Food in Chattanooga
We love food! I mean, who doesn’t?!? But I’d be lying if I didn’t say we put a whole ton of time into researching places to eat when we are traveling places. We may not hit the “trendy” spot, but we are always down to try that hole-in-the-wall local restaurant that has awesome cuisine. I realize we never have any food pictures, but I think that’s just because food doesn’t last long in this family 🤣
I mentioned our BBQ pickup from Charlie’s in our first Chattanooga post! I’m rounding up the rest of our good eats here.
Our two nicer meals were at Main Street Meats & Public House. While Main Street Meats wasn’t bad, it left a little to be desired. And then we went to Public House two nights later – it BLEW Main Street Meats out of the water! Main Street Meats had a slightly more eclectic menu, and we felt the value wasn’t as good as Public House. I will say that my burger was very good and the best bang for your buck on the menu. If you’re heading there, I’d recommend expecting more of a burger-type experience over steak. They did have a meat and cheese case that had many yummy looking things in there, but I didn’t get to spend too much time looking at it since I was chasing around 3 kids 😉 Maybe when we go back, we’ll go grab some things out of the case to bring back to the AirBNB to try.
We had way better, and way more, food at Public House & the bill was less! Public House did have a wait, but they have a bar in the back called ‘The Social’ that the hostess mentioned to us when we told her we couldn’t afford the wait time with the little ones. It has the exact same menu, and we literally sat right down. The drinks were also better here than at Main Street if that’s important to you. We had the best server that we’ve had at any restaurant in awhile, which if you enjoy dining out, you know can make all the difference! We ordered the deviled eggs & bacon brittle, fried chicken livers and sauteed sea scallops to start – recommend them all! My mom & I don’t eat chicken livers, but my dad mentioned numerous times that they were “outstanding.” Our main dishes were the Red Wine Braised Pot Roast, Grilled Beef Fillet and Steak & Fries. One was better than the other; seriously!! Their kids menu is spectacular IMO. We don’t typically order off of the kids’ menu because the boys eat too much; we usually just let them share an adult plate. The kids menu has a starter, meal & dessert. We used their appetizer to try out the pimento cheese. We got them the chicken fingers, & y’all, I’m not lying when I say these are some of the best chicken fingers I’ve had. The mac-n-cheese is totally kid friendly if you happen to have “cheesy pasta” lovers like we do 😉 The cookie was so good, too – I may or may not have had them wrap it up to go & eaten it after the boys went to sleep #momperk The portion size of their meal was very generous for the price! They also offer gluten free menus if this helps someone in your group. This restaurant is a must in my opinion. We will go back here again!!
On the day we visited the Tennessee Aquarium downtown, the car was parked in a paid lot and not coming out until we were ready to head home. The weather was nice, so we decided to walk to lunch. This was sort of an audible, and we had to pull out the trusty ole’ phones and start googling! 🤣 We found this delicious Italian restaurant, Tony’s Pasta, that had views of the river. We sat outside because they didn’t have an elevator to accommodate our stroller, but it was a gorgeous day & we didn’t mind one bit. If Gage hadn’t been sleeping in the stroller, we would have been happy to fold it up; but if you’re a parent, you know you’ll do just about anything before waking your toddler up as a last resort 🤣 The food here was sooo good. I mean, my whole family loves Italian food, but my mom’s dad was also from Italy, so we can be kind of picky. This was a winner all around – all 5 dishes we ordered. We had a few “build your own pastas,” but I think the consensus for the favorite was the Fusilli Classic Pasta dish. And the bread; oh man, I have a love-hate relationship with bread. I LOVE it, but it doesn’t love my hips back!! They give you two different types along with some herb-enriched olive oil 😍 Important to note: this walk is about 10 minutes from the aquarium but all uphill. We had to take this long, winding ramp up a big hill (because of the stroller) that legit added an extra 5 minutes. My parents were able to just take the stairs and it was much quicker. It’s uphill there but downhill back after you’ve eaten – that’s a win in our book!
We ordered pizza in one night from Mr. T’s. The parking lot was a little crazy when busy, but you could tell people liked this pizza. It was right there in the St. Elmo neighborhood and took 2 minutes for us to get there. Not the best pizza we’ve ever had, but very good & super cost effective … makes for a fun family night in 😀 We played games and watched ‘Christmas Mickey’ this night!
We also grabbed some pizza when our besties came up to meet us from Huntsville. This time we drove across the river to try out Fiamma Pizza Co. It had great reviews online & it did not disappoint! In addition to the neapolitan style pizza I love, another thing I really liked about it was that you could get single slice pieces if you chose. We didn’t simply because we had a big group, but I love that if you’re by yourself or really want to try out a bunch of different toppings they make it easy. Their menu was extensive, and I found the kids’ menu to be really awesome & fairly priced.
We didn’t make it to Julie Darling Donuts the morning we had planned because everyone slept in. We were more grateful for sleep than worrying about donuts at the time 😉 Another spot we didn’t get to check out was The Hot Chocolatier. I had read they have awesome hot chocolate & we will definitely make it there the next time we go. Honestly not sure why we missed it because we were near it a hundred times!
We also passed Clumpie’s Ice Cream at the lower incline station, and it was bad timing to grab the boys some ice cream & unfortunately we never made it back. Their ice cream is supposed to be awesome & I read the menu – tons of flavors & some that are so unique. They have tons of locations to make it easy to catch up to them. Really sad we missed this one, but it gives us something to look forward to when we make it back there.
Hiking in Chattanooga
On our hiking day, we decided to go just north of town (about a 20 minute drive from St. Elmo) to the Signal Mountain area. Our plan that morning was to hike the Rainbow Lake Trail (or at least part of it). It looked to be a relatively short trail, and since it was a loop we could sort of customize our hike to make it either longer or shorter as needed based on kids’ energy and attention levels. Plus it features a waterfall and a bridge, which we thought would keep the boys intrigued.
Well, we got to the trailhead, and the tiny parking lot was completely full. “No problem, we’ll just find a spot on the street,” we said. Nope, nowhere to pull off – the area is all residential and not at all friendly to curbside parking. Our plan quickly dissolved, and as we continued to drive around looking for parking it became apparent that we would need to come up with a Plan B.
We did a quick look at Google Maps and found a park – Signal Point Park – which not only happened to be a trailhead but was only about a half mile away. Totally worth a shot. There was plenty of parking, plus some pretty decent restrooms. Turns out this is the southern terminus for the extensive (but not yet completed) Cumberland Trail. When completed, the trail will be over 300 miles long, going all the way to Kentucky. We obviously weren’t going quite that far with 3 kids in tow, so we just did the short Signal Point to Julia Falls Overlook segment, which ended up being about 1 mile round trip (Kimberly swears it felt longer & our time suggests the same). The very beginning is basically a steep, long staircase going down the mountainside, which seemed like it might be a challenge, but Hunter tackled it like a champ (Gage and Beckett were both being carried). Once we got to the bottom, the trail was relatively easy, and our 4-year-old (as uncoordinated as he is) did just fine with it. We eventually reached Julia Falls Overlook, which gave us amazing views of the Tennessee River Gorge. After hanging out there for a bit, we decided it would be best to turn back so that we could go grab lunch (our family gets hangry very easily). We had that long, steep stairway again, but this time around we had to go up. That was definitely a bit more challenging, especially since Hunter was starting to get tired & some of the steps went up to Kimberly’s torso. I was lucky enough to get to give her a few boosts especially since Beckett was still little & had to be worn on her front. But we made it back to the car with no injuries and more importantly no meltdowns. We did luck out that the weather was beautiful that day; exactly what you imagine Chattanooga, TN to feel like in the fall!
Overall, despite the challenging part at the beginning/end, we would definitely recommend this trail for families, as long as you have at least some hiking experience and are in halfway decent shape. We are not nearly as fit as we were 10 years ago, but we were still each able to carry a kid on our front or back while hiking this trail, and did not have any major issues (other than a very sweaty shirt).
There were a bunch of other trails that we considered but did not have time to explore, so I wanted to mention them here.
Glen Falls was near the top of our list – if we had time to do one more hike during our trip it would’ve been this one. The trailhead was super close to the house we were renting (we actually passed it on our way to Rock City on our first day of the trip). It looked like a pretty easy trail, though not too easy – we live in a place with no hills, so we want a real mountain experience when we can get it. And with waterfalls, a bridge, big rocks, and even a natural tunnel, it would have been a perfect place for the boys to explore. Definitely doing it next time!
The Guild Trail was another one that was super close to the house. In fact, part of the trail passed just a couple hundred yards away, and it was about a 10 minute walk to the trailhead. The trail is actually an old railroad bed, so it is nice and wide and smooth, which makes it popular among trail runners and mountain bikers (so if it’s a busy day you may need to be a little extra careful with the kiddos). From the trailhead on Ochs Highway, it’s about a 1 mile gentle uphill to Ruby Falls (which you can read about here), and from there you can connect to a couple of other trails if you’re feeling extra ambitious. This is a good segment if you’re looking for something that’s more like a path than a trail – the rail bed is very flat and even, so you won’t need to be worrying about your footing and you can enjoy whatever pace you’re comfortable with. We’d venture to say that you could even push a jogging stroller on this one if you prefer that to a hiking carrier!
The Blue Blazes Trail at Moccasin Bend is one that reminded us more of what we see in Louisiana – flat and swampy. Because of that, we weren’t super interested in it, but it is definitely a nice and easy trail that people with kids might appreciate. It’s right across the Tennessee river from Chattanooga, so it’s not a very far drive to get there either.
Man – just writing about our trip makes us itch to go back! Kimberly needs to get through tax season, but I could absolutely see us heading back up there once the boys get out of school in mid-May!
