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Most major food cities can boast at least one legacy restaurantthe historical dining room that still proudly offers formal service and a kitchen packed with pedigreed chefs. In Nashville, it's the Capitol Grille set inside the Hermitage Hotel, where oversize chairs, linens on the table, and an air of elegance mark the type of dining experience that seems to be fading under as a horde of casual, small-plate-focused restaurants move in.
What to Order: What to Order:
Razor clams, $15
Shrimp and avocado, $16
Nashville 'hot chicken” liver pâté, $14
Ricotta gnocchi, $28
Grassroots chicken, $32
The historic hotel's spacious AAA-rated four-diamond restaurant can also claim its place on the résumés of many notable Nashville cooks, including former chef Tyler Brown, Trey Cioccia of The Farm House, Hal Holden-Bache of Lockeland Table, and most famously, Sean Brock of Husk Nashville. Now you can add chef Cory Untch to the list of ones to watch. Having taken over for Brown, who left late last year, Untch is revitalizing the menu and offering up a new excuse to visit this Nashville staple.
Filling Brown's shoes might seem like a daunting task. The popular mustached chef put a rather large stamp on the operation by launching the Garden at Glen Leven in conjunction with the Land Trust for Tennessee as well as helping the hotel acquire and get off the ground the 245-acre Double H Ranch, where the restaurant has been raising its own cattle. Those two operations shifted the entire focus of the vaunted institution, bringing it to the forefront of the city's farm-to-table movement. But if there was ever a chef qualified to carry the torch, it's Untch, whose most recent gig as executive chef of The Inn at Dos Brisas, a Relais & Chateaux Texas resort, put him in the fields and greenhouses of that property's 313-acre ranch. Before that, he'd worked at resorts from Florida to Aspen to Hawaii, adding regional inflections to his cooking along the way.
At the Capitol Grille, Untch will continue to utilize the resources from the farms but stresses his commitment to the kitchen:
'I won't be the chef who is out working on the farm,” he says. 'I will get out there, I'll know what's going on. But I believe the chef's role is to communicate with the farmer. The more we talk, the better we can utilize all of the resources from the field.”
That means he'll be speaking regularly with the hotel's two full-time farm managers, Crystal Miller at Glen Leven and Chris Turner at Double H. (Previously, the farms were overseen by contract employees.) Miller is keeping a grow chart up to date so that Untch knows exactly when certain ingredients might become available.
As the produce begins to arrive, Untch says his menu will change slightly from week to week. But his goal is to offer dishes that can adjust with the seasons. A ricotta gnocchi, for example, in early spring featured a comforting blend of braised Double H oxtail napped in a Madeira cream sauce; by now, Untch has surely lightened it up, showcasing more green vegetables and a simpler sauce.
There are dishes that will stand out as year-round keepers, too, like the beef carpaccio laced with Dijon and shallots or the obligatory nod to Nashville, a 'hot chicken” liver pâtéthe heat is doused on top in the form of chile oil. A shrimp and avocado starter shows off Untch's various Asian influences with a shrimp toast bolstering the dish. Other entrees include a Border Springs lamb loin served over eggplant puree. Untch dresses up the dish with a dusting of rye powder.
Meanwhile, longtime regulars will be relieved to know that you can still find the restaurant's classic sweet onion bisque as well as an à la carte selection of steaks and chops, including a 16-ounce rib eye. (One of those goes nicely with the restaurant's vast selection of bourbons.)
At the Oak Bar, Untch has revealed a few new snacks, like a roasted head of cauliflower, which he cooks sous vide and serves whole. There's also an all-beef hot dog made by the team behind Porter Road Butcher using Double H beef. To finish, pastry chef Emily Reed is playing in all sorts of fun directionsif her yeast doughnuts are on the menu, do not hesitate to put in an order or two.
As the Capitol Grille team transitions into the growing season and settles into their new roles, now is the time to revisit one of the city's best dining roomsand celebrate a fresh face within the city's blooming food family.
231 6th Ave. N., 615-345-7116; capitolgrillenashville.com