RestaurantScape: Bluegrass Kitchen
Click to enlarge. Photo for thegazz.com by Walker DeVille
There was some back-and-forth in the gazz foodblog, “There’s a Blog In My Soup” (the finest named blog for 50 miles) about the ups and downs of the culinary experience at the Bluegrass Kitchen restaurant on Charleston’s East End. I have always enjoyed my meals here, especially a pumpkin beer they had the other week which carved a smile in my face. But the boite deserves points, too, for displaying area art so well, even if the place looks just this side of rumpled and dissolute, without going overboard. Kind of like a fashionable college student who brushes his/her hair with one hand and looks nice in whatever he/she throws on after leaping out of bed.
October 22nd, 2006 at 8:29 pm
The Gazz continues its love affair with this mediocre eating establishment.
I suppose it is the hip thing to do.
Im my ever so humble opinion it is simply a Top Cats with a slight smell of patchouli in the air.
October 23rd, 2006 at 2:36 pm
The first and only time I ever went to this place was to meet a friend who lived in the nieghborhood. I passed it by a couple of times because there was no sign. When I mentioned it to the guy waiting on us he said they didn’t have a sign because they had enough business. He acted ever so slightly affronted that I would suggest they do anything as common as putting a sign outside so customers could find it.
I suppose they are keeping out the riff raff.
I never went back.
October 23rd, 2006 at 5:55 pm
I had high hopes for this restaurant. The East End needed a good place to eat and relax.
Unfortunately, the last post refects the opinion of many.
Perhaps the Bluegrass is content serving meals to their friends and fellow travelers. As for me a my friends, we’ll remember our first visit and won’t return.
October 24th, 2006 at 2:14 pm
The weird thing about places like this is that when they go out of business they always have as many excuses as a redneck going to jail. They blame the economy, they blame lack of parking, they blame a dearth of sophisticated diners and lament that the masses want McDonalds.
But when you treat customers like you are doing them a favor by allowing them to eat in your restaurant then pretty soon, you open up one day and nobody comes.
That makes me sad too because I know how much blood, sweat and tears goes into opening a business. Not to mention money. I like having an alternative to Applebees. But these places don’t know the basics of a good restaurant - good service, good food, fairly priced. It’s that simple. Pseudo hipness is no substitute for good service and good food.
This place is a classic naked emporer waiting to happen. Too bad.
October 24th, 2006 at 10:21 pm
How true.
I’m afraid the service / food will only get worse as the owners begin to work on opening yet another East End hip hangout across the street as was reported in the Gazette a few weeks ago.
Maybe try and get this one right first.
The art is good, the food is mediocre and the service is non-existent. Not many folks go out to eat to view the art.
Bluegrass Kitchen, lighten up on the hip, quit believing your own PR and all of your friends who tell you how great (cool, hip, etc.) the place is and focus on making your food good and your staff accommodating. Then maybe you won’t go the way of so many restaurants – out of business.