I had bigger plans for this trip to Athens than would see the light of day. I was going to spend all darn afternoon in town, and take a really nice springtime walk at the Botanical Gardens, and visit four places for the blog, and have a couple of beers at Trappeze. Then I had that first meal, recounted in the previous chapter, and, my stomach laden with more grease than I can remember having anywhere, ever, I began scaling back plans massively. There wasn’t going to be any beer, for starters. The thought of drinking anything other than water made my stomach hurt more. I made the decision to be a little more explicit about the effect it had on my system in this separate chapter, because it wasn’t that first restaurant’s fault that I put more food in my gut sixty minutes later. Continue reading “Pulaski Heights BBQ, Athens GA”
Cabin Creek BBQ, Nicholson GA
My father, when he was still with us, was never a big fan of driving from Smyrna to Athens, but when he did come to see me when I lived there, he’d take the long way. This was when 316 only went as far as Dacula, and he hated the sprawl on the old Atlanta Highway. Everything between the mall and the dorms rubbed him the wrong way. So he sat down with a map after coming to see me once, and went home along Prince Avenue, taking GA-15 through Jefferson to the interstate. That way is ten miles longer, but it was worth it to him. Continue reading “Cabin Creek BBQ, Nicholson GA”
Nello’s Pasta Sauce
A couple of months ago, we got an email from a small pasta sauce company based in Raleigh. They suggested that we think about giving their sauce a try sometime, and I said that I’d keep an eye out for it. It took a few weeks before the road took me by a Whole Foods that carried it, but I am glad that it did. I really liked this a lot, and think that we will pick up some more sometime. Continue reading “Nello’s Pasta Sauce”
Special Announcement: Come Meet Us at the Dogwood Festival!
Hey, Atlanta! We’re doing something on Saturday that we’ve never done before. We’re making a personal appearance at the Dogwood Festival!
We’ll be there for a couple of hours with Audra Lowe and some of the team from the syndicated Better Show. They’re spending the spring and summer on a nationwide tour called “License to Spill” and are driving around in a news van turned food truck, tasting the best, and messiest, food in the land.
To this end, Jeff Martin from Atlanta’s Smallcakes Cupcakery will be there with literally thousands of his famous Georgia Peach Cobbler cupcakes. Because the only thing better than talking about messy food is eating it.
This is the 77th Annual Dogwood Festival, and it’s held as usual at Piedmont Park. Parking may be at a premium or kind of expensive, and the organizers are suggesting that visitors try taking MARTA to the Midtown station. Go visit their website to learn more about all the outdoor fine arts fun that’s going on, and look for us at the License to Spill van from 1 to 3 on Saturday the 20th!
If you can’t make it out, don’t worry. We’ll have a recap post up next week, but we’d love to meet some of our readers. Come say hello, and maybe get a cupcake!
Sweet Tomatoes, Kennesaw GA (take two)
This is Marie, doing a follow-up article about Sweet Tomatoes. If you recall Grant’s article from a while back praising their tomato soup, he alluded to how sad it was that a restaurant with Tomato in the name, who in fact have a tomato soup recipe that is better than most of their other soups, only has it once or twice a year – March is the month it appears regularly, but we’ve noticed that there is also an occasional week when it will show up outside that schedule. Continue reading “Sweet Tomatoes, Kennesaw GA (take two)”
Pier 213 Seafood, Marietta GA
From the outside, Pier 213 looks exactly like the same suburban fried fish joints that we all learned long ago to drive right past. That’s exactly what I did last month when I first saw the place, and then I got home and realized that I was wrong to judge it. Continue reading “Pier 213 Seafood, Marietta GA”
Alon’s Bakery, Dunwoody GA (take two)
(Every once in a while, Marie goes to a restaurant that I’d visited without her, and about which I’d written a chapter, and feels that I could have captured it a little better. Rather than revising our previous story about Alon’s, here’s a revisit.)
Dear Grant,
I had the chance to go to Alon’s and didn’t think you said all there was to say about the place. Maybe you could add just a little more, at least in the way of photos? Even if not, at least you’ll know what kind of photos my phone is capable of, so I will be able to use it instead of borrowing the camera. Continue reading “Alon’s Bakery, Dunwoody GA (take two)”
Marie, Let's Eat! 