You know who you are. Those women lounging on your lunch hour. Clearly not going back to the office in your jeans and trendy top. Maybe you were even still in your tennis skirt. Regardless, I was envious. In my uncomfortable heels and stuffy suit I vowed to have at least a day as a lady who lunched. Well, we all get vacation eventually! So my friend
Elin and I decided to have a day of cultural expansion. Since it was going to be a long day we headed for lunch first. We happened to be snooping around the
Gultch to see where soon-to-open tequila bar,
Agave, is located. Luckily, we found it. Even luckier, it's next door to Jason
Brumm's Radius 10. Hailing from the panhandle I knew first-hand about
Brumm's seafood experience after eating time after time at
Cafe 30A in
Seagrove.
The
Radius 10 lunch menu includes twists on such gulf faves as shrimp and grits, blackened grouper and oyster
po-boys. He adds scallops to the grits along with a corn ragout. His
Destin Black Grouper sits in a lobster bacon broth and is served with shrimp and fingerling potatoes. Lastly, my lunching lady special was the oyster and shrimp
po-boy served on crusty french bread laced in tarter and topped with green tomatoes. The fry batter was not too thick but not too thin and the portions were substantial (plus the rock shrimp were huge!) I subbed out the curly fries for their sweet potato chips. I suggest all
lunchers to do the same. My partner in crime,
Elin, split the arugula salad with me. While the g
orgonzola/pear/walnut combination is usually one of my favorites, the salad is not very large. I don't suggest splitting starters here (and it's cautioned on the menu by adding a surcharge). However, her lobster pizza was covered in their yummy pesto. I couldn't taste the lobster much but the goat cheese and
pancetta shine through. If you can't handle a lunch hour cocktail I recommend one of their Jones sodas, specialty teas or lemonades. PS - Service at lunch is speedy and the weather is getting better for mid-day meals on their cool deck with views of downtown. Plus,
Radius 10 is an OpenTable.com partner where you can make your reservations online. How easy.
After we charged our stomachs we headed to the
Frist. While we enjoyed the Chinese 19
th century art, modern Chinese photography exhibit and lastly the Sylvia Hyman clay showing and film, the only one we saw last week that is still up is the Ashcan Leisure paintings upstairs. These are mildly interesting and if you are longing for New York scenes in the park they will ease your pain a bit. I don't recommend going out of your way. Right now the
Frist boats an exhibit on how they grew from a post office to an art center. I would plan a trip after November 16 when there will be 3 new exhibits in full swing: Australian photographer Rosemary
Laing's work, 1920's-1940's modern European and American art and Middle Tennessee's up-and-coming artist's work. That makes your $8.50 adult ticket go a long way.
If you haven't caught
3:10 to Yuma in the theatre I recommend it. I'm not a huge movie-goer and this did not get rave reviews. I haven't seen a good western since
Tombstone so if you are
jonesin' for a little cowboy/Indian, good guy versus bad guy action then catch it before DVD does. It doesn't hurt that you get to look at Christian Bale and Russell
Crowe for 2 hours.
Now, girls, that should fire you up. Stop wining about the ladies who lunch and just join them for the day. If you didn't spend all your vacation days on the beach then use one up before your folks steal them over the holidays.
KEEP EATING OUT, NASHVILLE!
Featured sites:
http://www.radius10.com/http://www.fristcenter.org/http://www.opentable.com/start.aspx?m=30www.movies.aol.com/movie/310-to-yuma-2007/25306/main
