175 Best Restaurants in Nashville, Tennessee

Calypso Cafe 100 Oaks

$ | Berry Hill

Casual healthy dining that is easy on the wallet is Calypso Cafe’s focus, making it a popular, laid-back lunch spot. Calypso Cafe’s menu features Caribbean influences, with an emphasis on chicken and fresh produce, creating tropical flavor combinations like their Lucayan salad and famed corn muffins that easily satisfy nutrition-focused eaters and those with dietary restrictions.

Chateau West

$$$ | West End

A Southern answer to French cuisine, Chateau West serves French-inspired lunch, dinner, and weekend brunch. Their upscale yet relaxed setting matches the quality and accessibility of their entrées.

Christie Cookie

You can’t miss the bright red facade or the window where you can order the signature chocolate chip or oatmeal raisin cookies; sometimes there's a tray of samples at the window. This location opened in the summer of 2018, but the bakery has been around since 1985 and tins of the cookies are familiar and beloved holiday and celebratory gifts.

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City Winery

$$ | Downtown

As a restaurant, concert venue, and wine bar, the versatility of City Winery’s offerings make it a standout in the city. The Barrel Room restaurant and wine bar within City Winery serves hearty, Southern-inspired fare for brunch and dinner with an extensive wine list.

Clawson's Pub and Deli

$ | Wedgewood-Houston

Look for the large gravel parking lot at the Track One development and you’ll find this delightful spot serving large, fresh sandwiches with foodie-worthy options—and any sandwich can be made into a salad. The interior is cozy, there are several picnic tables on the front porch; fill out one of the postcards next to the checkout and Clawson’s will mail it.

Coco's Italian Market

$$ | Sylvan Park

Part grocery market, part travel agency, part restaurant, Coco’s Italian Market is dedicated to and passionate about all things Italian. Their house specialities remain proudly authentic to original Italian recipes that won't break the bank.

Cork and Cow

$$$$

This steak house has major chops: if an exquisite cut of beef isn’t epicurean enough for you, you can pair your steak with lobster, crab, scallops, or shrimp. And with a long, luxurious cocktail menu and plenty of aperitifs, desserts, and even a port flight, your meal can drag on all evening with no end to indulgences in sight.

Crest Cafe

$ | Wedgewood-Houston

Opened in the summer of 2018, Crest is billed as Nashville's first donation-based coffeehouse—in other words, it's pay what you wish for the coffee and teas. It hosts trivia nights, open-mics (welcome to Nashville!), and also takes part in the Wedgewood-Houston art crawls. Baked goods from Sweet 16th Bakery in east Nashville.

Daddy's Dogs

$ | The Nations

A hot dog stand housed in a converted gas station, Daddy's Dogs offers creative topping combos on your choice of a beef or vegan hot dog. They also have a small selection of filling sides.

Dose

$ | West End

Dose is one of the neighborhood’s better-kept secrets; its location on the border of Midtown and Sylvan Park makes it a less frequented (and, subsequently, quieter) café than the larger chains closer to downtown or Vanderbilt University. This is a good thing, because their daily fresh-baked goods, specially blended coffees, and delicious breakfast and lunch options are ones you’re going to want to keep all to yourself.

Dose Café and Dram Bar

$ | East Nashville

Located in East Nashville's Riverside Village neighborhood, Dose Café and Dram Bar serves up some of the city's finest espresso drinks. In addition to a caffeine fix, you'll find a full food menu, baked goods, beer, wine, and cocktails, making Dose the perfect one-stop shop for exploring the neighborhood.

Dozen Bakery

$ | Wedgewood-Houston

This small space is airy and bright, and maintains a bit of its pop-up-shop origins. Serving breakfast and lunch items—including soups and sandwiches—the best options are the cookies and pastries made on-site and also sold at a number of Nashville eateries. Marble-topped tables and black café chairs inside; outdoor seating in warmer months. The baking room is cloaked in a wooden shell that also wraps the counter. Only basic coffee, but it’s from local coffee shop Crema.

Edley's Bar-B-Que

$ | East Nashville

At Edley's it's first come, first served for their mouthwatering brisket. If you miss the brisket, there are plenty of other delectable Southern barbecue favorites, quickly made to order and enjoy on polished-wood picnic tables inside or on the large patio; you can wash it down with a local craft beer or their signature Bushwacker, a chocolate rum milk shake.

Edley’s Bar-B-Que

One of three locations in Nashville, weekend brunch here includes the “Nashville Nasty”—fried chicken served on top of homemade biscuits and covered with sausage gravy. This location has a large patio, and a small cocktail menu that includes the signature Bushwacker.

Elliston Place Soda Shop

$ | Elliston Place

Elliston Place Soda Shop has been open since 1939, and has retained much of its mid-century decor, including vintage jukeboxes at the tables (though the boxes themselves no longer play), and a lovely soda counter, complete with a fountain. Come for great burgers, frothy ice-cream sodas, and delicious chocolate shakes—or breakfast.

Epice

$$$

A family-owned restaurant serving traditional Lebanese and Greek dishes with foodie flair, Epice has a large patio, serves lunch and dinner, and has a popular weekend brunch.

Etc Restaurant

$$$ | Hillsboro Village

Etc Restaurant is tucked away behind the Mall at Green Hills, making it the kind of place an out-of-towner could easily miss. The menu, though, makes getting out the GPS worth it, as new American favorites are reimagined using international ingredients. Etc also has an extensive dessert menu and a generous happy hour.

Falcon Coffee Bar

$ | Wedgewood-Houston

Falcon opened in spring 2018 in a small former church. A light menu includes sandwiches after 11 am. Uses local beans from local roasters.

Fenwick's 300

$ | Berry Hill

Bright and airy, this diner-style restaurant features a stand-alone coffee bar within the dining room, where Bongo Java’s coffee and signature drinks are paired with thoughtful, hearty brunch selections and breakfast cocktails. The large center bar is topped with a bowling lane, a nod to the building’s past life.

Five Daughters Bakery

Located inside the Factory, this dreamy bakery seems to glow with soft pink light. They specialize in donuts, but not just any old donuts—these are 100-layer croissant-donut hybrids, cream-filled and glazed in flavors like spiced honey cheesecake and maple bacon (they also have a wide selection of paleo and vegan donuts).

Frothy Monkey

This coffeehouse opens first thing in the morning and stays open through breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and there’s plenty of porch space to enjoy your rosemary honey latte outside; in the evening, they expand their drink menu to include craft beer and wine. The menu is Southern comfort food with a New South twist (like johnnycakes with house-pickled okra and bacon-onion marmalade), but coffee is still the main event at Frothy Monkey. All their coffee is locally roasted by their own roasting company, and you can buy it by the bag from the café.

Germantown Café

$$ | Germantown

One of the early restaurants to open in the now-bustling Germantown neighborhood was Germantown Café. Now a pillar of the neighborhood, the popular dining spot serves inventive takes on an eclectic Southern menu, serving up meals for lunch, dinner, and brunch (on the weekends). Don't miss the bar's happy hour, either, as it's one of the city's most generous.

Gojo Ethiopian Cafe & Restaurant

$ | Berry Hill

A standout in the pocket of international eateries clustered around Nolensville Pike, Gojo Ethiopian Cafe serves authentic dishes in a cozy, brightly colored building. The lunch buffet is a favorite of both vegetarians and meat eaters. The ability to bring your own alcohol to pair with a tasty dinner combo plate is a plus, and the staff is known to be helpful to beginners having their first Ethiopian food experience.

Gray & Dudley

$$$ | Downtown

Featuring absurdist art in the dining room, and adjacent galleries with interactive installations, this restaurant in the bottom of the 21c Museum Hotel provides more than a meal, but a one-of-a-kind immersive experience. Featuring rich dishes that modernize Southern cuisine with surprising flavors, it includes a variety of hearth-baked in-house breads.

Gray's on Main

$$$

Before Gray’s signature neon sign signaled innovative cocktails and comfort food, it was the sign for the pharmacy that occupied that space for 72 years. When Gray’s the restaurant moved into the building in 2012, they kept all the discarded memorabilia from the pharmacy and decorated the place with handwritten prescriptions and vintage pill bottles.

Hattie B's Hot Chicken

$ | Melrose

One of three Nashville Hattie B’s locations, the Melrose Hattie B’s provides the hot chicken hookup often with less of a line. Enjoy hot chicken of varying heat levels, wash it down with a sweet tea or craft brew, and finish off your meal with a delicious Southern-inspired side or two.

Headquarters

$ | Sylvan Park

Blink and you could miss the narrow, 9-foot-wide storefront of Headquarters, which serves locally roasted coffee, seasonal lattes, and locally sourced snacks. Small in size but not personality, relax in the cozy interior or head outside to the inviting back patio and deck area.

Hemingway's Bar & Hideaway

$$$ | Wedgewood-Houston

The spacious interior shares the rustic elegance—rough brick walls, rich hardwood floors—found throughout Houston Station. The hearty menu's large portions are balanced by sampler-sized chocolate mousse and other desserts. Vintage items include a large card catalog at the entrance to the dining room.

Henrietta Red

$$ | Germantown

New restaurants have popped up all over Nashville in recent years, but few are as promising as Henrietta Red. The project of chef Julia Sullivan and sommelier Allie Poindexter, the hip Germantown spot is a new go-to destination for creative seafood and craft cocktails. Bonus: their happy hour tends to include Jell-O shots.

Honest Coffee Roasters

Franklin’s first coffee roasting company is an honest-to-goodness great place to get a cup of coffee. Located inside the Factory, Franklin’s converted industrial shopping complex, it’s also a great place to get an honest day’s work done on your laptop, and in addition to their ethically sourced and roasted coffees and selection of teas, there’s usually an assortment of croissants, scones, and donuts available.

Nashville

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