A Total Experience

See. Smell. Hear. Touch. Taste. These five words are the building blocks for a beguiling restaurant aptly named Five Senses. The designers/architects/builders are Mollie Murphree and Mitchell Murphree, a sister/brother, front-of-the-house/back-of-the-house team raised in Paris, Tenn. It is there, growing up on and around the farms owned by both sets of grandparents, that the foundation for their calling was formed, to be laid one year ago in a strip center on a busy commercial thoroughfare in Murfreeesboro. “Growing up, we were accustomed to eating out of the garden, of food coming fresh from the ground to the table,” says Chef Mitchell. “Even so, I was the pickiest eater ever as a child.” “I am not a picky eater by any stretch of the imagination,” Mollie attests. “I have always loved food and have always loved to cook.” The paths that took them from Paris to Murfreesboro wound first through Knoxville, where both attended UT—she majored in business and advertising, he in food science. Both worked as servers in restaurants, but then Mitchell made a U-turn into the kitchen of The Tomato Head and hasn’t changed course since. “Tomato Head was a great restaurant, owned by a woman, and very vegetarian-friendly,” he remembers. “I was working as a server, and one day she suggested I move into the kitchen. I don’t think I was a very good server. And once I got into the kitchen, I never wanted to leave.” From there, he took a route north, to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park; Mollie moved to Nashville. After graduation from CIA, Mitchell went back to Tennessee to consider his options. He knew he ultimately wanted to open his own restaurant, but figured that practical experience in established kitchens might be a plus. Since Southern regional food was in his blood and bones, he zeroed in on cities below the Mason-Dixon; with a pile of résumés in hand, he got in his jeep for a two-week odyssey to culinary meccas. He began at Blackberry Farm in Knoxville, then made a call to Birmingham, inquiring about any available positions at a place someone had recommended: Highlands Grill. “I had heard of Highlands Grill, and I had heard of Frank Stitt, but I didn’t know the extent of his or his restaurant’s reputation until I got there. I really lucked out.” Indeed. Since opening his career-making landmark restaurant in 1982, Alabama native Stitt has earned a passionately loyal clientele, a fervent following among young chefs and national acclaim. He has since opened two other Birmingham restaurants, Bottega and Chez Fonfon, and last year published a stunning cookbook, Frank Stitt’s Southern Table: Recipes and Gracious Traditions From Highlands Bar and Grill. Mitchell gained entrée to Stitt’s empire as assistant pastry chef at Highlands and over the next two years ended up logging time at all three restaurants in escalating positions. Meanwhile, Mollie was sounding the siren call from Music City, right around the same time that Mitchell had gotten word that there was a chef’s position at B. McNeel’s, an independent restaurant just off Murfreesboro’s town square. Packing his knives, he bid a fond farewell to Birmingham and moved north. Back in close proximity, the siblings began talking about opening a restaurant together, with each of them bringing complementary skills to the table. Mollie was keen on Nashville, but down in the chain-dominant ’Boro, Mitchell saw a need for more independents. When a virgin space opened up in the new, upscale Georgetown Park shopping center, they grabbed it and set about making it their own. “We knew we wanted it to have a small, separate bar, a fun dining room, some private space for dining and an open kitchen,” Mollie says. Mitchell had a clear vision for his side of the house: “I didn’t want to scare people with the food or be too froufrou. You have to serve people what they want, what they know, but you can do that in creative ways and bring them along with you. I feel like people in Murfreesboro have been underestimated as far as their tastes and sophistication are concerned, and underserved when it comes to creative dining choices.” The siblings’ mission is clear from the moment a diner passes through the door into the lively restaurant; in fact, the writing is all over the brightly painted walls of the cozy dining room, in the form of black-framed quotes about food and dining. Among them, this from Julia Child: “If you are afraid of butter, use cream.” And this from Virginia Woolf: “One cannot think well, love well, sleep well if one hasn’t dined well.” While the mood is casual, guests are not cheated of fine-dining accoutrements; heavy white plates in different shapes provide a clean canvas for the beautifully presented food. Service is friendly, easygoing, but efficient, and the wine list is an adventure for even well-traveled connoisseurs. As one of my wine-savvy guests remarked, “I don’t recognize a single wine on this list.” Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Mollie admits that her intent is to have wines exclusive to Five Senses. “Mitchell and I try every wine on this list; we look for things for people to try that are priced reasonably enough to enable them to do so.” Our server was very patient as we sampled several before settling on a red and a white that we liked. It is in the food where Five Senses shines, and where—as Frank Stitt does—Mitchell marries his rural background to his culinary school training, applying classical techniques to regional products. The restaurant’s location has proven to be particularly fortuitous in one way Mitchell had not expected. “I didn’t realize there were so many farmers in this area. When we were open for a while, they started bringing me things they grow locally: organic lettuces, shiitake mushrooms, figs, asparagus, squash blossoms.” The bounty plays itself out nightly in the Five Senses kitchen, now harvesting autumnal fare, the menu in its fourth edition since opening. The roasted quail starter deliciously fills the apple-a-day recommendation; the tiny bird is stuffed with cornbread, diced apples and sage leaves, split and splayed over sliced green apples on a shallow pool of apple-brandy sauce. Everyone in my party had different expectations of what the hot country ham dip would be, none of them particularly favorable, but we were pleasantly surprised with the ramekin of warm creamy dip studded with small pieces of country ham, its saltiness balanced by the cream cheese tang. The smoked trout cake is not surprisingly an intensely fishy version of a crab cake; I wish the accompanying, fresh-from-the-garden marinated bean salad—with limas, garbanzos, red beans, white beans and black-eyed peas—was sold by the quart to take home. The fried oyster salad had a painfully slow route around the table as each diner regretfully passed along the silky morsels of meat, batter-crisped on a bed of baby greens with a spicy rémoulade, grilled red onion and slivers of country ham. Land entrées, as they are categorized on the menu, are robust and earthy. The meats are braised or grilled, served with substantial comfort-food sides like cabbage, grits, mashed sweet potatoes and mashed potatoes infused with apples or horseradish. The braised lamb shank was pulled from the bone, tossed with sundried tomatoes and feta cheese, and strewn atop a bed of mushroom-barley risotto. Four exquisitely composed and executed water entrées compose the delicate ying to the brawny yang of the lamb shank, pork chop and braised beef short ribs. The mahi-mahi is first poached in a light tomato broth, which is served in a bowl, then placed atop a mound of country ham, spinach and mushroom risotto. Succulent seared scallops team up with a crunchy grit cake atop a bed of halved baby brussels sprouts and meaty mushrooms in a rich pesto cream sauce. Diners who want an extrasensory experience should request a stool at the kitchen-bar, which encircles the cooking area and allows one to see, smell, hear, touch and taste the process from start to divine finish. “Once people try the kitchen bar, they never want to sit anywhere else,” says Mollie.Likewise, once people experience Five Senses, they might not want to eat anywhere else in Murfreesboro but there. The question Nashvillians invariably pose when considering an out-of-county restaurant is whether or not it’s worth the drive. My response is absolutely, with one qualifier: if you plan to enjoy the wine list along with the food, appoint a designated driver. And you might want to make a reservation before setting out on I-24; Mollie and Mitchell Murphree have given the ’Boro a superb restaurant to call their own, and regulars are pretty possessive of their seats. Five Senses has introduced live jazz on Friday and Saturday nights from 10 p.m. until midnight. Wednesday is Champagne and Oysters night.