Got Soul?

Four new area restaurants serve soul

Ed Murrieta, for the Northwest Guardian

This part of the world is about as geographically removed from Southern soul food as you can get in the lower 48, but here you go: 11 South Sound restaurants specialize in soul food and/or Southern cooking with black American roots.

Seven were covered in one form or another last year. Here’s a taste of four more, plus a recap.

Hot Mama’s THAI Asian Cuisine & Soul Food

Where: 34029 C, Hoyt Road S.W., Federal Way, 253-835-3430.

This corner of southwest Federal Way/northeast Tacoma is a veritable Soul Central. Hot Mama’s, where chitlins, gizzards, collard greens and fried green tomatoes are served alongside pho, spring rolls and curry, opened in November, across the street from Meat for the Soul.

Hot Mama, aka Nai Duncan, is Cambodian and Thai. She learned to cook soul food to please the tastes of some residents of the adult-care home she runs with her husband, John.

Chitlins and gizzard salads ($6.99 each) may be Hot Mama’s signature fusion: a bed of romaine with cucumbers, jalapeños and carrots and a mound of hot offal slices bathed in chili-citrus-peanut dressing. It was a downhome take on Thai salad. I liked the salad better cold the next day, when the chitlins absorbed the dressing, firmed up and lost a bit of their intestinal edge.

Collard greens ($4.50) were stewlike; depending on the day, you’ll find okra, onions, carrots, cabbage, bacon, hamhocks or beef among the biting greens.

Skin-on catfish nuggets ($6.95) were limply deep fried in seasoned cornmeal crust. Cornmeal crust soaked up a tad too much oil and slid off fried green tomato slices, which retained tart bite despite their squishiness.

Black-eyed peas were bacony. Red beans were salty. Barbecue wings had rich depth; hot wings were slick with chili oil. Hot Mama’s menu advertises Friday night buffets, but slow business silences the soul smorgasbord. Still, for $9.99, Duncan will serve you a bottomless soul food platter.

R.C.’s Food 4 the Soul

Where: 3816 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, 253-474-1632

The initials stand for Ribs and Chicken. The rest of the name speaks for itself. The four-month-old restaurant is small and unassuming. The food ain’t.

The “belly buster” ($15.95) is a terrific sampler: three spare ribs, three fried-chicken wings, three catfish fillets and four side dishes. Add a slice of dense sweet potato pie ($1.75), and you’ve got a platter for two for less than $20.

Ribs were firm, meaty and smoky-sweet. Dusky sauce soaked into a bed of white bread. Chicken wings were from a full-sized bird, and included the wing and drumette. Marinated in Cajun spices overnight before dredging and deep-frying, the meat was flavorful and the skin was supple.

Catfish filets were seasoned before being dredged in seasoned cornmeal; the meat’s flavors really came through. Smoked turkey sweetened astringent greens.

DjembeSOUL

Where: 1126 Commerce St., Tacoma, 253-284-2453.

Formerly involved with Tacoma’s venerable Southern Kitchen, Thad Martin opened DjembeSOUL (named after the West African drum, pronounced “Jim Bay”) last month in the low-slung downtown space formerly occupied by Cellars Under Broadway.

The menu includes Southern fried chicken, meatloaf, gumbo and pork chops. There’s also Northwest fusion soul like deep-fried salmon nuggets ($7.95) with cayenne-cumin-nutmeg seasoning. I liked the smothered chicken ($8.50). Dredged chicken was par-fried and simmered in milk-flour gravy. The dark-meat dish I sampled was smothered beyond recognition, but the flavors were familiar and satisfying.

Daily lunch buffet includes baked catfish, barbecued pork sandwiches and sides like fat-back-infused greens.

Organist Leslie Byrd plays live jazz Wednesdays through Fridays. On Friday and Saturday nights, two sidemen and singer Anthony Brown join in.

Sweet tea was thick on the tongue, but not sweet on the teeth. Sweet potato pie was glowingly good. Blackened and blistered, the top of the pie added sweet caramel notes to the sweet tuber custard.

Southern Kitchen Restaurant

Where: 621 Capitol Way S, Olympia, 360-943-8300.

Located in the Ramada Inn Governor House, the three-month-old Olympia location is like the Plaza Hotel compared to the downhome Tacoma diner.

Gloria Martin, who bought Southern Kitchen 11 years ago, has transplanted the Tacoma menu to Olympia.That means corn cakes were corny, sweet tea was sweet and chicken and waffles were a syrupy treat. But there are some changes, such as more vegetarian dishes for Olympia eaters.

Whole catfish ($10.95) was encased in tight cornmeal batter punctuated with coarse black pepper, paprika, garlic and a touch of cumin. Deep-fried, it was crisp and golden outside, moist and flaky inside.

Greens were spiked with lower-sodium beef bacon; the absence of pork didn’t diminish their pleasure a bit.

Cornmeal-battered deep-fried green tomatoes were firm and tart.

PREVIOUSLY REVIEWED SOUL

JT’S Original Louisiana Bar-B-Que

7102 Sixth Ave., Tacoma, 253-565-4587

Recommended: Pork ribs, greens, sweet potato pie

The Rail Splitter

3828 S. Yakima, Tacoma, 253-474-1800 (ask for “kitchen”)

Recommended: Pork ribs, fried chicken, pan-fried catfish, chitlins

Meat for the Soul

34024 Hoyt Road S.W., Federal Way, 253-874-6900

Recommended: Pork ribs, yams, sweet potato pie. They now have a dining room that accommodates approximately 40 people.

Southern Kitchen Restaurant

1716 Sixth Ave., Tacoma, 253-627-4282

Recommended: Fried chicken, sweet tea, mac and cheese, greens.

Porter’s Place Southern Cuisine & BBQ

2615 E. N St., Tacoma, 253-383-7603

Recommended: Pork ribs, red beans and rice loaded with pork, fluffy corn bread, spicy jambalaya

Southern Touch Cafe

5502 Orchard St. W., University Place, 253-473-6964

Recommended: Braised oxtail bathed in smooth gravy

The Fish House Café

1814 Martin Luther King Jr. Way, Tacoma; 253-383-7144

Recommended: Catfish, fried chicken, fried okra