Silva Spoon Cafe

LUNCH COUNTER

Address: 5080 Rivers Avenue, North Charleston.

Phone: 554-3333.

Hours: 11 a.m.-6:30 p.m. Mon.-Fri.

I can't remember the last time I surfed the Internet over a plate of deep-fried ribs or chitterlings, cornbread and sweet peas on the side.

Never at home, for sure. But at the Silva Spoon Cafe, a soul-food eatery on Rivers Avenue, they're churning out believers one meal at a time. Catering, fried crabs, turkey wings, okra soup and free WiFi: all are courtesy of owner Venus Silva-Keye, and her "Silva" Spoon.

Talk about a dandy resource. Say you're unsure what the $8.50 beef oxtail might entail, one quick Google search later and, voila, we're talking the tail from a cow (usually).

But maybe oxtail isn't your first choice, but here's what should be: a big plate of smoky, rich lima beans ($6.50), emboldened with a salty piece of neckbone that draws flavor from the fat.

The lima beans, served on a bed of white rice, take up half the Styrofoam container, the other portion reserved for fried fish, chicken or a pair of crunchy pork chops.

Specials ($6.50-$8.50) change daily, counting meatloaf, barbecue chicken, beef lasagna, jerk chicken on Thursdays, and ribs and chitterlings on Friday.

A portion of the menu is reserved for fried seafood ($6.50-$10.50), including jumbo butterfly shrimp, a three-piece shark steak dinner, crabs, scallops and whiting.

And the Silva Spoon stays cool in the summertime too, with a bevy of fans blowing a light wind through the restaurant.