Charleston, SC July 2017
All winter and spring when I wasn't creating an AP French syllabus or teaching my students I was researching restaurants and coffee shops for Summer 2017. I spent 6 months thinking about all the cities I'd visit. Pinterest, Google maps, long conversations with travelers, restaurant lists, booking hotels. Of all the new places I knew I'd visit, the one I truly couldn't wait to return to was Charleston, my friend Stephanie Wilson's Charleston. Thick, heavy raindrops followed by bright humid sunshiny days Charleston. Swimming pools, beaches, palmetto trees and crushed seashell parking lots Charleston. Ginger and Stephanie gorging on Southern seafood, that Charleston. I returned. Here's what we ate:
Saturday - I literally left one amazing trip to start another amazing trip. I flew from Colorado Springs (my husband and I had spent the week with his family in Manitou Springs) to Charleston and as soon as Stephanie picked me up we drove to Hyman's Seafood in downtown Charleston! I had missed those hush puppies, deviled crabs and scallops so much! I don't care if this place is a tourist trap. It's insanely good!! Afterwards we had cappuccino and a vanilla lavender latte in City Lights Coffee. I loved the vibe and I loved the coffee in this place. We walked through The City Market and I stopped at Callie's Hot Little Biscuit kiosk for a cinnamon butter biscuit. It was as delicious as it looked. We stopped in Kaminsky's for a huge slice of Italian cake and a cappuccino ice cream float. This was my first coffee float. Can you call it affogato if it's a cappuccino with ice cream? Whatever you call it, it's delicious. Kaminsky's is a pretty place to sit and if you're into adult beverage milkshakes they have those too.
All winter and spring when I wasn't creating an AP French syllabus or teaching my students I was researching restaurants and coffee shops for Summer 2017. I spent 6 months thinking about all the cities I'd visit. Pinterest, Google maps, long conversations with travelers, restaurant lists, booking hotels. Of all the new places I knew I'd visit, the one I truly couldn't wait to return to was Charleston, my friend Stephanie Wilson's Charleston. Thick, heavy raindrops followed by bright humid sunshiny days Charleston. Swimming pools, beaches, palmetto trees and crushed seashell parking lots Charleston. Ginger and Stephanie gorging on Southern seafood, that Charleston. I returned. Here's what we ate:
Saturday - I literally left one amazing trip to start another amazing trip. I flew from Colorado Springs (my husband and I had spent the week with his family in Manitou Springs) to Charleston and as soon as Stephanie picked me up we drove to Hyman's Seafood in downtown Charleston! I had missed those hush puppies, deviled crabs and scallops so much! I don't care if this place is a tourist trap. It's insanely good!! Afterwards we had cappuccino and a vanilla lavender latte in City Lights Coffee. I loved the vibe and I loved the coffee in this place. We walked through The City Market and I stopped at Callie's Hot Little Biscuit kiosk for a cinnamon butter biscuit. It was as delicious as it looked. We stopped in Kaminsky's for a huge slice of Italian cake and a cappuccino ice cream float. This was my first coffee float. Can you call it affogato if it's a cappuccino with ice cream? Whatever you call it, it's delicious. Kaminsky's is a pretty place to sit and if you're into adult beverage milkshakes they have those too.
Sunday - For a year I have followed Page's Okra Grill on Instagram sighing over the Sunday morning brunch pictures. If you get there at the right time you can have the Bloody Mary bar. I ordered a tomatoes and okra omelette with pimento cheese grits, a giant biscuit and a small Bloody Mary. It was garnished with bacon, pickled okra and celery. The only thing that makes bacon better than bacon is bacon that has soaked in a Bloody Mary. Stephanie had the English muffins and potatoes with melted pimento cheese on top. These potatoes were one of my favorite discoveries of the trip. I could faint just thinking about the flavors of every bite of this brunch. We went to Collective Coffee and I had a tasty cappuccino. We went to the Mt Pleasant Pier and walked under the Ravenel Bridge and watched people fish. We shopped at the very cute Boone Hall Market for local favorites and even snagged a few of the local peaches that survived the late freeze. It started raining but we shopped at Towne Center anyway. We looked at kitchen supplies in Coastal Cupboard at Belle Hall and we stopped in Cupcake DownSouth for the gf French toast cupcakes and the cake shake. French toast has to be one of my all time favorite cupcake flavors! We bought a few groceries at Whole Foods and Trader Joe's and then had dinner at Fiery Ron's Home Team BBQ. I was mostly excited about the cool Beastie Boys mural outside but the food inside was good too. I'd like to try the wings next time. I'd recommend the pulled pork, the Mulligatawny stew, the turnip greens and the pork rinds. Eating BBQ with vinegar will take some time for me to savor but I'll keep trying. Stay away from the hash rice. It looks and tastes like dog food.
Monday - The Day We Ate Everything! I woke up early and had a bagel with cream cheese (my first meal of the day) but Stephanie and I officially started our day of eating with a small breakfast at Mercantile and Mash. This place was so stylish and inviting. I loved the cappuccino and the gf banana nut bread. Then we drove downtown for our guided food tour of with Bulldog Tours. Our tour guide was Fran and she told us all about the history of food in Charleston. We started at Another Broken Egg and had creamy grits and fried green tomatoes with goat cheese. Then we stopped in Low Country Bistro for pimento cheese, she crab soup, jambalaya and pickled okra. We visited the Spice and Tea Exchange and tasted different spices as well as assorted dips with crackers. I fell in LOVE with the dill seasoning. We had delicious hush puppies and red rice at The Noisy Oyster and an assortment of sweets at River Street Sweets including pralines, candied pecans and strawberry fudge. When the food tour ended we shopped in L'Occitane and I bought some new perfume. We stopped in Glaze Doughnuts for one of everything and our favorite flavors were raspberry, praline, apple bacon and bacon glazed. As if that weren't enough food we then drove to Taco Boy and had amazingly delicious tacos with three salsas, green rice and Mexican corn. (Taco Boy seriously reminds me of my favorite restaurant of all time: Rum House on Magazine Street in New Orleans) And THEN if that wasn't enough food we went to dinner at McAlister's because they now have gf bread! I savored my Reuben sandwich and potato salad. So I had 6 meals this day! I would have eaten more but I fell asleep.
Tuesday - Tuesday morning we made an awesome breakfast before we left: bacon, dill eggs, doughnuts and bagels. Last summer when I visited Stephanie we took a day trip to Savannah, Georgia. This year we drove to Beaufort, SC and walked up and down charming Bay Street. We made our first stop in Scout Southern Market for an iced tea float. This summer goes down as the ice cream float summer. Affogato is so popular but I hadn't seen anything about iced tea floats. They are delicious and refreshing. Unsweet tea with an icy scoop of strawberry sorbet floating in it is yummy and it's fun to scoop sorbet with a spoon followed by a sip of unsweet tea. I think you're supposed to mix it all together but I enjoyed the texture switches. For lunch we ate at Low Country Produce. We discovered this farm to table cafe by chance. It was beautiful, relaxing, inspiring and yummy. Quilts were hanging on the walls, the color scheme is beautiful and so is the furniture. The menu is just right. My ooey gooey grilled pimento cheese was good but the crab soup and broccoli salad were astounding! We walked around and took pictures of the beautiful old homes and saw a pomegranate tree as well as Spanish moss hanging from Magnolia trees. Then we drove out to Hunting Island State Park to see the light house and maritime forest. I had never explored a palmetto forest. We walked on the beach, visited the gift shop and then stopped in Starbucks on the way out. For dinner we drove out to Folly Beach and ate at Snapper Jack's where we had cheeseburgers, crab dip and shrimp cocktail. We also stopped in Bert's Market, a gourmet grocery, souvenir shop and bait store all-in-one. We went in a few stores like this on the trip and they're so much fun! It was also fun to see vacationers living it up on the streets of this pretty beach vacation destination at dusk. We walked out on the pier and watched people playing volleyball and running around on the beach catching the last rays of sunshine before sunset.
Wednesday - The sun came out in full effect and we went to lunch in Shem Creek at RB's Seafood. We had fried shrimp, scallops, grits, red rice and peel and eat shrimp. We watched people kayaking and paddleboarding. And there were dolphins playing in the creek! Everyone watched them out the windows of the restaurant. We shopped at Towne Center in Mt Pleasant again and visited Vintage Coffee Cafe which reminded me of Tart in Memphis and smelled like an old kitchen in an old house. We drove back to the apartment and made affogato. Neither of us had had it before. Stephanie brewed some Zabar's coffee I brought as a gift and we poured it over scoops of pistachio ice cream and vanilla ice cream. It was insanely good! The texture, the taste. Decadence!! I went to the pool and read for a while and then packed most of my suitcase. Then we decided to drive to Sullivan's Island for dinner. It started to rain and that turned into a storm that turned into serious traffic on the Ravenel Bridge and everywhere else in the city! Some large tarps and cables hanging on the Don Holt Bridge had fallen on some unlucky drivers causing a crash. One person was rushed away in an ambulance believing he was having a heart attack. It was actually a panic attack caused by #tarpmageddon. After a long nervous drive in rain, lightening and flooded streets we finally made it to Poe's Tavern for nachos and cheeseburgers. We later joked that we outran one of satan's storms just to try a new restaurant. We drove around Sullivan's Island and Isle of Palms to take pictures and stop in souvenir shops. I love cheesy seaside stores that have one whole wall dedicated to cheap sea shells and live hermit crabs. We went in My Favorite Things to talk to Bubba the Parrot, a beautiful blue parrot that can say a few phrases and wave his wings at customers. We went in The Co-op at Sullivan's Island, another cool grocery/bait shop offering savory pimento cheese cake. We walked to the beach and looked at the calm after the storm. We stopped at Page's Okra Grill one more time to have dessert: banana pudding and peanut butter pie. We passed out after a 5 hour trip that should have taken 3 hours. We were exhausted!
Thursday - Unbelievably the holiday in Charleston that I had looked forward to all winter and spring came to an end and I carefully stuffed my suitcase almost to the point of breaking the zipper. I went to Stephanie's apartment gym and worked out one more time. I ate two of the last three Against the Grain bagels with cream cheese that Stephanie had bought for me in advance. For lunch it was Martha Lou's Kitchen. I have wanted to try chitterlings (or chitlins) my whole life and this place cleans and cooks them. We went to Martha Lou's Kitchen for chitlins but they were OUT!! Obviously we will have to go back the next time I'm in town. I had the pork chops instead and they were astounding as were the string beans, giblet rice, peach bread pudding, fried chicken and cornbread. I can see why this place has had so much press. It's delicious, the real deal Southern meal. We stopped in Goat Sheep Cow to make mental notes of charcuterie and cheese plates to try next time. We drove through Starbuck's for an iced coffee and then on to the airport. Stephanie was a great hostess, chauffeur and friend to take me to all these wonderful places. Charleston is many destinations in one and travelers would miss out on so much if they only visited the beaches.
During my layover in the Dallas airport I ate at a tapas place and had a small basket of tiny arepas (arepitas) and sweet plantains and they were delicious! I'll be visiting this place again the next time I'm there! My precious husband picked me up in Wichita and it was so good to be back with the hubby and our little dog!
Here's what I became aware of on this trip: 1. Stylish small groceries/bait shops/markets are damn cool. 2. Very tall layer cakes under very tall cake domes are very pretty. 3. Guided food tours are a great place to meet likeminded people. 4. There are other people besides me that insist on repeating over and over their wonder at America's diversity in food and culture. 5. There are other people besides me that repeat over and over that travel is an antidote to fear, racism and wrong thinking.
See you again as soon as possible, Charleston!
During my layover in the Dallas airport I ate at a tapas place and had a small basket of tiny arepas (arepitas) and sweet plantains and they were delicious! I'll be visiting this place again the next time I'm there! My precious husband picked me up in Wichita and it was so good to be back with the hubby and our little dog!
Here's what I became aware of on this trip: 1. Stylish small groceries/bait shops/markets are damn cool. 2. Very tall layer cakes under very tall cake domes are very pretty. 3. Guided food tours are a great place to meet likeminded people. 4. There are other people besides me that insist on repeating over and over their wonder at America's diversity in food and culture. 5. There are other people besides me that repeat over and over that travel is an antidote to fear, racism and wrong thinking.
See you again as soon as possible, Charleston!