Alright, how about a little Senior Bowl content that isn’t football content?!?! I’m sure you guys are exhausted by it all by now anyway. Let’s talk about that good good stuff – all of the food that I ate while traveling with my main man Zach Lyons down to Mobile. Before I break it all down, here’s a straight up list of all of the meals I ate last week:
Callaghan’s (website)
1. Reuben, coleslaw, and fries
Brick and Spoon (website)
- Pictured below (second): Bayou benny- “bayou topping, poached eggs & housemade hollandaise”
- Creole killer omelet – “shrimp, tasso, onions, red & green bell peppers & cheddar jack cheese, topped with housemade hollandaise.”
- Shrimp and grits – “shrimp, red & green bell peppers, onion, garlic cream sauce & fire roasted corn grits, poached egg, served with toast points”
- Pictured below (first): “Taste of the South” – not on their website’s menu, but this was a combination of three fried green tomatoes, two crab cakes, topped with remoulade, and served on a bed of grits.
- Build-your-own Bloody Mary with Tito’s vodka, tasso, bacon, pickled green bean, lime, celery salt, and sriracha.
Walk-On’s (website)
- Deep fried bacon-wrapped shrimp with jalapeño and cream cheese
- Smoked Gouda Turkey burger w/ fries
Wintzell’s Oyster House (website)
- Blackened chicken Alfredo pasta, fried okra
- Bread pudding
- Gumbo
- Cajun seafood pasta, fried okra
- Pictured below: Pineapple upside down cake
- Cajun seafood pasta and fried okra again
Dreamland BBQ (website)
- Brunswick stew
- Chopped chicken and smoked sausage, fries and coleslaw
O’Daly’s Irish Pub (Facebook)
- Queso Bacon Fries
- Sausage, Pepperoni pizza
Outside of Friday night at O’Daly’s, I didn’t have a bad meal in Mobile. I was more than greatly disappointed to arrive at O’Daly’s after a night of drinking beer to discover that they did not actually serve Irish cuisine. I love Irish cuisine! Even Callaghan’s didn’t serve traditional Irish cuisine, but at least they had a damn good reuben! But, the food at O’Daly’s was atrocious – it just tasted like microwaved pizza and crinkle cut fries that had jar queso dumped on top of it. It reminded me of every shitty bar I went to in college with cheap drinks and cheap food. I totally misread the room on my O’Daly’s selection and am willing to pat my chest and say “my bad” on that one.
Everything else was simply phenomenal, though – from that first night in town, eating a reuben that was so stacked with corned beef that I’m sure it weighed five pounds at Callaghan’s to my last run with the Cajun seafood pasta at Wintzell’s on Saturday night. It was all good.
I had never been to a Walk-On’s before, and honestly, I only even knew the name because of the bowl games they sponsor – so, props to their marketing department. Zach and I saw it, and thought, “hmmm….let’s try this place out.” I can easily see the Buffalo Wild Wings comparison, and any bar that keeps Kona Big Wave on tap is a winner in my book! But, for it to be bar food, I was pleasantly surprised at how well my turkey burger was cooked, and how they successfully pulled off that fried shrimp/jalapeño/bacon/cream cheese concoction. It was a restorative meal after an uncharacteristically hot day in Mobile in January. We were both sunburnt, dehydrated, and tired, and Walk-On’s felt like an oasis in the desert.
Unfortunately for Walk-On’s, it only held the title of “our spot” for one day. On Wednesday, we discovered Wintzell’s Oyster House had a location just 1.7 miles from Hancock Whitney Stadium. People kept recommending it to us, and after a hard day’s worth of contentin’ out at the stadium, we decided to hit it up. It was fantastic – I’m not an oyster guy, but Zach is, and I think he ordered oysters just about every afternoon we spent there. Their cajun seafood pasta was a revelation – loaded with shrimp, and scallops that were among the best I’ve ever had. They were seared to perfection, so they had that nice little crisp when you first bit into it, but as you savored it, you could taste the ocean. So fresh. So clean. The bread pudding and the pineapple upside down cake were two of the best restaurant desserts I’ve ever had. I could bathe in the rum sauce they put on the bread pudding. There’s no doubt in my mind why they’re famous for that bread pudding. Factor in an extensive beer tap with good local IPAs, and that Mike Norvell just happened to walk into the place when we were there, and Wintzell’s was by far our favorite spot to eat, hang out, and review our notes after a hard day’s work. Also, shout out to our boy Clayton down there slingin’ beers and shuckin’ oysters. His company did make the experience a lot more enjoyable.
While I think I’d give Wintzell’s the honors of “spot of the week,” I think the most consistent place throughout the week was Brick and Spoon, and it definitely came in handy with their build-your-own Bloody Mary menu when we were hung over Saturday morning. It was some of the best breakfast food I’ve had in awhile, all week long. Just these massive decadent breakfasts – it’s hard to get good seafood here in landlocked Nashville. So, I might’ve gone a little overboard getting shrimp or crab at every breakfast. But, I couldn’t help myself. The grits popped with flavor, and went down as smoothly as butter. I love corn in grits, and each bowl I had also had a little bit of corn mixed in with it. So good. I discovered tasso last week, which is basically a cajun ham. It was fantastic. The poached eggs were perfect. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.
As far as my individual meal of the week, removing all other factors and just grading it on food alone – that goes to Dreamland. I had the meat sweats leaving that place, and damn near ate enough to make myself sick. As you can see above, that brunswick stew was nice and hearty. The sausage was spiced, sliced, and cooked to perfection. The chopped chicken was the way to go, slathered in their Alabama twang sauce, that was a bit barbecue-y and a bit vinegary, but popped with spice. Their Alabama white sauce was a little thicker and creamier than it usually is, but made for a great condiment to splash my fries and forkfuls of chicken into. The more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve bought in….this is the best barbecue sauce combo I’ve ever had.
Damn, we ate good in Mobile, Alabama last week.
Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network, and a Dogs Playing Poker on velvet connoisseur. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD, #BeBetter, and ‘Minds right, asses tight.’ “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, Nashville, Yankee Candle, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley
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