Friday, June 1, 2012

Mrs. Wilkes Dining Room


Thursday, May 31 – My friend Greg said that we absolutely MUST have lunch at Mrs. Wilkes Dining Room, a legendary restaurant in Savannah.   They are only open from 11am-2pm for lunch, and all guidebooks advise visitors to get in line EARLY in order to get a seat.  Well, we didn’t get into town until after 1pm, and thought we would just walk over and check it out, assuming that we probably wouldn’t get in.  We arrived exactly at 2pm, opened the door and asked “is it too late?”  The answer was no – just wait for 5 minutes and they were setting up one more table! 

There were seven other people waiting, and we looked around to see if there was a menu to take a peek at.  No luck.  A couple of minutes later, they called all nine of us over to a big family-style table – the picture says it all.  We just started passing dishes and filled up our plates with traditional southern cuisine.  The fried chicken was amazing, and so was the BBQ.  There were TWENTY-ONE side dishes passed around.  Sweet tea was pre-set at every seat, so if you wanted unsweetened, they’d swap it out.  We sat next to a German couple from Dusseldorf who are doing a 4-week road trip throughout the South, and Brian and his wife from Austin, who were in town on business.  The meal was finished off with the option of blueberry cobbler or banana pudding.  Then, they reminded everyone that as is Mrs. Wilkes tradition, all guests please bring your own plates to the kitchen to clean up.

Wow – what an amazing start to our Savannah visit!  Thanks for the suggestion, Greg!

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