Dining
Margot Café and Bar
1017 Woodland St. 227-4668Sunday Brunch served 11 a.m.-2 p.m.; reservations recommended
A couple of Sundays ago, I arranged to meet friends for brunch in East Nashville’s Five Points, within walking distance of their homes; we set the rendezvous for 11 a.m., getting the first reservations of the day with the intent of beating late-risers. What I somehow forgot until about 10:30 that morning, as I was reading the sports section in my 12 South home, was that the Titans were playing the Colts at the Coliseum that day.
I’ve been to enough Titans games to know that a noon kickoff means that ingress to the stadium peaks around 11 a.m., so I went into hurry-up offense, jumped in the car, zigzagged my way through the outskirts of downtown to the backside of the Gateway Bridge and sailed right over, only to be met on the other side by what looked like the entire Metro Police Department. I was perhaps the only person in the fleet of vehicles not going to the game, and the cops directed me to the one through-lane that allowed me to continue past the Coliseum and onto Shelby Street.
Arriving about 10 minutes late, I explained what had happened. The East Nashvillians nodded their heads in acknowledgement: it’s awful, they agreed. You have to plan your whole Sunday around the traffic. Game days totally cut us off from the rest of the city. Other people can’t get in, and we can’t get out. We’re trapped over here.
I looked around the cozy, sunlit, brick-walled room, eyed the blood orange mimosa that had just been delivered to our beautifully set table, and glanced down at the menu that was teasing me with painful choices—the poached eggs with prosciutto and Hollandaise on toasted Tuscan bread, or the breakfast casserole with sausage, caramelized onions and shiitake mushroom cream sauce? And there, in the open kitchen to my right, was Margot McCormack. If only I could be trapped here more often.
I can think of no better place to be on a lazy Sunday afternoon than at Margot Café and Bar. While hotels set out the all-you-can-eat feeding trough, and many restaurants treat brunch as a no-brainer, McCormack and her staff approach the meal with the same confident creativity, meticulous attention to detail and seamless execution they display for their dinner patrons.
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As the dinner menu changes nightly, the Sunday brunch menu changes weekly—dependent on McCormack’s mood and whim, what other chefs are in the kitchen with her and, particularly, what’s available and freshest that day. In July, when local corn was at its sweetest, corn bisque was a starter; in October, sweet potato bisque took its turn on the bill of fare.
Count on an assortment of sweet breads and an artisan cheese selection among the starters, though we opted instead to begin with a salad of baby spinach, lamb, grilled eggplant and feta, and a pan-fried trout with apple, fennel and red onion salad. The first was earthy and intensely flavored, the second light and beautifully balanced.
Typically, there will be 10 entrées, though they are hardly typical of most brunch items around town. Dishes with bread—whether it be the French toasted croissants, the egg sandwich with aged cheddar and aioli, or McCormack’s superb version of eggs Benedict on Tuscan bread—will be made with the best bread, dismissing any silly concerns about carb intake. For heaven’s sake, what is life without good bread? Or fat, for that matter? The rich, buttery, melt-in-your-mouth goodness of the smoked salmon crepes oozing mascarpone cheese leaves no room for self-denial. Frenchwomen don’t allow themselves such pesky thoughts, and neither should you.
How do you soothe the pain from a lively night before? Protein and starch work for me; a fried or grilled steak, served with eggs and potatoes, will do the trick. Hearty hashes and casseroles cooked up with bacon, sausage or beef perform the same Sunday service.
It would be impossible—almost immoral, really—to send a plate back to McCormack’s kitchen that was not picked clean, so I am grateful for the portion control performed at the source. We could not have been more satisfied, and yet none of us were struck with the need to loll supine on the nearest sofa, as is often the case after a hearty midday meal.
Instead, after a cup of French-pressed coffee, we walked across the street to 3 Crow Bar for one of Nashville’s best Bloody Marys and caught the second half of the Titans game. If you’re going to be trapped in East Nashville, you might as well make the most of it.