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Welcome to eatatdish.com site for Charlotte's Newest Restaurant
Dish It Out
Eatery offers warm, neighborhood feel
and good food, too
BY TRICIA CHILDRESS
Dish is a disarmingly unpretentious kind of joint you immediately
warm to as though it were your mama's or grandma's kitchen.
The menu is one you can afford with food you grew up on. Best
of all, if you are lucky enough to live in this neighborhood,
Dish
is a place you can walk to, and walk into knowing you will see
people you know.
This
modest spot, which opened last July, is the restaurant debut
of Tremont Music Hall owner Penny Craver and her Plaza Midwood
neighbors and colleagues Lawrence Stubbs, who is general manager
of Dish, and Marguerite McGee (Maggie McGee) Stubbs, the restaurant's
chief financial officer.
"We
fought for this location," says Craver. "We looked at other
locations, but we wanted this spot on Thomas Avenue." All
of the owners live in Plaza Midwood, an area that has become
a unique urban setting in Charlotte and a neighborhood that
has blossomed under individual entrepreneurship rather than
the formula sameness of developers.
The
building, which housed Ho Toy under several owners, Cafe DaDa,
and Phat Burrito, has been transformed. Now it feels bigger
and brighter. The dining area, with pale yellow walls, has
more windows. The walls boast a collection of retro paint-by-number
art, plates, hammered copper repousse pictures, fiber filled
fabric art, and a mix of work from local artists. The smoking
area in the back room is more subdued, but enlivened with
colorful artwork. (Note, though that smoke slips out through
the large hole in the connecting wall into the main dining
room.) Says Craver, "The decorating was done by friends Hope
Nicholls and Scott Weaver of Boris & Natasha and Melody
Hoffman and Brigit Wyant from Tremont. We'd had the walls
painted and they had been collecting. At 6 or 7 o'clock the
night before we opened, they strolled in with the stuff."
On
paper, Dish's familiar menu mimics a timeless Southern kitchen
with tributes to Low Country, Cajun, and Tex-Mex cuisines.
But unlike any bone-dry homage, this kitchen's take is a vast
improvement on the original with food that is happily marked
by a lively use of vegetables, agreeable side dishes, and
a kitchen team with a penchant for smooth finishes. Behind
the food is kitchen manager Lennox Gavin from Atlanta and
Jamie Lynch. Brigit Wyant helms the desserts. Prices feel
Southern too: honest and fair. Entrees run $6.95 for Chicken
and Dumplings to $10.95 for a Grilled Rib-eye with roasted
garlic mashed potatoes.
The
Southern Delight Appetizer, enough for two to share, is a
blend of new and old. Moroccan couscous spiked with black-eyed
peas and herbs is surrounded by slices of fried green tomatoes,
over-battered, but served with a crisp horseradish dill sauce
in a plastic container, a deviled egg foursome with a healthy
dose of paprika, and a hot biscuit. The latter is not made
in the kitchen, but has almost the taste of the ones Southern
grandmothers doled out to keep the children quiet at Sunday
supper.
Entrees
are impressive: a perfection of plump shrimp perched atop
creamy stone ground grits, centered with wilted spinach. Slices
of chicken and portobello fill a spinach herb tortilla for
a delightful quesadilla accompanied by a fresh tomato salsa.
A special of steamed mussels poised in a shallow pool of a
white wine broth cost less than 10 bucks, but easily had over
40 mussels. How we longed for crusty bread to soak up the
broth. Sides of collards embellished with smoky, dense and
hearty black beans, and just plain good macaroni and cheese
framed these entrees.
A
concerted effort has been made by the folks at Dish to cater
to vegetarians with such choices as a portobello and button
mushroom burger, the vegetable pot pie, beans and greens,
and black bean burrito entrees, the grilled polenta with wild
mushrooms, spinach, and roasted garlic cream sauce appetizer,
and a veggie plate for kids. The menu, which included sandwiches
such as a sloppy roast beef Po boy, chicken salad, muffaletta
and burgers, as well as soup and salads, is offered all day.
Those
who cannot say goodnight without a sweet will want the strawberry
shortcake, which is wonderfully swathed in fresh whipped cream.
The chocolate pecan pie, on the other hand, was too sweet
in my book.
Service
at Dish is personal but not polished and the feeling of neighborhood
among the customers is palpable. They are a cross section
from Plaza Midwood: long time residents, young families, singles,
professionals. One amusing take was watching a table of white
haired older women discussing the menu with a multi- tattooed,
crimson haired server. We're not in Kansas anymore.
It's
hard to go wrong at Dish. With an easygoing, yet retro, atmosphere
and simple, but satisfying Southern fare, Dish is the perfect
neighborhood joint.
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HELEN
SCHWAB