#1 Tourist - Indulgences

This past weekend my mom and dad came to town for their first *stress-free weekend in Nashville.  We did so many things, I feel the need to separate out the recap into multiple posts.

Nashville has awesome restaurants.  This is great for me considering I thought Richmond had awesome restaurants.  I had the hardest time narrowing down the different places we should eat, while also trying to remember no one wanted to end this weekend needing clothes the next size up.  The latter part of that was tricky....

My parents got to town on Friday afternoon and that night we went to Burger Up for dinner.  I knew we had to go to this restaurant because the food is out of control.  And yes, it's just burgers.  This is a new Nashville restaurant that I ate at while I was here for my interview.  The location (12 South) and "feel" of the restaurant (fancy-style picnic tables, really small, no reservations) instantly sold me on moving here. (Seriously, I hadn't even had my interview...just dinner...and I was ready to move.)  I had the Bison burger, Dad had the Pimento Cheese burger & mom had the Black & Bleu burger.  It's seriously ridiculous how good these burgers are.  We all left feeling full enough to not need to eat the rest of the weekend. (Yeah right...)

12 South is definitely my favorite area in Nashville!

I love the "feel" inside Burger Up - so friendly!

When I have visitors, Saturday mornings are reserved for one place and one place only. Pancake Pantry. It has been in Nashville for over 50 years and is "famous" for the line of people that line up outside around the building waiting to get in for breakfast.  There are locals that have NEVER been to this place because they are turned off by the line.  Idiots.  I, personally, have never waited longer than 30 minutes in this line, then again we were there at 8:15am.  If I was my friend Allison, we would have been there when they open at 6:30am just to be sure we got our pancakes.  They were as phenomenal as always and you should expect for me to take you here if you ever come to visit. Mmmmm....

Just your typical Saturday morning line @ Pancake Pantry

After our ginormous breakfast, we somehow snuck skipping lunch by my dad.  It was too late in the day for him to realize, but we did have afternoon beers for a snack (more on that later)  Dinner was at a new local BBQ restaurant called Stone House Q.  I read about it in one of the multiple Nashville blogs I follow and thought it would be good to try out.  It was delicious and I will definitely go back.  Very casual atmosphere and a cool patio to eat outside when it's not...Oh you know, below 30 degrees.

I WILL be eating on that patio this summer

Sunday I snuck into my parents' hotel for breakfast and after an afternoon snack at my place of Chips & Helluva good dip, we hit up Mellow Mushroom for dinner.  Mellow Mushroom has some of the greatest pizza and anytime I'm in Charlottesville, I demand to eat here.  Luckily I now live in a "college town" and have one of my own.

As you can see, we ate a lot.  When my mom called me Monday night when they got home she told me she was going to staple her mouth shut.  I might consider doing the same.

I was so glad to share some of my favorite restaurants with my parents this past weekend and try out a new place as well.  Can't wait for more visitors to try more of Nashville's amazing restaurants!

That's all from me y'all!!



*First trip to Nashville - Mom & Natalie apartment hunting. Fair amount of tears.
*Second trip to Nashville - Traumatic moving experience.  LOTS of crying.