Countryside Café – Still Here To Serve You

 

After tornadoes ripped through Ooltewah, it’s a wonder that the Countryside Café was unharmed. On the corner of Mahan Gap and Ooltewah-Georgetown Road sits a cute little café with a lot of memories for many folks. I remember eating at this place 20 years ago and found it surprising that it is still in business with the same owners. I had to visit again to see how they have evolved in the last two decades.

Driving along Ooltewah Georgetown Road was disheartening to see all the devastation brought on by the recent storms.

However, seeing that familiar country restaurant touched a tender place in my heart. I’ve tried to eat sensibly over the years, but I knew when I stopped into Countryside that I was going to have something country-fried! Surely after 20 years, a place would learn how to cut corners and they would have to lose their finesse, but not this place.

No cutting corners. They still pan fry! So, of course, I had to order some good old fried okra that is prepared in an iron skillet! I decided that ordering a vegetable plate would ease any guilt of eating the delicious, country “take me back home” food. For many, this restaurant provides home-cooked meals at affordable prices; each day. In fact, the community that surrounds Countryside counts on it!

Julia greeted me at the door and was ready to take my order. A country meal insists that you start off with sweet tea - and that’s what I ordered. If you are like the 160,000 people here in Chattanooga who loves your sweet tea; you will be happy with the tea here. There were so many vegetables to choose from for my “choose four” vegetable plate. I picked pinto beans, carrots, fried okra and steamed cabbage - with cornbread.

Nobody could be any more of a Southern cook than my sweet mother, but I have to tell you - this restaurant knows Southern! The okra was small to medium size and I know it was hand-breaded in cornmeal. A little hard to get onto my fork, I wondered if I could ask for chop sticks that would have made it a little easier. With them putting the okra in a small bowl on the platter it made it difficult to eat with a fork but I assure you - I learned how to “scoop” the tasty nuggets. Maybe I should have used my spoon.

The beans, I could tell were not from a can and slopped onto my plate - these were dry beans that had been soaked. The flavor was so good I did not add any condiments. Now for my cabbage - I can’t eat cabbage without a little twang and a little hot, so I was glad to see they had a bottle of vinegar pepper sauce right on the table. I gave it a dash or …six and added some of the ground pepper that was also on the table. The steamed cabbage was not soggy and it was tender. Perfect!

My favorite vegetable was the baby carrots. I did not have to add one thing! The first bite was so scrumptious that I wanted to shove the rest of the plate aside and just eat on those little gems. Of course I didn’t. I could taste a buttery flavor and the carrots were tender but not mushy, sweet and not boring. Some places will add sugar or cinnamon and it takes away from the hint of the carrots' natural sweetness, but not this place - they had my vote as being the best cooked baby carrots that I had ever tasted.

I ordered the cornbread “just to taste it”. I did not really want bread if I was going to eat that fried okra but I was tricked. Had I not known any better, I would swear my mother was back there in that kitchen making their cornbread so I ate the whole thing! Moist and buttery and I could taste the buttermilk too. Most restaurants cannot hold a candle to “real country cooking” that you grew up with but Countryside does. It is as if they have everyone’s mother in the back cooking away with iron skillets.

If I thought I could have eaten it all I would have ordered fresh tomato to go with it (but that would have gotten in the way of my pie). Yes, I ordered the fresh-baked coconut cream pie and it was worth the calories that I am sure were packed into the topped-high meringue alone.

It’s a rotten job, but somebody has to do it.