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grub notes
Motherly Grub
MAMA JEWEL’S AND MOTHER PHO MOSTLY IMPRESS
By Hillary Brown food@flagpole.com
BAXTER IMPROVES: If you are a naturally skeptical person
living in the South, you might tend to react to Paula Deen-
style hyperbolic Southernness with a raised eyebrow. A
new restaurant calling itself something like Mama Jewel’s
Kitchen (1075 Baxter St., 706-
850-9797) would not automati
cally be on your good side, evoking
the sort of down-home nostalgia
meant to cover laziness in the
kitchen.
But your skepticism would be
mostly wrong, because Mama
Jewel’s is a perfectly pleasant and
low-key place, not to mention a
welcome addition to Baxter, where
it has taken over the former Mirko
Pasta, making it the fifth good to
pretty-darn-good restaurant on
the block between West Hancock
and Collins. That’s not bad at all
for a street that has a reputation
for killing the dreams of would-be
restaurant owners.
Mama Jewel’s is Southern,
yes, but it’s not nearly as cutesy
about it as the name suggests.
The interior is clean and bright,
with vases of fresh flowers, a few
flat-screen TVs that don’t intrude
too much and a big bookshelf one
can browse. A high-top bar—just
for eating; the restaurant doesn’t
serve alcohol—looks out the window and is a nice place to
eat solo.
There is food for ladies who lunch (salads, chicken salad)
and food for ladies who are hungover (biscuit plates, hearty
hot entrees). The chicken salad, which comes in three
varieties—classic with hard-boiled eggs and pickle relish;
mild pineapple and almond; and grape and blue cheese with
pecans (the best)—isn’t anything to sing hallelujahs about,
but it’s fine. The meatloaf is overpowered by its sweet,
ketchup-y sauce. The egg, bacon and cheese sandwich is
a good idea but needs a few more tweaks: slightly crisper
bacon, so you don’t yank a whole slice out with your teeth;
a sharper cheese; perhaps some hot sauce or spicy mustard.
The grits need some zip, too.
Some things are excellent. The collard greens available as
a side are maybe the best I’ve had in Athens outside of my
mother-in-law’s kitchen. Cooked with ham, they retain just
a touch of bitterness but haven’t been ruined with sugar or
red pepper flakes or any of the other ridiculous things peo
ple add. They have a little bit of texture but not too much,
they’re not wet, and they marry salt and vegetal flavors
with beauty. The corned beef hash is another item not to
miss, consisting of small cubes of the salt-cured fatty meat
tossed in a frying pan with seasoned potatoes. It may seem
like a weird item in a Southern restaurant, but it’s fine stuff.
The biscuits themselves make up a large portion of the
menu, and if you split them rather than biting into them
like a savage, their crusty exterior marries well with their
softer interior. If you happen to order the peach cobbler
(enthusiastically recommended by all three staff members
behind the counter in unison), you may find yourself ignor
ing the cobbler, although it’s perfectly serviceable, in favor
of the small cups of fresh cinnamon whipped cream that
come with it. Dunk your biscuit in one of those and you will
be happy.
Here’s to the occasional defeat of cynicism! Mama
Jewel’s is open 6:30 a.m.-2 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 6:30
a.m.-8 p.m. Friday and 8 a.m.-8 p.m. Saturday. It does
take-out with speed.
TWINSIES: Speaking of names, Mother Pho (167 E. Broad
St. 706-354-6006), which has taken over the former
Yummy Pho downtown, may make
you snicker when you hear the staff
answer the phone. (Pho is pro
nounced “fuh.”) It is not tremen
dously different in most ways from
its predecessor, but the quality has
not diminished. The prices are a
bit higher ($5.99 versus $4.75 for
a banh mi), but the menu is some
what expanded, for example with a
banh xeo, a rice-flour-based crepe
filled with shrimp, sliced pork
and bean sprouts. Grab a piece of
lettuce, wrap it around a hunk of
crepe and dunk it in the spicy nuoc
cham sauce.
The “Mother Fresh rolls” (grilled
pork summer rolls, basically) are
fat and tasty. The banh mi could
use a little more pate, and the
jalapenos are kind of like play
ing roulette as far as their level of
spice, but the pickled carrots and
the other fillings are good and fla
vorful. Shaking Beef (cubes of beef
quickly cooked with onions and a
soy-based sauce) is tender but not
hugely exciting. Better is the yel
low curry, which is fairly spicy even at a 3 on the scale of
1-5 that customers use to indicate what level of heat they
desire. Both come with jasmine rice.
The pho itself is slightly less fragrant than at Just Pho,
over on Baxter Street, but if you doctor it up with the plate
of peppers, herbs, limes and bean sprouts that comes on
the side, there isn’t a huge difference. Mother Pho is open
from 11 a.m.-9 p.m. every day and runs a slightly less tight
ship when UGA is on break.
WHAT UPP: Get the scoop on all local food news by book-
marking the Grub Notes blog at flagpole.com. ©
Mama Jewel’s Kitchen
CLUB T-SHIRTS
'ADDITIONAL PRINT $5 . SHORT-SLEEVED DTG
NO MINIMUMS • NO SETUP FEES • FREE ARTWORK
(706) 354-8529 • athens@bigfrog.com
1880 EPPS BRIDGE PKWY, SUITE 110, ATHENS • BEHIND CHICK-FIL-A
14 FLAGPOLE.COM • MARCH 23, 2016