This past Christmas, we decided to forgo the required gathering in Corpus Christi and present exchange for a family trip to Charleston. I love food, I love traveling, hence I will travel for food and Charleston is tops when it comes to food. Think of a grown-up New Orleans. You would have to try REALLY hard to find a bad meal, and everything you order off the menu will be fantastic…but no go cups.

Our food journey went just like this:

Indaco. Warm and inviting environment (we walked in at 9pm with a toddler and no reservation) and VERY creative cocktails – I had the Chai Me A River, which is comprised of Tito’s, lemongrass, chai, falernum, grapefuit, lemon and bitters! Stellar pizza and the 2^nd best carbonara I have ever, the black pepper tagliatelle. Service was fantastic – which is the norm here.

Harold’s Cabin. Grocery store turned restaurant, and partially owned by Bill Murray, this place was the tits! Felt very old Austin, everything was SUPER fresh and they pull ingredients from their roof top garden. Bonus – they gifted my kid with not 1, but 2 kids Christmas gifts AND a raccoon is their unofficial mascot. We were there for lunch and the fried oyster sandwich with bacon jam was delish and the bloody mary was outstanding!!!

Fleet Landing. My dad and step-sister picked this place. I typically shy away form overly touristy places…and I am controlling, so I wasn’t expecting much. They wanted seafood and to see the water, so there we went. The service was the 2^nd best we had the entire trip (nothing can top the crown jewel of the next post) and the food was phenomenal. I fell in love with a local oyster they just call blades and our server harvests them.  Not too big and the perfect amount of salinity. Gulf coast feel with east coast flavor!

Hominy Grill. This is a must for every visit, ha. This time I discovered the Charleston Nasty biscuit – fried chicken breast on the most bestest biscuit covered with jalapeno, cheese and sausage gravy. Yes, it was as good as it sounds.  She-crab soup, fried chicken, fried green tomatoes, shrimp and grits – it is ALL good here.

The Ordinary. I had to come back here because I was pregnant on our last trip to Charleston and I didn’t get to have 1,000 oysters. It used to be a bank and is now a decked out oyster hall and I want every piece of décor for my house. It’s seriously perfect. And they have Hawaiian rolls, you haven’t lived if you haven’t had a fired oyster slider on a Hawaiian roll!

This should be enough to sink your teeth into for now. More to come…Part deux later this week.

Full belly = happy lady,

Gina