The Grub Scout
| For the Knoxville News Sentinel
Bruce Bogartz opening fine dining restaurant in Bearden
Longtime chef Bruce Bogartz discusses his new restaurant, Bogartz, at 4705 Old Kingston Pike in Bearden on Thursday, August 8, 2024.
Many people think of year’s end as a time for looking forward. While that’s certainly an optimistic perspective, I usually like to look back — at all the great (and, in some cases, not so great) restaurants I got to try (and, in some cases, retry). As I have done in years past, I’m wrapping up 2024 by recapping some of my favorite such outings. Following, in chronological order, are the 10 eateries that impressed me most out of the nearly 70 restaurants, food trucks and food-hall vendors I visited and reviewed in the past 12 months.
Lilou
While my retrospectives typically feature an eclectic mix of eateries (and that’s still true to some extent), 2024 seemed to be the year for upscale dining in the Grub House. That trend started in January with dinner at Lilou, the restaurant occupying the ground floor of Hotel Cleo on Gay Street. The dining area is an aesthetic manifestation of Lilou’s French-rooted cuisine, and the food itself was a success from course to course. From the frog-leg appetizer to our prime rib and monkfish entrees to our crème brûlée dessert, we celebrated our culinary tour de France, which included some of the best service we received from any staff all year long. The Grub Spouse and I enjoyed ourselves so much that we wound up making two more visits to Lilou throughout the year.
Celestina Mexican Crafted
This new (at the time) restaurant on Ebenezer Road impressed with its refined take on Latin cuisine. The interior vibes of Celestina Mexican Crafted are notably contemporary, and the menu offers a fresh take on standard Mexican-restaurant fare. For example, I didn’t recall having seen items like tuna tostadas or pork with black chili on any of my many previous go-arounds with local Mexican-food eateries. However, The Spouse and I did keep things on the familiar side, dining on arroz con pollo and the California Burrito, respectively. And I got to enjoy a margarita on National Margarita Day. Speaking of the strong stuff, Celestina has a tempting list of craft margaritas and other cocktails.
CM Chicken
Historically speaking, fried chicken has been a lower-tier food item in my rotation. However, I became enamored of Raising Cane’s chicken fingers this past year, and the locally owned CM Chicken in Farragut also contributed to enhancing my appreciation of deep-fried poultry. Interestingly, the fare is influenced by Korean cuisine. And unlike fast-food eateries, CM Chicken offers full sit-down service. I was there for a solo lunch, and I opted for their chicken fingers (Gizzards, calamari, popcorn shrimp and other items are available as well.). I had them prepare mine in their house curry sauce – they also have garlic soy and red-hot pepper – and I ordered them Snow style, which means they were topped with sliced white onions. Man, were those some tasty Korean curry chicken fingers!
Saint Lucille’s Kitchen
Five months would pass before I encountered another restaurant strong enough to make my list of 10 favorites for 2024. That honor went to Saint Lucille’s Kitchen at Emory Place (having formerly operated out of Last Days of Autumn Brewing). I found the menu to be limited, but the Cajun/Creole tastes coming out of the kitchen made that fact irrelevant. The Spouse and I started with hot crawfish dip — made with crawfish tails, cream cheese and more — and moved on to two of the three entrees available at the time: red beans and rice, featuring andouille sausage and tasso gravy; and the hot beef po’ boy, made with spicy beef patties on toasted Gambino’s French bread. I also enjoyed a glass of suds courtesy of Crafty Bastard Brewery, which is Saint Lucille’s partner and next-door neighbor.
The Kennedy
Just one week later, I got back into the finer-dining groove with an evening meal at The Kennedy on Gay Street. While the restaurant does exude elegance, I classified it at the time as “accessibly upscale.” In other words, the shorts I wore into the dining room fit in just fine. The menu appropriately ranges from pub grub to haute cuisine, which was reflected in our orders of mahi-mahi with Sweet Heat Brussels Sprouts for The Spouse and the double sausage pizza for yours truly. However, my humble pie was jazzed up a bit with a pink vodka sauce. We had other courses as well, including a bacon-wrapped dates starter and separate desserts — the chocolate truffle cake and the Salty Malty ice cream pie. This was another instance where the service was exceedingly good.
Chismoso
I would have thought it unlikely that two nontraditional Latin-cuisine restaurants would make my year-end honors, yet Chismoso succeeded in becoming the second. At the time, the eatery was new to the Gay Street scene (the 100 block), and we appreciated it for its delightfully funky décor (there are no gratuitous nods to the restaurant’s south-of-the-border roots) and similarly unique menu, which enticed us with items like watermelon aguachile (ceviche), grilled al pastor (a pork shoulder cut) and the chicken enchilada stack. How’d you like to try shredded chicken, jack cheese, cilantro, avocado, jalapeños, queso fresco and many more ingredients, all layered between and atop a stack of corn tortillas? Chismoso’s cocktail game is strong too; I enjoyed sipping on a Chisme Marg. And it wasn’t even National Margarita Day!
Bistro by the Tracks
The last quarter of the year was marked with visits to a number of legacy brands that are still going strong won the East Tennessee fine-dining landscape. The first was to the new location of Bistro by the Tracks, which is now operating out of the former Orangery site in Bearden. They’ve shrunk the footprint a good bit and given the place a complete aesthetic overhaul, but I was pleased with the product — not just the updated atmosphere but the food experience as well. This trip marked the first time I had made a third official visit to the same restaurant brand (although each previous dinner was in a different location). Not to our surprise, this meal satisfied all around with items like hand-rolled tortellini, Heritage Farms pork tenderloin, the American Wagyu butcher’s cut, fried okra and the Smokey pecan chocolate bar — an indulgent and decadent trip to chocolate heaven.
Spice Hut
I interrupt my fine-dining travelogue with a brief pit stop at the Bimbo’s Fireworks location just off Interstate 75 in Lenoir City. That’s where I found Spice Hut, a new Indian-food eatery sharing square footage inside that convenience store. But don’t let the exterior trappings fool you. I love Indian food, and if you do too, I think you’ll enjoy what Spice Hut has cooking on the inside. I got to splurge on a wide variety of flavors at the lunch buffet on the day I visited, and I also placed a to-go order from the main menu — some samosas as well as a lamb curry entrée with rice and naan to enjoy at home over the next couple of meals. It’s a bit of a drive for me to get there, but I can tell you that I have not paid my last visit to Spice Hut.
Foothills Milling Company
I got back to posh dining with the second restaurant brand to receive a third official visit — in this case, because I had not dined there since new ownership took over (and brought in a new chef) some five years ago. I was pleased to see a few of Foothills Milling Company’s classic dishes still on hand, but they had greatly expanded their menu, offering more choices than ever (although, interestingly, I didn’t see any chicken dishes whatsoever). I got the blackened redfish, The Spouse ordered the beef stroganoff, and we bookended our meal with truffle Gruyere fondue as well as blackberry cobbler a la mode and a Prayer Bar for me. From food to atmosphere to service, Foothills Milling showed me that it had maintained the standards it set more than 20 years ago.
Bogartz in Bearden
Rounding out 2024 is the new restaurant venture from a long-familiar name on the Knoxville restaurant scene — chef Bruce Bogartz. The Spouse and I stopped in at Bogartz in Bearden for dinner just a couple of weeks ago and were pleased with all aspects of this latest concept. I liked what Bogartz’s team had done with the space itself, which had previously been home to Thistle & Brier (among other previous restaurants), and we were the beneficiaries of wonderfully conscientious service that night. Of course, the food was the star of the show, treating our taste buds kindly with the likes of goat cheese beignets, Bunny Foo-Foo (chicken-fried rabbit), mountain trout and two desserts — chocolate mousse and derby pie with ice cream.
That’s it for 2024. Here’s to a happy and healthy new year and to happy dining for all. I can’t wait to taste what 2025 has in store.