Lets give it a try!

For those of you who don't know me personally, I am a server at a fine dining restaurant located in downtown Chattanooga. Today on my break from work one of my fellow servers and I decided to try out the new competition in town.

Public House Chattanooga is a small restaurant located by the main entrance to Warehouse Row. The exact location is the corner of Market St. and 12th St. (A.k.a. Houston St.) The owner of the restaurant is Nathan Lindley, the brother of the owner of St. Johns. It is nice to see a little competition coming down to our side of town.

The restaurant itself is quite small. I believe I remember someone saying the interior seats somewhere around 80 with about 30 additional seats on the patio. When we arrived, the patio was relatively full with just a few other people dining inside. The decor is very simple. The white walls and furniture give the restaurant a very clean look. In the back area of the restaurant there are large curtains which can block off sections for larger parties to feel less crowded. The bar was very small, but had a very interesting look to it. Also, the wine machine looked very neat. It is a machine which holds the bottles of wine it is displaying and siphons the wine into spouts which can easily be poured. It has a cool look to it, but I would have to work it myself to see if the look was worth the maintenance.

The prices for lunch are about the same as the prices for our lunch at Table 2; between 6-10 dollars for full lunch entrees. They offered a decent selection of salads and a few different meat entrees including Mahi Mahi, Short Ribs, and Fried Chicken that is brined in sweet tea.

Water is served "french style" in a large refillable bottle with no ice. I personally didn't notice that there was no ice until it was pointed out to me. While it did not bother me, my friend was very unhappy with it. For my meal, I got the Grilled Chicken Club Sandwich with Herbed Fries. My friend got the Grilled Mahi Mahi with Stone Ground Grits and a Mixed Green Salad. The Mahi Mahi was the driest piece of fish I had probably ever tasted. If I were to guess, it seemed like the fish was frozen, not fresh, grilled earlier, and kept in a warming drawer where it lost all its moisture and flavor. The Stone Ground Grits had almost no flavor to them and had to be seasoned by us to make them good. My Chicken Club Sandwich was a large tender chicken breast with with cheese melted on it. There was the standard bacon lettuce and tomato and was served on a large croissant. The Herbed Fries were shoe string style fries. While the sandwich was good, I could have taken Steak n' Shake fries and thrown pepper and parsley on them myself. But, I can't be too critical. Afterall they were just fries.

Service was good. Nothing over the top. He was there when we needed him, but he wasn't over crowding us either. Seemed knowledgable enough to get the job done, but we didn't have many questions for him either.

Overall, I have to give Public House Chattanooga a resounding "Ehhh..." Not great. Not bad. Just... food. I will have to go for dinner to get the full experience, but as of right now it isn't a place I have to go back to. It will be interesting to see what becomes of this restaurant in the coming months.

-Mike-