Nashville Food and Sightseeing Adventures

Our last 2 posts talked about our Top Picks on Nashville Food and Sightseeing, and music venues. Now I am sure you want to know my last few, and are wondering about the restaurants and food – especially southern comfort food, for which Nashville is known. We dined in several restaurants during our stay… mostly the ‘known ones,’ but some less known as well.

Nashville Music Venues – Outside of Downtown

With all of Nashville’s music, it has many recording studios and some of the most famous are located on Music Row, an area southwest of downtown Nashville. In an earlier post, I mentioned RCA Studio B who recorded:

• Elvis
• The Everly Brothers
• Dolly Parton
• Al Hirt
• Waylon Jennings
• Roy Orbison
• Charlie Pride
• Boots Randolph
• Connie Smith
• Dottie West
• Carrie Underwood
• Martina McBride
• Wynonna

to name a few. It’s great fun to see where these celebrities recorded and to listen to their recordings while hearing stories about their escapades.

The Bluebird Cafe, in Hillsboro Village, is a well known listening room. Since 1981 it has drawn celebrities and other up-and-coming talent. You never know who you’ll see there. Many great talents were discovered at Bluebird Cafe, like Garth Brooks, Kenny Chesney, Keith Urban, and Taylor Swift.

We went to the Row for dinner and music 2 different nights and enjoyed the less hectic atmosphere of midtown next to Vanderbilt.

Nashville Top Picks for Food

Nashville is known for its barbecue, mac n cheese, green beans made several ways, and corn cakes. While this is not the way we tend to eat, we tried it all. Most of it was good, yet a bit heavy for me. You may ask – where should we go when there are so many places to choose from?

After quite a bit of research, we picked a few restaurants since we only had a few days of eating out, as we were in Nashville for a wedding. As stated above, we liked the Row (#10), since we could listen to music while eating Nashville cuisine comfortably in the bar, with some healthy food choices as well as the meat and grits. I had a Quinoa burger the first time we went, and I had to try the pork barbecue on the corn pancake the second time, which was quite good and not fatty, but a bit heavy.

One of the famous Lower Broadway restaurants is Jack’s Barb-B-Que; they have another location near music row that has more seating and is not nearly as crowded. We went for lunch at 11:30 since we skipped breakfast, and we had no lines. However, by 12:05, it was packed. For those who are big meat eaters, you’ll likely love this place, and for those who are not, I got the smoked turkey, which was very good. If you are vegetarian, the choices are mac n cheese, cucumber salad, warm apple compote and a few other things. It was good and an experience, and once was enough for me. Tom would go there any time. This type of food is available all over the Nashville area, some not as good as the reviews say.

A more unusual spot for dinner is Rolf and Daughters in North Nashville. The food is very different with what I consider unlikely combinations. Mostly it was quite good, but if you are particular about what you want in your food, it may not be the right place. There are not many greens on the menu, which was a disappointment for me. While we liked it, the portions were much too small for Tom, and the prices were on the higher side. We had  a dandelion/turnip/nectarine salad (I wouldn’t order it again), the sourdough bread with seaweed butter (yum!), squid pasta with clams (yum!), and sweet corn pasta (a delicious main course but a very small portion). They had a great craft beer and cocktail menu. You need a reservation no matter when you go.

There is so much to see and do when you visit Nashville, pick and choose carefully or plan to visit Nashville several times.

Please add to this post with your Nashville experiences in the comments section.

Related Posts:

• Top 10 Things to Do When You Visit Nashville — History, Music, Food
• Top Sights Around Nashville – History, Art, Music – My Top Picks