You Give Me Fever

Fever!

No, seriously–I literally mean Fever.  Taqueria Fever to be exact.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve passed this place and thought, “That’s a damn odd place for a tiny nightclub–right in front of the Statehouse.”

However, one day we were walking downtown and I stopped to take a look at the door and realized, “Hey!  This is actually a little restaurant!”

Taqueria Fever–Artistic Hand Food

I know, I know.  I laughed, too.  But shockingly, their food is actually really tasty!  Co-worker Melissa and I decided to brave the short walk towards Gervais St., so we could try out this trendy little joint.  Hand food, indeed.

I will say, it is not a large space but it is well lit, with a nice looking bar, a goodly amount of tables, and fairly decent artwork on the walls–with the exception of the one huge painting I tried to knock off of the wall and onto my head.  I’m still holding a grudge against that work of art.

They’ve got burgers, hot dogs, salads, tacos, and some other higher end food that looks quite tasty.  My only raised eyebrow is that this little place seems chock full of PR and lots of pretty descriptive words.  It seems to me that there’s a lot of talk–and I’m wondering if the restaurant can live up to everything they say they are.

With restaurants, I prefer a in your face, “you’re going to remember this food because it is JUST that damn good, girly!” approach rather than the “Someone with a MBA in marketing wrote their thesis assignment on our main page and hey, the food’s fairly decent, too!” line of attack.

Yes, I’ve got a background in Marketing, myself, which is probably why I feel this way.  I can bullshit with the best of them.

Downtown Main Street (Columbia, SC) is trying to pull in more businesses, and while there has been a fair of positive changes in the area, many restaurants have recently closed.  Chick Fil A, which resided at 1301 Main St. for the past 17 +  years recently closed, due to failed lease negotiations.  The downtown area has also seen at least two other restaurant closings in the past few months.  Both Hennessey’s and The White Mule also departed Main Street, Columbia.

Why am I adding this into my quick review of this little restaurant?  Because quite obviously, even a brisk business and a long time standing in the downtown community is not an instant guarantee for longevity in our downtown area.  These are just my opinions, as someone who works downtown and notices the changes, both positive and negative, on a daily basis, during our lunchtime walk.

How was the food?

It was pretty darned tasty. The restaurant serves up a slightly higher class of what you can find downtown, already. We already have access to burgers, salads, tacos (on the USC side), and hot dogs.  This little nook offers all of these in one place

I, myself, had the Pimento Burger.  The kitchen did a good job of cooking my burger to order and the pimento cheese was homemade and plentiful.  I did take a goodly amount off of the burger and put on the side.  That much pimento cheese on anything makes me a bit green around the gills.  The cheese does, however, work brilliantly as a dip for the Pommes Frittes.

Whenever I get a burger with a toasted bun, I give extra points. Haven’t had a toasted bun on your burger?  You simply must try it.  A toasted burger bun can make a burger extraordinary.  Obviously the toasting adds more calories and fat grams.  Let’s be honest here, though.  It’s a hamburger.  With a honking big blob of very rich pimento cheese on top.  We’re not talking health food here, folks.

The french fries were decent.  They were fries.  Nothing to set them apart from any other side of fried potatoes that I’ve come across in my years of dining out.  The restaurant calls them pommes frites.  They’re french fries.  Get over it.

My friend Melissa had The Rumba.

Description from the menu:  Chicken & shrimp skewers grilled with pineapple, red onion & cherry tomatoes served over confetti yellow rice.  She seemed to enjoy it a great deal, however, the red dipping sauce on the side had a sever burn to it.  The sauce was set aside.

I tasted the chicken, and for me, at least, it had a strange texture and WAY too much oregano.  I have a loathing of anything that is doused in that much oregano.  It’s a pungent herb that should be used sparingly, in my opinion.  A liberal hand was used on the chicken. I didn’t get paste tasting the poultry, for fear of what the herb might do to the delicate lady, the shrimp.

Overall, we had a nice lunch.  I did feel that the atmosphere was a bit 1990′s tapas bar/club, but changing the music and some of the artwork might help with that particular mood.

The restaurant did offer a few dollars off on what is typically dinner fare.  I found this to be a great idea, because most of us are loathe to try full-price dinner items at lunch.  In this way, you can try the food out for less dollars and then you can bring your friends back for a meal and a drink after work.  Very clever, artful hand food people! Very clever!

I will try this place again.  I’m aiming for The Southern Comfort dog on my next trip.

Taqueria Fever

1202 Main Street
Columbia, SC 29201

Monday – Tuesday    11am-3pm
Wednesday -  Friday    11am – Late
Saturday & Sunday    6pm – Late

Coming up:  Judy’s at the Market and Mai Thai

Phone:(803) 799-1250

 

The Early Bird Diner

I have to say, I was extremely excited to visit this little place, especially after seeing it on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, hosted by Guy Fieri.  Luckily, Guy has been hitting several places in SC, as of late.  I’m quite thrilled that I won’t have to travel halfway across the nation in order to visit a Triple D restaurant!

We arrived around midday on a Saturday–the place was doing a fairly brisk business and we had about a five minute wait.  The diner is very tiny, with a tiny parking lot.  The lot, however, was overflowing with cars. After all, the smaller the restaurant, the better the food, and the more people want to be inside, right?

Though busy and crowded, the diner didn’t make me feel uncomfortable or closed in.  Light comes in from many windows, and the chatter is that of happy folks eating.  It’s a local place and it’s low key and friendly.  That kind of atmosphere only comes from a restaurant owned by good people, in my opinion.

The one dish that caught my eye on the Triple D episode was the Chicken and Waffles.  I’ve been watching this dish rise in recognition for years.  Even IHOP has their own version.  I’ve never had any interest in eating these two foods together–until I saw the Early Bird version.

I’m a Southern girl–I like my chicken fried (now and again).  But, the crunch of fried chicken paired with the softness of a waffle? Pfft.  No thank you.  Or so I thought.  Early Bird has the MOST amazing honey mustard sauce (made in house) drizzled over the chicken.  The chicken breast is boneless and tender and has just the right amount of crunch. In fact, I picked off a lot of the fried breading and ate the chicken by itself.

The sauce is sweet and slightly spicy–you catch the pop of the mustard at the end.  I have to say that I would have happily paid the restaurant for a pint of the honey mustard alone. It was fantastic.

The waffles were fairly typical and weren’t anything to write home (or write online) about.  The syrup on the pancakes was a good consistency and had a nice flavor.  I truly didn’t like the chicken and the waffle eaten together in one bite.  They were better, in my opinion, eaten alone.  The flavors went well together.

My partners in dining had two other dishes:

Jimmy had the Schnitzel–a breaded pork cutlet with mushrooms and baby swiss on a hoagie.  He wasn’t too terribly impressed with the sandwich. His exact words?  ”It was okay.”  The guy in the booth next to us, however, thought the sandwich was the best thing he’d ever had, as he hoovered it quite quickly, not even bothering to chew, apparently. I kid. I’m sure he chewed.  Some.

I found it to be a nice piece of fried pork, not greasy, with a nice earthiness brought in with the mushrooms; However, the sandwich was lacking something. Perhaps a touch of acid?  Maybe some onions on top with the mushrooms?  The parts were nice, but together they weren’t memorable.

Marge, on the other hand, went the breakfast route with the Country Scramble.  I’m not one to be overly fond of foods that are covered in white gravy, but, there you go.

The Scramble pairs potatoes, country sausage, eggs and cheddar–topping it all with cream gravy.  Marge had a biscuit on the side and a dish of grits.  From the lack of vocal approval, it was quite obvious Mother Marge was not thrilled with her dish.  She’s not one to go out on a limb to try something new, and I’m still unsure just why she ordered this dish, but she found it pleasant enough to eat, as the dish wasn’t pushed away.

She did vocalize that she did rather enjoy her biscuit.  I ate the grits, myself.  They were fantastic–creamy, hearty, and had a great flavour.   Those of you who don’t eat grits….or who eat only packaged grits, may not have an appreciation for how hard it is to get a good batch of grits made.

Early Bird has some damn good grits.  Just saying. The only other remark of note from Marge was that she didn’t like her coffee at all.  She had decaffeinated.  Then again, she drinks instant coffee most days, so, I’m not really sure what her definition of good coffee is, truly.

We also had two other sides–mac and cheese and collards.  Neither one really deserve any shiny or “awesome!!
manner of exclamation.  Suffice to say that I was unimpressed and they were left uneaten.

All together with sweet tea and a soda (and the aforementioned coffee), the meal was less than $36.

The Early Bird is a nice diner. The staff are pleasant and the atmosphere is comfortable. They have late hours on the weekends and you can get breakfast all day.  I can imagine that having the EB in your neighborhood would be a lovely thing, indeed.  I’d certainly go back and try more dishes.  Overall, we had a good time and a fairly good meal.  Perhaps next time, I’ll try the pork chop with the homemade pepper jelly!

The Early Bird Diner

1644 Savannah Highway

Charleston, SC 29407

Monday to Thursday:  7 am to 10:30 pm
Friday and Saturday:  8 am to 4 am
Sunday Brunch:  10 am to  3pm
Phone: 843-277-2353

 

Greetings and Salutations

I’ve wanted to start a food blog now, for quite some time.  A co-worker spurned this idea and I’m hoping that she can come on over and guest blog at some point!

Needless to say, our household loves to eat.  So, I’m going to talk, as it were, about where we eat and what we cook at home.  I’ll be sharing recipes and techniques we use–whether they work out or not!