October: A Weekend Trip to Nashville!
Friday, October 4: Opportunities knocked, so we hit the road and set out for Nashville, Tennessee. It’s pretty fun that, when you live in Columbus, you can just get in the car and drive about 6 hours and then you’re in Nashville!
However, we did not drive six hours straight because we stopped at a Buc-ees in Kentucky. It was both Liz’s and my first trip to a Buc-ees and boy did it live up to the hype! We got a nice brisket taco and pledged that we’d stop at Buc-ees again on the way home.
From Buc-ees we headed for Nolensville for a nice lunch and catch up with Jeff, Noelle, Josh and Holly (from Freshman year at BYU!) before they all headed off on vacations.
And then from Nolensville we went up to Nashville-proper and our nice little hotel room. After a bit of a recharge we hiked through downtown to our dinner destination, a mediterranean-ish place called the Butcher and the Bee.
The Butcher and the Bee was a nice meal and we got to eat it from the balcony because maybe I made a reservation for November, not October?
Pictured food: Avocado crispy rice, whipped feta (foreground) and hummus with chicken shawarma (background), pepperoni meatballs, and the potato pancake.
Over the years, through my Nashville trips, I’ve eaten a lot of hot chicken but I had never been to Hattie B’s because it seemed like the new place built for white people. But there was one over by our hotel so I decided to take advantage of the opportunity. There was still quite a line at 11pm and when I got the chicken back to the hotel, dang, it wasn’t playing! Their Hot was hot enough for me to not be able to tell if the Hottest was any hotter. Sorry I doubted you, Hattie B.
Saturday, October 5: Up and at ‘em! We had a little bit of our hotel’s breakfast buffet before going to see the Parthenon. I’d seen it before, but this time we went inside and I had never been inside before. Even better: It was free that day! Best $0 we spent all day!
From there we headed back to East Nashville for a very lovely brunch at Sean Brock’s restaurant, Audrey. Service was excellent, food great, the building super cool. You know someone means business when they build a whole building for their new restaurant (or 2 restaurants, to be precise, there’s a tasting menu place called June upstairs) if the building has a library! Looking forward to returning here someday.
Pictured food: Their great big hashbrown with whipped ham butter, their hickory smoked burger, and the steak and eggs with hickory hollandaise.
From Audrey we headed even more east to Lebanon. The Big Reason for our Nashville trip was that Liz’s friend Annemarie invited Liz to come “get the band back together” with her at the Mid-Tennessee Hatch Green Chili Roast Festival. Liz and Annemarie used to be in a trio called the Pretty Darns so they called their 2 out of 3 band “the Darns.” We had spent my birthday at Annemarie’s house so it was great to be back and re-establishing friendships with her sons.
The gig was great and cousin Katharine and cousin in law Brian came out, too. One thing we learned for sure: chili roasting is loud!
After the show we had some nice tacos in the back of a Mexican grocery store with Annemarie’s family and then a nice walk around a nice Lebanon park. I sure have been saying “nice” a lot! Guess that’s just what this weekend was: Nice.
Sunday, October 6: Back on the road! Back to Columbus! But, good to our word, also back to Buc-ee’s!
