H.

“We’re known for down-home cookin’,” Cracker Barrel spokeswoman Julie Davis said Monday.

Davis said the signature dish of the restaurant, which serves all-day breakfast, lunch and dinner, is chicken and dumplings. Other specialties include a sausage and biscuit dinner and bowls of pinto beans and turnip greens served with country ham and corn muffins.

Harding said he does not expect the Cracker Barrel store to generate more traffic to the development, because the clientele consists of restaurant patrons waiting to be seated.

Merchandise from the store includes an Americana collection featuring a birdhouse, a key box and a checkerboard, all decorated in red, white and blue; cast iron cookware; dolled-up teddy bears; candy; candles; soap products and rocking chairs.

The design of the building’s exterior, which is all brown with a flat roof and a chimney, could cause some issues at the planning board, Bacon said. According to Bacon, the board had approved specific designs for each building and new ones proposed will have to “fit into the original designs and themes.” According to Bacon, some details, including the color, are different from what the board had approved.

Davis said the company is still in the early stages of working with Scarborough and a lot depends on the reaction from the planning board.

“We’re just looking around,” Davis said. “It is so early in the process, frankly, anything could happen.”

With the majority of the Cracker Barrel locations situated in the southern United States, the restaurant and store chain could be a brand new concept for Scarborough residents.

At the Tim Hortons shop in Scarborough Monday, Jeremy Johnson said he’d never heard of the restaurant, but wouldn’t be opposed to it coming in beside Cabela’s.

“I would try it,” said Johnson, a Scarborough resident.

Lloyd and Judy Egers, of Gorham, said they had eaten at a Cracker Barrel in Brooksville, Fla. Though the couple will happily trek out to Dunstan to visit Len Libby’s, they’re not so sure they would make a special trip for Cracker Barrel’s comfort food, but might make a stop in passing.

“The prices are pretty good,” Lloyd Egers recalled. “And you get big servings.”

Cabela’s, the giant retailer of hunting, fishing, camping and related outdoor merchandise, is expected to open its first Maine store next spring in a 130,000-square-foot building. Based in Nebraska, the company has said it expects to attract more than 3 million visitors a year to Scarborough.

Cracker Barrel eyes Scarborough Cracker Barrel eyes Scarborough