Lesley Stracks-Mullem knew she had a tall order to fill for the San Francisco “foodie” relatives who visited her and her husband in Durham.
“They wanted to eat as much as possible in a day and a half, and we wanted to show them all of our favorite restaurants,” she said of the fall 2008 visit. “So I planned an appetizer and wine tour of downtown Durham the first night and an elaborate barbecue tour the next day, where we went to seven restaurants in about six hours.”
At the time, she was finishing graduate school and looking for work during a difficult economy.
“I thought that tour was as much fun to plan as it was to go on and maybe there might be a market for something like this,” she said.
Stracks-Mullem began talking to restaurant owners, chefs and friends and soliciting feedback for a Durham food tour. A colleague introduced her to Joe Philipose, a native New Yorker and Durham resident who also had been looking for a way to show people the best of what their city had to offer.
“I was relatively new to the area and discovering all these wonderful restaurants and food shops,” Philipose said. “All of my neighbors, who had been here longer, had little exposure to them. I wanted to introduce people to the wonderful food culture right in their backyard.”
The pair researched food events in other places and launched Taste Carolina’s walking tours of Durham and Chapel Hill in March 2009. A few months later, they added a Raleigh tour.
This year, the company expanded its tours to Greensboro, Hillsborough and Winston-Salem — held every Saturday rain or shine.
To date they’ve given more than 5,000 food-lovers a taste of the region’s finest fare.
Taste Carolina offers more than just samplings from various restaurants. The three-hour tour features a behind-the-scenes experience, meeting chefs, restaurant owners and managers and hearing their stories. Tours emphasize the importance of learning where food comes from and using local ingredients whenever possible for a fresh, “farm-to-fork” approach. Guests also learn interesting tidbits and trivia about local history and architecture along the route.
Each tour visits seven or eight restaurants and other food-related spots. In Greensboro, stops include Undercurrent, Jammin’ George’s, the Downtown Farm Market, the Edible Schoolyard at Greensboro Children’s Museum, Cheesecakes by Alex, Table 16 and Bin 33.
In Winston-Salem, two tours are offered. The Downtown to West End tour visits Mozelle’s Fresh Southern Bistro, Haute Chocolate, City Beverage, the City Beverage Farmers Market, Caffe Prada, Noma Urban Bar and Grill, Foothills Brewing, and Bib’s Downtown while the Downtown to Arts District tour stops at Breakfast Of Course, 6th and Vine, Sweet Potatoes, Mooney’s Mediterranean Cafe, Tate’s Craft Cocktails, Camino Bakery and Bib’s Downtown.
Tours typically feature the same lineup of stops but are subject to change. Guests enjoy a tasting at each stop that is determined by the chef or owner. It may be a light salad and glass of wine or several small dishes and a few bites of dessert, but with so many stops along the way, participants are usually full by the tour’s end.
“The food is delicious, but providing a platform for the participants to have an insider experience is also part of the fun,” said Meredith Pettegrow, Taste Carolina’s director of operations, who guided a recent tour of downtown Greensboro.
At Undercurrent, the first stop, owner Ben Roberts told the story of his restaurant and showed guests his new patio and Wagner Room for special events. Chef Michael Harkenreader prepared grilled bistro steak with a raspberry ver jus, Oregon cheddar and potato croquettes, and haricot verts (green beans) poached in a bacon-chicken stock.
“We take our food from square one. Everything is made from scratch,” Roberts said. “It’s so nice to be able to tell a captive audience about everything we do.”
At Jammin’ George’s, Lebanon native George Daher’s all-natural, homemade jams, jellies and Middle Eastern delicacies were a hit. Daher shared his hummus, baba ghanouj (dip made with roasted eggplant, tahini, lemon juice and garlic), tabbouleh (a salad of bulgur, parsley, mint, tomato, onion, olive oil and lemon juice), falafel (fried bites of ground chickpeas with tahini sauce) and burma (a shredded phyllo pastry filled with pistachios).
“I grew up on this food, and we like to make it the way I remember it tasting,” said Daher, who buys most of his ingredients from the Downtown Farm Market next door, the tour’s third stop.
Downtown Farm Market owner Mike Causey shared decadent butter-pecan and blueberry ice creams from Homeland Creamery with guests as he bagged customers’ purchases. Scores of shoppers, including a few local chefs, filed in and out, gathering fresh produce from bins piled high.
“I coordinate this market with 43 farms in North Carolina,” Causey said. “We’re helping small farms stay in business, and when people shop here, they’re also helping them, plus getting the freshest, best foods they can possibly find.”
Pettegrow told the story of author O. Henry and his connection to Greensboro on the way to the Greensboro Children’s Museum’s Edible Schoolyard, a half-acre, hands-on organic teaching garden where kids learn how fruits and vegetables are grown. The group tasted sweet peas right off the vine and freshly plucked radishes as they learned about renowned chef Alice Waters of Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley, Calif. Waters is the founder of the original Edible Schoolyard there.
“I really liked the Edible Schoolyard. The idea of it is so cool,” said Allison David, an elementary-school teacher from Winston-Salem . “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Yamile Nazar of Greensboro, who was entertaining her brother and sister-in-law, Robert and Sandra Nazar of New York, said she enjoyed the tour even though she had previously visited many of the restaurants.
During her brother’s last visit seven years ago, he was surprised by the lack of traffic downtown, Yamile said. This time, she was determined to show the couple how much Greensboro has to offer.
“Robert kept teasing me that downtown had tumbleweeds the last time he was here,” she said. “But it’s been revitalized so much since then. I just love my city.”
His response to the tour?
“It was fantastic!” he said.
His wife agreed.
“We’ve always been foodies, especially living in New York,” she said. “I’d definitely recommend this.”
After a trek through Center City Park, Pettegrow told the history of Porter Drug Store and the Jefferson Standard building. Outside the International Civil Rights Center & Museum, she talked about the Greensboro Four’s 1960 sit-in at the segregated Woolworth’s lunch counter.
At Cheesecakes by Alex, the group sampled a well-received variety of cheesecakes –– New York style, pineapple, pumpkin, white-chocolate raspberry, mint chocolate, key lime, peanut butter and sweet potato, among others –– and compared favorites.
Katelyn Lamar of Durham, a former UNCG student visiting with her husband, Peter, was impressed by downtown’s growth.
“I’ve been gone for four years, and I’m thinking, 'That’s new, and we didn’t have that before,’” she said. “I never even knew about the farm market. What a great way to learn more about the area.”
At Table 16, owner and chef Graham Heaton prepared prawn corn dogs; sweet slaw with jicama, carrots and beets; sliced “Mr. Stripey” tomatoes topped with fresh greens and feta; and apricot bread pudding.
“We’ve got a 12-season philosophy,” Heaton said. “Basically, whatever produce is at the height of its availability dictates what goes on our menu .”
Next door at Bin 33, owner John Jones and chef Eric Moss presented guests with chilled New Zealand sauvignon blanc and shrimp salad made with local ingredients, something Jones also feels strongly about.
“I go with local ingredients every time I can,” he said. “What Taste Carolina is doing is a great way to get people to start thinking about where their food comes from.”
As the group enjoyed salads of shredded cabbage from the mountains, marinated shrimp, basil, cherries from Levering Orchard in Virginia and pickled watermelon, they chatted about the day and made plans to return to their favorite spots.
“Even people who live in these cities don’t experience them in the way that we show it to them,” Philipose said. “So many of our towns are having a downtown renaissance, and we want to support that. And besides, I don’t know anyone who doesn’t love to eat.”
Contact Tammy Holoman at tjholoman@gmail.com
