Georgia Reese's brunch (revisit)

For Easter Sunday, we were looking for a good brunch place for lunch with the family. I had been interested in trying Georgia Reese’s Sunday brunch anyway, just because it is so hard to find Sunday brunch places that take reservations, and in this case we had a large party. My first visit to Georgia Reese’s had its ups and downs for sure, but I am always one to give a place a second chance, especially if there is fried chicken involved. Plus, like I said, it’s good to have a handy list of brunch places.

I was worried that they might be a bit overwhelmed on Easter (again, my first visit wasn’t ideal when it came to waiting for our reservation), but was pleasantly surprised to find the place busy, but not slammed. The bar was only about ½ full and we were seated right at our reservation time.

It’s a buffet ($24.95), so you can pretty much start eating whenever you want. They also leave little sheets of paper on the table on which you can create an omelette that they will then make to order for you in the kitchen and is included as part of the buffet. They will bring you most (non alcoholic) drinks included with the price, including orange juice, coffee and sodas.

We started down the line—there’s the usual brunch buffet stuff—bacon, sausage, scrambled eggs, and cream cheese stuffed French toast, but they also had biscuits and gravy, which was a welcome addition. The biscuits themselves were quite delicious. I ended up going back for another one just to eat with butter. They’re the lighter, less greasy kind of biscuits and held up well to the gravy. The gravy had nice chunks of sausage in it, although the gravy itself was kind of thin. It served its purpose, even if it wasn’t the best gravy ever.

getting ready to refill the buffet

They also had nice chafing dishes of fried catfish and fried chicken. And the chicken was constantly being refreshed. It was always hot and juicy on both visits when I refilled my plate with it. I also think they have upped their spice game since my first visit because this chicken had way more flavor than the first time I went. You could see the pepper and seasonings on the meat itself. Based on this visit, this is a place I would go just for the fried chicken now. The catfish is good, but I don’t think the turnover is as high, so it didn’t seem quite as fresh. It could also stand a little more seasoning still.  They also have a carving station of ham—I just had a bite—I am not fanatical about ham and it was okay. A little chewy. I think usually they have prime rib, and I would prefer that.

There was also some alligator/chicken/sausage gumbo—it was spicy and had some nice hunks of the different meats. Hard to tell the difference between the chicken and the alligator, but I appreciate there was something different from typical buffets.

As far as the breakfast meats, the bacon was really outstanding. I mean, I prefer it a little crispy, but the flavor of it was really salty and bacony. There is nothing worse than bacon that doesn’t taste like anything.

As far as cold items, there was a large platter of shrimp cocktail and there was also a little table with a green salad and fresh fruit. People at our table raved about how ripe and juicy the pineapple was.

I can’t say the omelette was really my thing, even though it was a nice idea to include. I had mushrooms and cheese in mine, but it was too stuffed with the ingredients. I like the extra ingredients in an omelette (besides the egg part) to be something to enhance the eggs, not the other way around. But there are lots of options here to make an omelette if you like a big fat one.

They also have a dessert table—there were some really wonderful soft, warm chocolate chip cookies out there. They were slightly addictive. They also did hot peach cobbler, which wasn’t bad, but the cobbler topping was more of a piecrust almost. It was pretty sweet. There were also some little brownie/cake bites that my kids put a hurting on, but which I couldn’t fit. If I had extra room, I was filling it with fried chicken, which I think was probably the single best thing.  Loved the biscuits and the bacon too.

It’s a nice option to know about for a Sunday brunch, particularly if you have a group and need a reservation. The food is decent buffet food and I am glad to see they have improved the chicken.

Georgia Reese’s

3454 West 86^th Street

Indy  46268

317/876-3454

www.georgiareeses.com 

Georgia Reese's

I have been waiting to go to Georgia Reese’s for a bit to give them a chance to work out the opening kinks. I had heard there were times when they were out of certain things and I didn’t want to take the chance that they might run out of fried chicken.  Well, when we walked in, this first thing I noticed was that it was jammed. Liked literally, standing room only, every square inch taken with people. I thought, hey, we have a reservation, so we’ll be fine. Well, as it turned out, ALL of the people waiting had reservations. So, first thing—they are either overbooking or the kitchen is too slow. Either way, they need to figure that out. We managed to get a seat at the bar after about 10-15 minutes of waiting. One friend was told by the bartender that they didn’t have vermouth to make the drink he wanted. So, not a good start. We ended up getting seated 30 minutes after our reservation time.

When we did get seated, our server, while a bit frantic, was pretty quick about taking our orders (we did wait later when we just wanted more drinks). We quickly ordered some apps—the deviled eggs ($6.95), the volcano hot rocks (their version of oysters Rockefeller) ($3.75 for 2) and the alligator poppers ($9.95). The best things were the alligator poppers—they were quite spicy. Hubby could barely believe they were actually jalapeno peppers inside there and not a spicier pepper. But they were whole peppers stuffed with spicy cream cheese, and apparently alligator, but I couldn’t really distinguish it amongst the other things. Again, they had some heat, and a nice crispy exterior. They served it with a lemon-chive aioli that was strangely thin in consistency. But overall, I liked them. 

Deviled eggs are something I really like and they were good as well. They give you a classic version, a shrimp version, an asparagus version, and a smoked salmon version. I liked that the filling had a fair amount of acid (lemon I assume) and the eggs tasted fresh. They were a nice variation from what ended up being a lot of fried stuff.

The volcano hot rocks? Well, they were just downright bad. The oysters were not fresh and smelled bad. Really bad. One friend actually spit hers out of her mouth. That bad. I’m not going to go into more detail about this, because you get the picture, but if they aren’t turning over oysters fast enough to keep them fresh, these should be taken off the menu. Fast.

As we moved into our entrées, I was excited to try the fried chicken ($16.95). Of course I was. You get four pieces-a breast, wing, leg and thigh. The chicken was fried really well—super crisp on the outside. I particularly enjoyed the dark meat pieces, as they were nice and juicy. The breast got a bit dry, as they often do. The biggest problem with the dish, and honestly most of our dishes, was it was under-seasoned. Add some seasoning into the breading mix and you could have some killer fried chicken. Heck, even salt helped (and our salt shaker made its rounds around our table several times). The entrées come with two sides and I enjoyed my sides of Indiana creme corn and mac and cheese. The mac had some texture to it, from actual cheese—again it wasn’t super seasoned, but would have been the perfect balance with the chicken if the chicken had been a little spicier. I liked the creme corn as well—had a nice crunch from corn and diced onions. Again, a sweet mild flavor, but tasty. As they were, I’d order both again.

My friend’s fried catfish was similar in its preparation. It was well cooked, the fish tender and the breading nice and crisp—it just needed more flavor. Because she had read too many reviews beforehand complaining about the lack of spice, she brought tobasco and garlic salt in her purse (that’s how she rolls). After the addition of these, that fish was pretty darn tasty! They just need to amp it up a bit themselves. The same was true of the order of fried green tomatoes ($5.95) we had as a side as well (it’s actually an app, but we wanted some on the side, so we ordered them with our dinner). Nice crunch, not much flavor in the crust. Also, the tomatoes were a little thick for my taste—I like ‘em a bit thinner so your ratio of crust to tomato is more balanced. 

Hubby ordered the fried bologna sandwich ($8.95) and he really, really liked it. It had a lot of good stuff on it—some more fried green tomatoes, and lime aioli. There were also some greens on there. Nice variation in texture and flavors—I liked the crunch of the tomatoes with the slightly crisped bologna and the tangy aioli. This might have been the best thing we had as an entrée overall. The sandwiches come with one side and hubby got onion rings—these were more of the onion string variety, which I like a fair amount. I can’t say these seemed house made and were similar to those you could get anywhere.

Overall, I think Georgia Reese’s has potential. It obviously is drawing a large crowd (a bit too large perhaps) and I like the vibe of the place. They have live music on the weekends that started while we were there and was nice. You could hear it without it being so loud you couldn’t talk. The place has definitely got a buzz to it. I think the foundation of the food is mostly good—they just need to loosen up with seasonings—everything was pretty universally under-seasoned (even salt would help). If they do this (and take the oysters off the menu or else keep them fresher), as well as figure out their reservations issues, this could be a really great place to get a southern meal in an upscale atmosphere, which is something Indy doesn’t really have. Also they do a big weekend brunch, which is a nice addition as well. I would love to hear what you guys think if you have been there.

Georgia Reese’s

3454 West 86^th Street

Indy  46268

317/876-3454

www.georgiareeses.com