Steven Mullaney and Joe Clarke dug in to cut the deficit on the second day at Canterbury, amassing a third-wicket stand worth 131 as the visitors responded to Kent’s 446 all out, before the hosts regained control with a spate of wickets in the evening session.
Mullaney - batting at three for the first time this season - was called into action after three balls of Nottinghamshire’s reply, but looked fluent as he countered the initial charge before steadily building with Clarke.
Clarke himself, who is Notts’ top scorer this campaign, moved within two runs of his best return in a County Championship season for the Green and Golds - 760.
But when he drove before he drove Aaron Nijjar to cover to depart for 62 in the final over before tea, and Mullaney was caught at gulley after the break for a 141-ball 86 with Notts on 169, a succession of wickets left Notts behind the eight ball.
The Green and Golds had earlier taken Kent’s final six wickets for 59 runs, with Dane Paterson, Lyndon James, and Brett Hutton each claiming a pair of scalps.
The last four of those came in 18 deliveries as Division One’s top wicket taker Hutton prised out loan debutant Nijjar and Yuzvandra Chahal after Lyndon James bounced out former Nottinghamshire all-rounder Joey Evison and induced a spliced flay to mid-on from Nathan Gilchrist.
That followed a brief spell of quiet, in which Evison and Nijjar steadied the Kent ship in an effort to reach 500 - a total which looked in doubt when Dane Paterson had Harry Finch caught behind for 47, and Jack Leaning caught at mid-wicket for 63, early in the session.
Those scalps moved the South African to 46 in the County Championship season, four short of fifty for the third successive year as Nottinghamshire’s overseas professional.
Notts appeared to have wrestled back momentum after the early losses of Ben Slater and Haseeb Hameed either side of lunch, with Mullaney and Clarke building together.
But the latter’s dismissal was the first of six wickets for the addition of 46 runs, with only Matthew Montgomery, Calvin Harrison and Hutton - as yet unbeaten - able to offer double figure scores as Kent finished the day 227 ahead with two Nottinghamshire wickets remaining.