This is simplicity itself, a 9″-long, 2″-tall, 2″-deep two-hander topped by a crisp, puffed-out seal of skin, with striations of meat and fat, meat and fat, meat and fat. You can slice half of it up easily, and eat the rest down to the bones like the caveperson you once were.
Nodding to history while carving out a space of its own, this is a shape-shifting sandwich. It doesn’t so much occupy your mouth as it just pops in there and makes itself at home. A little less gravitas, a lot more fun.
It’s not the beer you’d drink watching the landscapers cut your lawn. It is exactly the kind of ice-cold beer you’d want after cutting the lawn yourself.
Poppy & Peep is not a purveyor of fine Belgian chocolates, and for Nashville, that’s a good thing.
There are few foods more personal in the South than banana pudding. Every restaurant in Nashville seems to offer it, many that do call it “The Best,” and they are all just … wrong.
(See, I told you it was personal.)
Is it stuffed cabbage? On a deconstructed level, perhaps, but no, not really. No rice, for example, and it’s a soup, there’s no getting around that. But, whoa. I may no longer care.
On the south side of the 440, Degthai has become Nashville’s Thai trendsetter in almost no time at all. One visit, and it will be tough to go back to your neighborhood place.
There’s one fried food that resonates with me more than any other: okra. At a food hall in Mississippi, the sheer glory of the fried okra speaks for itself.