Good eatin’ at Great Southern Cafe
By Colleen Coffield Sachs Daily News Columnist
Bartender Alex Savchenko works the indoor bar of Great Southern Café in Seaside. The restaurant also features a full dining room and outdoor seating and bar. Photo taken by Daily News photographer, Debi Haussermann.
SEASIDE – Chef Jim Shirley has plenty of fans at The Fish House in Pensacola. And now he has brought his brand of Southern cooking, along with some of his best-known dishes, to Seaside at The Great Southern Café.
The setting, in the building formerly occupied by Shades, plays up the Southern style. Inside dining is in small rooms with few tables, giving the impression of eating in someone’s home. More tables are on an outside deck that had the benefit of a breeze on a recent visit.
The menu has lots of regional flair. Seafood conjures up images of the coast. Gulf shrimp were perfect in every dish we tried, and Apalachicola oysters were found in a po’ boy and as an entrée.
Traditional Southern vegetables make it seem like a fresh vegetable stand is just outside the kitchen. Grits appear frequently.
It seems like no one talks about Great Southern without mentioning the Grits a Ya Ya. It is the signature dish at The Fish House, and one of the most-ordered dishes at Great Southern.
The dish starts with a bed of smoked Gouda cheese grits. The grits are topped with cream gravy laced with bacon, spinach and mushrooms. Nicely seasoned shrimp surround the grits and sweet potato hay tops it all off.
Because the dish is cheese grits topped with cream gravy, it is very rich. And while it is the most popular item on the menu, it wasn’t my favorite.
I liked the grits best as a bed for perfectly prepared blackened fish. It was dressed with lemon butter, and accompanied by okra that had been split in half, breaded and fried. Another grits option is Grits and Grillades, a time-honored brunch dish.
Collards stood out among the great Southern ingredients found throughout the menu. Artichoke dip is southernized with the addition of collards where you might find spinach. A bowl of collards listed as a side dish was outstanding. It was smoky and a little bit sweet.
My favorite collard dish was the Soul Rolls appetizer. Super-crisp egg rolls were filled with chopped chicken and chopped collards and served with chunky peach chutney. While it looked Asian, the flavor was completely local with the earthy collards as the star.
One appetizer that has Asian flavor is the Volcano Chicken Jets. These chicken strips have a golden brown crust of ginger and a sweet and spicy sauce. Other appetizers included crab cakes, crab claws, and a soup that varies each day. When we visited, the soup was a delicious crab and corn bisque that tasted of Thai seasonings.
There is light fare to be found among the salads, which include Tomato and Corn Salad, a Caesar, and entrée salads topped with grilled salmon and with pecan-crusted grouper.
The menu also has lots of sandwich options for good casual fare. Po’ boys are packed with nicely fried shrimp or oysters. There are burgers, and a chicken muffuletta.
I really enjoyed the Pensacola Pork Po’ Boy. A soft sub roll was overstuffed with exceedingly tender pork. A slightly sweet sauce added an unexpected, but enjoyable, taste of orange.
Side dishes were a big hit. Gouda cheese grits, and collards are definitely worth ordering. But there are many other good choices.
Fried okra, scallion mashed potatoes, and black-eyed peas are all enticing. Onion rings are thin and crisp, and fried green tomatoes are excellent with a crisp crust surrounding the tangy tomato slices. A remoulade sauce dresses the tomatoes.
Desserts change from time to time. We enjoyed a Key lime pie with a meringue topping, and creamy tiramisu.
We did find that there were several desserts listed on the menu that were not available. We also found that to be the case with the list of wines by the glass, although there were other options that paired well with the food.
The missteps at Great Southern were few. On each visit, our main course came out within five minutes of our appetizers. At lunch our server quickly remedied the situation and we had a pleasant meal. At dinner our server decided the best response was sarcasm (apologizing for being prompt). Our meal was rushed and one appetizer went uneaten.
All in all, Great Southern’s food lived up to its name. A meal there is likely to remind you of home. That is, of course, if home is the coastal southeast.
Colleen Coffield Sachs is restaurant reviewer for the Daily News. She dines unannounced at area restaurants for this column. You may write to her in care of the newspaper at P.O. Box 2949, Fort Walton Beach, FL 32549.
