Hendersonville in the 1980s wasn’t exactly a gourmet’s dream. The addition of Waffle House after the completion of Vietnam Veterans Boulevard in 1990 counted as big dining news.
Now, of course, Indian Lake Boulevard is Cool Springs Lite, with row after row of mundane middlebrow chain restaurants. But in the Reagan era, a family’s options for a sit-down meal were fairly limited, short of a drive across Mansker Creek into Rivergate for a “treat” at Woody’s or The Shack.
Shonjito
There was, of course, a Shoney’s — old enough that it still had the Big Boy out front. It was where my earliest brush with death came, as a paramedic once had to slap my back to dislodge an oyster cracker stuck in my throat. It was where seemingly everyone in town came for breakfast during an ice storm that knocked out the entire city’s power. (Shoney’s somehow dodged this fate.)
And it was where I drank RC Cola by the bucketful. My parents usually stuck with sweet tea, as liquor-by-the-drink didn’t come to Hendersonville until much later (and brought with it another dining option: Applebee’s!). And, c’mon, you can’t get a cocktail at Shoney’s.
Until now.
Shoney’s hasn’t changed as much as Hendersonville has in the ensuing 30 years. They still have Slim Jim sandwiches, the breakfast bar in the morning, and the soup, salad and fruit bar with a rotating hot-food buffet for lunch and dinner. (Friday is still seafood bar day.)
But now, Shoney’s has a bar bar, too. Like the kind with drinks. Alcoholic drinks.
When investor David Davoudpour took over the Nashville-based restaurant chain, he promised to return it to its glory days. In 2014, he announced some locations would add beer, wine and liquor in an effort to draw more customers. One of the first locations offering alcohol, coincidentally, is the location in Acworth, Ga., owned by former professional wrestler Scott Steiner.
Not all locations offer booze alongside the hot-fudge cake (White Bridge Road still teetotals), and not all the locations that do have a bar are stocked up with the ingredients for the signature cocktails. (On a recent visit, the Shoney’s by Nissan Stadium really struggled in this regard). Don’t go looking for high-end craft beer or that special bottle of wine, because the options at Shoney’s are fairly pedestrian. But, look — if you want to slam down a sugary liquor drink with your broccoli-and-cheese soup, they’ve got you covered.
In honor of the olden days, I started with the Natural Sweet Tea, an uncomplicated mix of sweet tea and Tito’s Vodka. (Give this to Shoney’s: They make most of their cocktails with call liquor; there’s even a Patrón margarita.) It was straightforward, if a little heavy on the vodka, and looked exactly like a normal sweet tea. Perfect for a surreptitious quaff at an after-church lunch when you might see a fellow member of the congregation.
Presumably, the cocktail the restaurant is proudest of is the Shonjito, which comes with a helpful trademark symbol next to its name on the menu, but without a helpful pronunciation guide. As when dining in a foreign country, pointing at the item you want on the Shoney’s cocktail menu is a good plan of attack. Bizarrely, considering this is the signature signature cocktail, this was one of the options unavailable at the stadium location, as the bar lacked the mojito mix. They were ready for it at Donelson, though. There’s nothing particularly special about the Shonjito that differentiates it from a regular mojito, except that they offer you myriad flavored rum options (strawberry, citrus, guava, mango or raspberry), but weirdly, it’s not available with just regular-ass rum. Like the aforementioned boozy tea, it was just fine.
If you’re getting the idea that Shoney’s cocktail choices run to the umbrella-in-the-drink side of the spectrum, you’re spot on. The three most tropical choices are actually the best of the bunch. The Easy Breezy, which is little more than pineapple-infused Tito’s served in a martini glass, is a good get-to-the-point kind of cocktail that plenty of bartenders with their elaborate muddles and whispers and rosemary garnishes would do well to mimic. The Fly-On Punch follows the old Bajan punch formula of “One of Sour, Two of Sweet, Three of Strong, Four of Weak” to success, if not virtuosity.
Panama City Beach Breeze
The standout drink, though, is the Panama City Beach Breeze, made with Malibu rum, cranberry and pineapple juices, and sweet-and-sour mix. Because the liquor comes in at a paltry 21 percent ABV, the PCB Breeze goes down easy and is what obnoxious self-described beer connoisseurs would call “sessionable.” It has a pleasant coral color and the sweetness is balanced by the tart cranberry.
Honestly, the biggest advantage Shoney’s has in the booze game is price, as nearly every selection is in the $7-$9 range. If, as Davoudpour intimated, the idea is to just have the option of alcohol rather than making it a centerpiece, it cleared the bar, so to speak. But no one is going to go out of their way to booze it up with Shoney Bear.
That said, find yourself in a place like 1986 Hendersonville and in need of a quaff? You certainly could do worse than the Panama City Beach Breeze.
