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A Chattanooga Food Blog

Public House Grits Recipe: Stone Ground, Never Instant

If you read the food section of the Times Free Press this week and are thinking it's OK to use instant grits, here is some sage advice from my mentor and the man Garden & Gun magazine calls the Godfather of Southern Cuisine: "Stone-ground grits from old fashioned mills that use locally grown, organic corn has significant texture and vivid corn flavor. It bears no relation to the "quick" grits served in greasy spoons throughout the country. If your local grocer doesn't carry stone ground grits, check your local health food store." - Frank Stitt's Southern Table, p.22, Artisan, 2004 If you ha...

Public House of Chattanooga is Proud To Serve Local Ingredients from Area Farms

A truly local restaurant is about more than where it sources its products—it's also about its involvement in and creation of community, and local entrepreneurship. Yet that's not to say that the ingredients don't matter. After all, local ingredients themselves create stronger communities. Like Catie Cummings Morris wrote for the Main Street Farmers Market blog, "Farming methods have a heavy impact on the quality of the air we breathe, and in turn the health of our community." Foods grown locally, sustainably, and as organically as possible make for better local environments and healthier prod...

What Does Local Really Mean? Local is Public House, and Public House is Chattanooga

The local food movement has definitely gone main stream, with more restaurants, markets, and groceries than you can count referring to their "fresh and local" fare. You can trace the local food movement's start back to the West Coast in the 1970s, but in reality it's always been around if you know where to look. Local food and emphasizing local business used to be how things were. In America, our parents and grandparents shopped at the local market, bought food from local farmers, and even grew some of their own fruits, vegetables, herbs, and more. The businesses in town were run by your neig...

Keepin' It Local Thursdays Special at The Social

With so many local farmers, butchers, and brewers on our regular menu, it was clear what our new Thursday special at The Social should be. We wanted to showcase some of these great area makers and give our customers an unbeatable special. What better way to celebrate what makes the Chattanooga community rock? We call it Keepin’ It Local Thursdays, and starting at 5PM there are $2 "Big Boy" Barton Creek Farm sliders, $3 Chattanooga Whiskey pickle backs until 10PM, $10 pitchers of Moccasin Bend Brewing Company and Chattanooga Brewing Company beers, and live acoustic music by local musicians 8-...

Public House: Southern Comfort Food in Downtown Chattanooga

Public House is perhaps best known as a Southern restaurant, with a menu full of pimento cheese and fried chicken. But what exactly does “Southern cooking” mean in the New South? First and foremost, Southern cooking is comforting. It is also rooted in a sense of place. It is made from familiar ingredients that give anyone who eat them a deep connection to the land. It is about memory and history. It is about family and community. Nora Ephron wrote “What I love about cooking is that after a hard day, there is something comforting about the fact that if you melt butter and add flour and then ho...

The Third Annual Harvested Here Restaurant Week

The third annual Harvest Here Restaurant week starts tomorrow from July 12-19th, 2013 and we couldn't be more excited. As Chattanooga's local restaurant community has grown as rich as the local produce, and we're thrilled about the chance to celebrate both every year. It's wonderful to come together and share what we do best in our individual kitchens with many of the same ingredients grown in the 100 mile radius around Chattanooga. Public House sources as many ingredients as possible from these regional farms year round, and we change our menu seasonally to reflect what's really growing in T...

At Public House, Downtown Dining Is Rooted in Chattanooga History

Public House simply wouldn’t be what it is without an amazing location. After all, the space we occupy has as much history as the food we serve. Warehouse Row was built when Chattanooga was a booming railway hub, the rail lines converging beneath where many of Public House’s neighbors now stand—TVA, EPB, the Public Library. Even before Public House was ever dreamed up, this was a place defined by bringing people together. Though Chattanooga’s downtown is very different than it was when Warehouse Row was first built, it’s still somewhere that people can connect. With EPB just down the street p...

It Doesn't Get More Southern Than Pimento Cheese

You can tell a lot about a person from how they make pimento cheese. No two Southern cooks make it the same, and everyone’s grandmother has her own special recipe. Some add extra mayonnaise, or are particular about the brand—the Hellman’s vs Duke’s debate has raged for decades. Others add in extra ingredients like jalapenos or pickles to give pep to the simpler pimentos, or use fancier cheeses than the traditional cheddar. The ratios vary, as does the mixing process. Some like their pimento cheese chunky, some prefer it creamy smooth and consistent. There are as many ways to make pimento chee...

Social Recipes: Is She Weird

It's no secret that we love The Pixies-- many of the specialty cocktails on our menu are named for their songs. One of our favorites is the 1990 classic "Is She Weird," a great little track from the Bossanova album. It also makes a great little drink, with vodka, Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur, Crispin cider, sour, lime juice, and a cherry garnish. It's little sweet, a little sour, and definitely weird. Next time you get the craving and you can't get to The Social, use this handy recipe and video tutorial to make your own at home, preferably with your Bossanova record spinning.

Public Houses: A Tradition of Food, Drink, and Fun

Like Southern cooking, the public house as a restaurant format has had a long and glorious tradition. Also like many aspects of Southern cooking, the public house comes from old England. Public Houses were establishments that served food and alcoholic beverages, but were considered more upstanding than the alehouses and ginshops that were the divebars of the era. They were suitable for casual and family dining, but you didn't have to be nobility to enjoy service. They were often centers of social life in the community. You might know the typical Public House better by its shortened name-- the...

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