Special coverage
It’s the best time of the year in the Lowcountry—temperature and humidity drop, cool breezes stream in, and the match is lit on backyard oyster roasts and fire pits.
The Post and Courier Food section is checking in weekly with four downtown Charleston restaurants coping with the coronavirus pandemic and recovering from restrictions designed to contain it.
The Post and Courier Food section is checking in weekly with four downtown Charleston restaurants coping with the coronavirus pandemic and recovering from restrictions designed to contain it.
I can’t shake the critic’s instinct that it’s silly to endorse a dish which might not be available tomorrow. I kind of miss taking chances, though. In other words: No promises. But here are my greatest hits from the first week of the dining ban.
Euro Foods is new to Old Towne Road, but not to West Ashley. It previously had a 13-year run on Ashley River Road, where it operated exclusively as a grocery store. Now the space bearing the Euro Foods name is split almost exactly in half, with a brightly lit retail section to the right and a counter-service café to the left.
Since launching the South Carolina Chef Ambassador program, the state has put approximately $360,000 into the culinary initiative. Less clear, at least according to data provided by sponsors S.C. Department of Agriculture and S.C. Department of Parks, Recreation & Tourism, is what eaters here and elsewhere have gotten out of it.
Community Table is decidedly not fine dining: The servers are dressed in blue jeans, and James Taylor keeps cropping up on the background music mix.
Prior to 2020, each restaurant was theoretically eligible for 15 stars, since it was graded in three separate categories: Food, service and atmosphere. But no longer.
What really characterizes the food in this alluringly gold-walled lounge is not the ingredients which the Wangs puts into it, but the feeling you get out of it.
Malagon is making exceptional food, but its owners don’t want you or me to know it.
For the most part, the food at Tradd's in downtown Charleston is just mildly bad.
It’s a critic’s job to accurately describe a restaurant so potential patrons can knowledgeably decide if they want to go there. Readers can do as they choose with the accompanying opinions.
The massive Folly Beach restaurant, which measures three dining rooms and 6,500 square feet in all, has good intentions that spawn nothing but disappointment.
Melfi’s is the third restaurant that Brooks Reitz and Tim Mink have opened on the short strand of Upper King Street bounded by Congress and Sumter streets
I can’t shake the critic’s instinct that it’s silly to endorse a dish which might not be available tomorrow. I kind of miss taking chances, though. In other words: No promises. But here are my greatest hits from the first week of the dining ban.
Answering readers' food questions
Q: It is my understanding that in calculating the tip, the amount to be used is based on the pre-tax total. Staff does not need to be tipped for taxes collected, especially in high tax areas (New York, Charleston, San Francisco). What, in your opinion, is correct?
Q: Where can I find authentic Peking duck in Charleston area? I asked Red Orchid if they could do special order and was told, “No, too time consuming to be profitable.”
Not so very many years ago, shad roe was one of the great harbingers of spring that downtown Charleston restaurants raced to trumpet. But it’s lately been quiet on the shad roe front, in part, because chefs who appreciate the value of sustainable seafood aren’t entirely sure how to classify the egg sac of an anadromous herring.
Charleston's newest restaurants
Hobcaw Brewing Co. is opening with three kinds of IPA lager and Charleston Coffee Roasters coffee stout on tap. It’s hosting food trucks on a regular basis.
Three years after launching their Braised in the South food truck, partners Brandon Lapp and Steve Klatt have opened a permanent food stand by the same name.
Shrimp and Grits Café recently opened in the Citadel Mall’s food court.
Tobin’s Market bills itself as a live music venue, as well as a modest restaurant.
Bussin’ School
A monthly reader recipe contest
When these beans were served in Linda Page’s childhood home, it meant her parents were trying to save money. Now the dish signals one kind of special occasion: Page says she always makes it when she finds hambones on sale at The Honeybaked Ham Company store.
Frederick Goulding’s crab cake recipe is one of four competing in The Post and Courier Food section’s contest for a category crown. Over the course of a year, the newspaper will publish four reader-supplied recipes for each of 12 iconic Lowcountry dishes.
Bob Payne’s crab cake recipe is one of four competing in The Post and Courier Food section’s contest for a category crown. Over the course of a year, the newspaper will publish four reader-supplied recipes for each of 12 iconic Lowcountry dishes.
R. Alex Hild’s crab cake recipe is one of four competing in The Post and Courier Food section’s contest for a category crown. Over the course of a year, the newspaper will publish four reader-supplied recipes for each of 12 iconic Lowcountry dishes.
Bobbye C. Wilson’s crab cake recipe is one of four competing in The Post and Courier Food section’s contest for a category crown. Over the course of a year, the newspaper will publish four reader-supplied recipes for each of 12 iconic Lowcountry dishes.
You’ve been served
Who’s right in this situation? Should restaurant owners be held responsible for mitigating natural phenomena beyond their control? Or should restaurant patrons accept that sunlight, heat and insects sometimes figure into dining out in South Carolina?
Should restaurants restrict kids' menus to elementary-school aged children? Or does any minor dining with his or her mother have the right to order the chicken nuggets?
The Post and Courier Food section weekly features a complaint that first surfaced online, along with testimonies from the patron and restaurateur. You, the readers, are the jury. Join us in our Facebook group to weigh in on whether the customer is indeed right, or if the case should be resolved in the restaurant’s favor.
The Post and Courier Food section weekly features a complaint that first surfaced online, along with testimonies from the patron and restaurateur. You, the readers, are the jury. Join us in our Facebook group to weigh in on whether the customer is indeed right, or if the case should be resolved in the restaurant’s favor. Let’s enter the courtroom.
Exploring what locals eat throughout a day
I added sliced strawberries and blueberries for my sweet tooth. We all have those, right?
"There’s nothing like food that feeds your soul while sharing it with the people you love."
This Charleston Battery soccer player enjoys Gatorade, whey protein and espresso.
More Food
Ben's Friends is helping food-and-beverage workers get sober, and in-person meetings are starting back up.
Initially, the Charleston Brewery District operation was slated to open early this year.
South Carolina restaurants will no longer be legally obliged to conform to social distancing restrictions designed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, S.C. Gov. Henry McMaster on Thursday announced.