Yes, I took this photo. Consider it a gift after last week’s disastrous pictures |
Our conference was centered at a spectacular hotel – The Charleston Place Hotel. I have no idea how much rooms cost there, but do choose it if it fits in your budget. It is at the center of everything you’ll want to see and do, and the Louis Vuitton store right in the hotel was recently visited by Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds following their Charleston nuptials. The Spa at Charleston Place was rated very highly, so I gave it a try for a lemongrass and green tea body scrub the day of my arrival, and was highly impressed at the quality of 30 minute massage included in the treatment. Usually, massages tacked on to body treatments are perfunctory, but my esthetician diagnosed my needs and gave me a true deep tissue massage, targeting my travel-weary muscles and providing a truly luxurious experience. Plus: turn down service and chocolates on the pillow!
This statue is very famous, apparently |
Your home base at Charleston Place will afford you a centralized jumping off point to enjoy both the glamorous potential pocketbook trouble of King St. shopping, the touristy glee of the Central Market’s Gullah-inspired souvenirs, and tons of fabulous restaurants. One such eatery, named Best New Restaurant by Southern Living in 2011, is Husk, which Boss K and I ate at night one of our Charleston trip.
The must-order, don’t-miss, don’t even think about messing with my guidance here item at Husk, and one they actually have every day, is a side of Benton’s bacon corn bread for the table. I’m serious, people. Do not blow off this advice. Get this corn bread, and then name your first-born after me. Benton’s is the fabled smokehouse of the South, home of the smokiest bacon in the land, bred from heritage piggies and lovingly cured by gastronomic superhero Allan Benton. In this cornbread, the bits of the hickory-smoked pork belly are rendered in a small cast-iron skillet, and then the corn bread batter is poured right in over top, so that the bacon grease provides the lube for the pan. Because Benton’s bacon is so smoky, the entire affair gets that hickory undertone, with a sea-salt-sprinkled top and crispy bottom. When you bite into this heavenly lavishness, the bacon fat coats your mouth in the best possible way, and then the corn meal batter takes over to balance the porcine content perfectly. This really is a Southern classic made into a masterpiece. Incidentally, you can order bacon directly off Benton’s website. I’ve done it; it’s a GREAT idea and hilarious to receive a box of bacon via UPS.
My entrée was a pork chop, accompanied by cider-braised cabbage, apples and turnips. Overall, the dish balanced bitter and sweet really well, with the turnips providing the counterpoint to the cider, cabbage and apples. The chop was caramelized outside, and cooked medium inside, which left the texture absolutely luscious. This dish was fall on a plate, which may have been incongruous with the high 90s temps outside, but was satisfying nonetheless. The cider-based sauce on the plate was lick-worthy, and I was so glad that attention had been paid to an appropriate amount of salt and pepper on the meat – under-seasoning is one of the biggest differentiators between high-end and run of the mill dining, I think.
The setting for all this fine food is a wide-porched, classic Charleston home, renovated inside to be modern and casual. K and I wore business attire, but jeans would be acceptable here, if you funked them up with cool jewelry and nice shoes. Be aware, you never know when you’re going to run into Faith Hill or Tiger Woods in Charleston, so you kind of want to look sharp. We gave Husk an eight on the BHS scale, a score only slightly negatively affected by my less-than-stellar buttermilk panna cotta dessert, which was rather insipid, unlike the rest of this sumptuous meal. Overall, this is a spot worthy of the hype. The food is thoughtful, measured, outrageous, but still anchored in history, with a real sense of both time and place. And the cornbread is bangin’.
Another worthy stop on the very same street is Poogan’s Porch, a Charleston mainstay since 1976 and another celebrity haunt. And by haunt, I mean this place is haunted, although K and I enjoyed a somewhat more casual meal there unmolested by apparitions. We began with the fried green tomatoes, which is one of my favorite things, though it was tough not to order the pimento cheese fritters, given my recent penchant for that product. The batter on these slightly bitter babies was everything – crunchy and just greasy enough to let you know you were eating something delightfully naughty, and the pecan-crusted goat cheese alongside was a brilliant, tangy, earthy accompaniment.
This was one of those doomed meals where my eyes were bigger than my stomach and I couldn’t really do my own entrée justice as far as eating it, but I tried my damndest. The pork 3 ways was most of my favorite things all on one plate: pulled pork, pork belly and ham-studded macaroni and cheese. Every little thing on that plate was outstanding – the macaroni was al dente, the gouda sauce was sharp, smoky, and had definite personality, and the pork belly was ridiculously rich, salty but not too much, and savory with not-too-sweet BBQ sauce deliciousness. The pulled pork could have had more texture, but I’m really splitting hairs, here; this was fine food.
K had the shrimp and grits, which I thought were fantastic in a spicy, hearty, homey way. She, however, wished in the end she’d ordered the fried chicken. And THAT is why you need to go to Charleston yourself and sample these yummies – because we all have different tastes, and just today I was reading a comment on Facebook from a dear friend who thinks chefs are relying too heavily on bacon as a crutch. This is blasphemous sacrilege to me, of course, but apparently, not everyone is as obsessed with salted, cured, pork products as I am.
Oh, and try Poogan’s sweet, buttery, flaky, tender biscuits. Riiight, I forgot I ate those. That might help explain why I was so full come entrée time. Anyhoodle, while Poogan’s might not be setting the world on fire like Husk and Brock’s other baby, McCrady’s, it is classic comfort food translated in a uniquely Carolinian way, and totally worth one of your Charleston evenings.
Next week, I’ll tie up Charleston in a pretty little package for you with a breakfast that blew my mind, and some fun new friends from Abu Dhabi. Hold on to your hats and stay tuned, because it was fabulous. My hunger is big; my personality is bigger!
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