The supplier spotlight for April is on Powder Springs Farm, our egg supplier. Read about John Chandler’s chickens, their fabulous eggs, and the “Fort Knox of chicken coops” where they live safe from foxes, raccoons, and other predators.

This month’s recipe first appeared in print when Susan Moses was asked to contribute to a cookbook called Better Things to Come: Recipes from America’s Top Female Chefs. One of the recipes she chose was a Hungarian sauerkraut and meet casserole called rakkott kasposzta that she learned from her Hungarian grandmother — now you can make it, too.

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And to view the May newsletter, click here.

Chickens roam freely within an electrified enclosure

It turns out that these eggs have more in common with gold than just the gorgeous color of the yolks: the chickens that lay those eggs live in “the Fort Knox of chicken coops,” according to John Chandler of Powder Springs Farm in McDonald, TN.

Chandler, a local attorney, began raising chickens about 3 to 4 years ago, housing them in an old coop near the barn, and allowing the birds to range completely freely. He soon discovered that raccoons, coyotes, and foxes enjoy free range chicken as much as the pickiest gourmet food snob. Fencing was no deterrent to the foxes; they just went over or under the fences and pretty soon the foxes were in the henhouse.

John Chandler of Powder Springs Farm delivering eggs to 212 Market

Pretty soon, Chandler had more eggs than he knew what to do with. Light brown eggs, light green or blue eggs, dark brown eggs. Lots of eggs. So he approached 212 Market Chef/Owner Susan Moses and offered to sell her some of the eggs. He now supplies as many as 212 can use.

“They’re delicious, and they are all different, and we enjoy them a lot,” Susan says. “We take them out of the cartons and give them back, so it’s all sustainable. and they’re local and humanely raised. We’re proud to support John by buying his eggs.”

Chickens at Powder Springs Farm

Susan, Maggie, and Sally Moses

Some of the food served at the restaurant is exactly like Susan’s mother makes because Maggie Moses works right alongside her daughter in the kitchen every day. In addition to baking almost all of the desserts and the bread, Maggie jumps in to help with chopping vegetables, peeling roasted beets, or whatever else needs doing.

Maggie learned to cook and bake from her mother, Cora Hundley, and her Aunt Iggy while growing up in Tyner. Susan remembers her grandmother cooking huge meals of Southern specialties like chicken and dumplings for her Methodist church, baking dill bread, and canning pickles.

While 212 Market gets credit for being “at the forefront of the green and local food movement in Chattanooga,” Maggie’s mom was a practicing locavore nearly a century ago. “All of the food she ate was locally raised,” Susan notes, pointing out that Maggie milked the cows and wrung the chickens’ necks to make the chicken and dumplings, and Maggie’s father Morris regularly shot squirrels and rabbits for Cora to cook.

“It was all really delicious and healthy,” Susan notes, “though my grandmother never ate a green salad in her life — she braised or stewed pretty much everything, including the greens.” Eating locally obviously worked for the Hundleys: Cora lived to be 105, and Maggie is currently 92.

Brunch (11 a.m. – 3 p.m.) includes soup or salad, your choice of a main course, and a dessert, $28 for adults and $12 for kids aged 12 and under. In lieu of reservations, we ask you to call ahead to get on the seating list in case there is a wait when you arrive.

Dinner begins at 5 p.m. and is a la carte. Can’t bring Mom to brunch or dinner? Show some love with a 212 Market gift certificate!

Menu
(gf=gluten free)

Appetizer: Choice of  signature seafood bisque gf, spring onion soup gf, Mediterranean sampler,  212 mixed greens salad, or classic shrimp cocktail gf

Main course:

Davis Creek Filet & Wild Caught Shrimp, asparagus, béarnaise & rosemary mashed potatoes gf

Mushroom, Asparagus & Brie Quiche, local spring lettuces with herb vinaigrette

Apricot Ginger Seared Duck Breast, strawberry salad, Bonnie Blue chevre, sherry vinaigrette gf

Seared Sea Scallops, beet risotto, Crabtree baby greens & Cointreau butter gf

Creekside Breakfast: cornmeal dusted Pickett’s Ranch trout, fried local egg, creamy Falls Mill grits, local kale & Tabasco butter gf

Love Me Tender Pancakes: peanut butter banana chocolate chip pancakes, local free range scrambled eggs & bacon

Crab Cake Benedict, key lime hollandaise on poached local free range eggs, corn salsa, avocado mousse, brunch style sweet potatoes

Elderflower Blueberry Oatmeal Soufflé, Eagle’s Rest bison sausage patty, boursin scrambled local eggs, fruit

Colorado Lamb Top Round strawberry salsa, roasted new potatoes & local greens gf

Housemade 3 Cheese & Spinach Walnut Ravioli, asparagus, carrots & greens with light pesto

Dessert:  Choose from lemon cake, vanilla crème brûlée, chocolate truffle cake,  vanilla crème brûlée, banana pudding, cobbler, peanut butter pie, cheesecake and much more!

Link 41 sausages

212 Market’s shrimp and grits gets a kick from Link 41 andouille

Founded in 2009 by Tom Montague and Trae Moore (who is now with Crabtree Farms), Link 41 opened its retail location next to Niedlov’s in 2010. According to Milton White, who joined the company in 2011 and now makes the sausage along with Tom, the company sells the vast majority of its product at farmers’ markets and through its store, with only about 10-20% going to 212 Market and a couple of other restaurants.

Milton White sells Link 41 sausages at the Main St. Farmers’ Market

“I really like that their products are made with meat from the same suppliers we use for the restaurant,” says 212 Market Chef/Owner Susan Moses. Link 41 gets pork and beef primarily from Cloudcrest Farm and Sequatchie Cove Farm, both of which also supply 212 Market.

White also appreciates the fact that Link 41 and 212 Market share suppliers: “I’m really happy that they’re supporting the local food economy, and I’m excited every time I look at the menu and see suppliers from close by.”

Link 41 and 212 Market also share another characteristic; both embrace global flavors made with local food. Link 41′s sausage repertoire includes Spanish chorizo, German bratwurst, Chinese-inspired potsticker, South African Boerewors, Moroccan merguez, and more. White’s personal favorite is the mole sausage, which is similar to chorizo but with a little chocolate, more chilis and other spices added.

According to White, the wide variety of exotic flavors isn’t the result of any particular philosophy. “We just like to make sausages that taste good,” he says; “We work with a local spice company, Alchemy Spice, and if they have the spices to make a particular sausage, we do it.”

Watch how Link 41 makes sausage:

Watch this video on YouTube.

Bike and car parking outside 212 Market with the CARTA shuttle park in the background

While it’s true that 212 Market is one of very few downtown Chattanooga restaurants with its own parking lot, it’s also a fact that the lot has only about 15 spaces. Obviously, many more people dine at 212 at one time than can park in the lot. So where are all the cars?

Drivers can usually find street parking or another lot within a few blocks when the restaurant’s lot is full — free parking on Cherry and Walnut Streets is especially popular — but a large percentage of 212 Market customers and employees arrive without cars.

As 212 Owner/Manager Sally Moses explains, “Downtown is just buzzing all the time these days, and it’s easier when you don’t have to compete for parking spaces.” Plus, she points out, “When you burn extra calories getting to the restaurant, you get to eat dessert without feeling guilty!”

Customers and employees ride in on bikes or scooters, walk from nearby condos and hotels, dock their boats near the Aquarium, or take the electric shuttle, she says. No one has ridden up on horseback since the Chattanooga police department did away with its mounted patrol a decade ago, but 212 Market’s staff would be unfazed if someone did.

Bikes are one of the most popular ways to get to the restaurant. Certified by the League of American Bicyclists as a Silver Level Bicycle Friendly business, 212 Market almost always has bikes parked outside — sometimes lots of bikes.

Bike Chattanooga station one block from 212 Market

More than a dozen members of one local family, says Owner/Manager Sally Moses, regularly converge at 212 for brunch after bicycling from various parts of the city, and it’s great to see kids, parents, and grandparents all parking their bikes in front of the restaurant. One group of up to 75 cyclists that makes occasional bar-hopping rides doesn’t even bother with bike parking, she laughs; they just leave all the bikes in a huge pile outside.

Cyclists riding Bike Chattanooga bicycles have three docking stations available within a few blocks of the restaurant: one at the Aquarium, one in front of the Sports Barn parking lot, and one on the south end of the Walnut Street bridge.

And four to eight of the restaurant’s employees bike in on any given day. Sally herself bikes nine and a half miles from Hixson every day, rain or shine. “It’s kind of a Zen thing for me,” she says, “It helps me unwind instead of getting stressed out dealing with traffic.”

212 Market introduced the local food movement to Chattanooga, and we are thrilled at the number of great suppliers within a hundred miles of the city. We also work with some great regional and national suppliers for products unavailable locally.

Over the past year, 212 Market Restaurant has featured almost a dozen of its great suppliers in its monthly newsletter as “supplier spotlights.” We thought we’d post them all here to give everyone, not just our newsletter subscribers, a chance to learn more.

Supplier Spotlight on:
Benton’s Smoky Mountain Hams
Bonnie Blue Farm
Chattanooga Brewing Company
Cloudcrest Farm
Eagles Rest Ranch
Fair Share Garden
Falls Mill
Sale Creek Honey
Sea to Table
Sequatchie Cove Farm (Dairy)
Sequatchie Cove Farm (lamb)

To see all of the past newsletters, with other exclusive articles and recipes, check out our newsletter archive. And to sign up for the newsletter, email address in the signup box to the right.

Sorry, this event has been canceled. 212 Market always has a great selection of craft beers available.

All beer lovers are invited to join the Pink Boots Society at 212 Market Restaurant the evening before the Chattanooga Craft Beer Festival to get psyched up for the big event. 212 Market will be adding to its usual great beer selection for the evening, and you’ll have the opportunity to taste several beers available for the first time in Chattanooga.

For $15, you get to sample 3 beers (6-8 oz pours). Nashville-based Jackalope Brewing Co. will be making its Chattanooga debut, and Jackalope brewers Bailey Spaulding and Robyn Virball will bring along their portable draft beer cooler. Brewer TC Sentell from Big River Grille will also be on hand, and we’ll have savory bar snacks like fried black eyed peas, ranch popcorn, and spiced nuts available to munch.

Feel free to hang out after the tasting to enjoy some of 212 Market’s fabulous food, or to try some additional brews. We’ll have a special selection of additional craft beers on our menu that evening.

The Pink Boots Society is an organization of female brewers and other beer professionals, but you don’t have be either female or a beer professional to attend the event — if you are 21 or over and want to taste some beer and meet some brewers, you are welcome.

Space is limited and reservations are required. Call the restaurant at 423.265.1212 to reserve your place.

Date: April 19
Time: 5-7 pm
Cost: $15 for a pour of 3 beers

In the supplier spotlight for March: Benton’s Smoky Mountain Country Hams. Many people associate ham with Easter brunch, but we love Benton’s ham and bacon year round. And 212 Market has been serving Benton’s products since long before they became a favorite of celebrity chefs around the country.

Susan Moses served Blackberry-Glazed Quail Stuffed with Figs & Country Ham at the James Beard House to celebrate Tennessee’s bicentennial, and now you can make it at home, with this month’s recipe.

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And to view the March newsletter, click here.

Benton’s hickory smoked ham

212 Market Restaurant offers a wide range of options for Easter brunch, but for traditionalists, it’s all about the ham. And 212 Market diners will be eating the same ham that has celebrity chefs like Tom Colicchio and David Chang “absolutely smitten”: Benton’s Smoky Mountain Country Ham, from Madisonville, TN.

As a matter of fact, 212 Market served Benton’s ham and bacon long before Gourmet magazine, Southern Living, and Bon Appetit began singing Benton’s praises. Chef/Owner Susan Moses began buying Alan Benton’s cured pork products more than 18 years ago, when David Chang was still a teenager.

Benton’s is located in Madisonville, TN

Benton makes both hickory smoked and unsmoked hams aged for up to 18 months, plus hickory smoked bacon. He starts with quality pork, sourcing as much pasture-raised anti-biotic free hams and pork bellies as possible, mostly from heritage breeds like Berkshire, Duroc, and Tamworth. “If you start with good product, you end up with good product,” he explains, noting that “lard hogs” like the heritage breeds with more intramuscular fat are the best tasting.

Allan Benton cures ham with salt, sugar, and red pepper

The curing process for both the hams and pork bellies (bacon) involves slathering the meat with a mixture of salt, brown sugar, and red pepper that draws out moisture, preventing bacterial growth and allowing the pork to be kept without refrigeration for several years. He does not use any sodium nitrite to cure his hams, noting that most mass-produced hams require nitrites as much for their color as for a preservative, while Benton’s hams acquire their color naturally with age.

He cures about 14,000 hams per year and about 40,000 pork bellies. With production that small, he can’t supply large grocery stores or chains, even if he wanted to. He prefers to concentrate on supplying the hundreds of restaurants whose chefs love his products — 80-90 in Manhattan alone — and visitors who take the time to drop by the business in Madisonville or order online (with a 4-week wait for shipping).

Benton says that working six days a week means that he almost never makes it down to Chattanooga, and although he has yet to dine at 212 Market, it’s on his “bucket list”: “We’re truly blessed to get to sell product to people like Susan; I have tremendous respect for her and everything she is doing down there.”

Watch a short video showing how Benton’s makes its hams and bacon:

Watch this video on YouTube.