Sometimes when friends come to town, they have a special restaurant picked out they want to try. Last weekend, that brought us to downtown Nashville for a food adventure at Peg Leg Porker.
The story behind the restaurant is one of personal triumph over adversity and award-winning barbecue (check out their website here). And the menu offered some interesting options. Here’s what we enjoyed.
Pink pickles and more
Yes, if they’re Kool-Aid pickles! Apparently, this isn’t a new idea (though I’d never heard of it). You simply mix in some red Kool-Aid when making your pickles and they come out a little sweeter and very pink! And Debbie had the jalapeño sausage, which was quite tasty. Kudos to friends who have patience with my taking photos of all their food!
She was also curious about the pimento cheese. It was really creamy and smooth…perfect for spreading. But not anything extraordinary…just pimento cheese.
Tried and true pulled pork barbecue
A pulled pork barbecue sandwich is the staple of most barbecue joints. This one came topped with slaw (they were very specific…you can’t have your sandwich slaw on the side…it’s either on the sandwich or not).
For sides, my husband chose mac and cheese (his go-to BBQ side) and barbecue beans. I didn’t try the beans (I just can’t do anything close to pork and beans…bad food poisoning memories), but I did get a few bites of mac and cheese. So smooth and silky…definitely a texture treat. But the taste was a little bland for me.
My choices
I had the pork platter with smoked green beans and cole slaw. I liked their sweet BBQ sauce, but again, I just wasn’t excited by the overall flavor of the barbecue. I tend to like bolder flavors. And of course, being from Texas, I prefer beef.
Smoked green beans sounded like something worth checking out. Turns out they were just pretty much homemade green beans (flat ones like Italian or even pintos in the pod). Still wondering what they meant by “smoked.”
But that cole slaw was great…freshest I’ve ever had. The cabbage was so crunchy…they have to be making that fresh along the way (or maybe there’s a secret to keeping cabbage crunchy? Enquiring minds want to know!).
I’ll need to go back and try this one
My friend Brett got the yardbird platter…unfortunately I didn’t get to try it as he demolished it pretty quickly! But I do love a good dry rub. Another friend later told me she LOVES going there but only ever gets this chicken. Her husband does, too. So, it looks like I need at least one more trip down there to see if this is the hidden jewel of this place.
Wait…there’s dessert!
Debbie wanted to try the fried pies and really liked how chocolatey they were. One of my pet peaves: when something is chocolate, but it’s so light you can’t hardly taste it. Again, I didn’t try this one, but they certainly did look flaky…another item for next time.
Looking forward to more food adventures!
This time visiting friends got me to try something new in my own backyard. There are many more options in Nashville I’d like to try as well though as a rule, I don’t like doing the tourist-y stuff. Are there restaurants near you that look interesting? Grab a brave friend and try something new. Let us know what you tried and how you liked it…never know when I might be in your neck of the woods looking for another food adventure!
Wanna see some of my other food adventures? Try these –
