These 3 Black-owned Savannah restaurants top my list
Ask most anyone in Savannah’s food service industry and they’ll readily tell you, Black chefs, cooks, and back-of-house workers are the backbone of the community.
If there were suddenly a mass exodus of African-Americans from the kitchens and back-of-house of Savannah’s many restaurants, cafés, and take-out emporiums, the industry might not fold, but it would certainly be crippled.
This has been true since the first enslaved Africans were put to work in the kitchens of Savannah’s early public and coffee houses, cook shops, and inns almost three centuries ago.
But what you may not know is that, beginning as early as 1810, these skilled cooks often owned the business in which they plied their skills.
That was the year, according to historian Dr. David Shields, when a free black woman named Leah Simpson opened The White House, a cook shop on Bay Street near Evans Print Shop and newspaper office. Her specialty was Caribbean Green Turtle Soup, but she was also an accomplished pastry maker.
A year later she moved down the street next to Gunn’s Tavern, and renamed her shop At the Sign of the Turtle, presumably as a nod to her specialty.
Simpson was not only influential as a free-Black entrepreneur, however. During her heyday in the 1810s and ’20s, her culinary influence spread across Savannah through a number of enslaved persons who were apprenticed to her for training as bakers and cooks.
Not all these early Black entrepreneurs were women. A notable exception was Charles Middleton, a free-Black cook whose famed oyster house, Oyster Hall, thrived at Drayton Street and Bay Lane in the 1820s.
Oyster houses were popular all up and down the east coast, and while those bivalves — fried, stewed, pickled, and raw in-shell — were obviously the mainstay, according to Shields, the fare included not only oysters but game, vegetables and roasted meat and poultry.
Two centuries later, the tradition continues. Not only do many of Savannah’s iconic restaurants and cafés rely on African-American cooks and back-of-house workers, many of those businesses are owned by them.
Some of these restaurants have sadly vanished. Although Chef Nita Dixon is still cooking professionally, I still mourn the loss of her tiny café, Nita’s Place, which all too briefly shone on Abercorn Street downtown.
The three places that follow are ones that I have known and loved — and look forward to visiting again. Significantly, all have a strong, vibrant African-American woman at their helm. But they’re by no means the only African-American owned restaurants in town.
There are too many such fine places for me to have visited even half of them, so if your favorite isn’t here, please don’t take affront: it’s due to the limited capacity of my wallet and stomach and not because I mean any slight.
The thing is, in this time of pandemic, all restaurants, regardless of the ethnicity of the owners, are struggling, so please support your own favorites as much as you can.
They need you. But we need them more.
Geneva’s Famous Chicken and Cornbread Co.: 1909 E. Victory Drive, Suite 102, eatgenevas.com, 912- 235-2978; Geneva Wade, executive chef and owner.
Chef Geneva Wade has been beguiling Savannahians with her magic touch since she first opened on Habersham Street in 1983. That was where I first met this lovely woman and sampled her cooking. Over the ensuing years, the business has moved several times, landing in its present location (in Victory Square directly across from Target and Home Depot) two years ago.
Somehow, over the course of those moves I blush to say I lost touch with this dynamic chef and her wonderful food. Until — oh happy day — I was working on this story and Kenneth Brown of The Sisters of the New South reminded me.
I’m not going to say it’s the very best fried chicken I’ve ever had, but I’ve never, ever, had any that was better. The first bite brought happy tears to my eyes.
But don’t get so caught up in the fried bird that you miss out on her Georgia-style chicken gumbo (a perfect antidote to winter’s chill), savory vegetables (the baked squash in particular) and feather-light cornbread.
The small dining area is open and has been rearranged for social distancing, but safe curbside pickup is also available.
The Grey Restaurant: 109 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., thegreyrestaurant.com, 912-662-5999. Mashama Bailey, executive chef and partner, Johno Morisano, managing partner.
Named for its location, the meticulously refurbished 1938 Art Deco Greyhound bus terminal on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, The Grey has in just a few years become one of Savannah’s hottest dining spots, thanks to Beard-award winning Chef Mashama Bailey.
Though born and raised in New York, Bailey has roots in Waynesboro, where she spent many of her childhood summers with her maternal grandmother. She also attended Charles Ellis school right here in Savannah, so the flavors of Coastal Georgia are in her soul and on her palate.
I first tasted and fell in love with Bailey’s cooking at a Southern food conference all the way over in Oxford, Mississippi, where she bravely (and flawlessly) cooked for more than 200 attendees. Unhappily, I’ve not been able to visit The Grey, but I’m looking forward to correcting that as soon as things get back to normal.
You won’t find a menu on the website because it changes seasonally. However, you can get an idea of what it’s like and take a taste of The Grey home by visiting The Grey Market, 109 Jefferson St., thegreymkt.com, 912-201-3924.
The Sisters of the New South: 2605 Skidaway Road (south of Victory Drive), thesistersofthenewsouth.com; on-line ordering also through www.sisters4me.com, 912-335-2761. Vicky Brown, executive chef, and Kenneth Brown, managing partner.
I discovered Sisters of the New South Café several years ago, not at their Skidaway Road location, but while they briefly kept an outlet at Oglethorpe Mall’s food court.
There, over the clamor of fast-food pizza, wraps, hot dogs, sweet rolls, and submarine sandwiches, beckoned the fragrances and flavors of my childhood. But there was more to it than nostalgia: adding kick to those remembered flavors was the unique spice of Coastal Georgia that had made me fall for Savannah.
There were collards, slow-simmered beans, baked macaroni and cheese, yams, both yellow and red rice, fried and baked chicken, ox-tails, smothered pork chops, fried and smothered shrimp, and oysters.
The café’s name isn’t arbitrary. This is a real family operation. While it’s the brainchild of husband and wife team Vicky and Kenneth Brown, Chef Vicky’s mother, Johnnie Mae Bing, and mother-in-law, Scealy Hooker, have been major influences on the cooking, and the kitchen is shared with her sisters, Betty Miller, Dorothy Bing, and Esterline Bing.
The dining room is open, but curbside pickup is available. Also, to give your cooking at home a little soul from the sisters, Chef Vicky has developed a line of seasoning blends available online and at the restaurant.
Damon Lee Fowler is a Savannah-based food writer and cooking teacher who has written nine cookbooks. Learn more at damonleefowler.com.