Tag: merchants

Travels: My food and music-filled short trip to Nashville

Drew and I have gone to CMA fest twice before, and had planned to attend again this year as soon as we were driving home from it last year. We had an apartment booked for four nights (Thurs-Mon) on Airbnb, which we booked nine months ago. Everyone was off work. A house/ dog sitter was booked. We were pumped.
But things quickly turned south and we ended up only getting to stay one night. Here is the timeline of events, as well as posts about all of the food, of course.

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We arrived in Nashville around noon. It took about an hour to find a parking spot ($30 btw) and to walk the half mile to get to the Park stage, where the first act we wanted to see, Clare Dunn, was performing.
We first got to see Tucker Beathard, who sings “Rock On”. He was a good filler before Clare.

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Tucker Beathard, CMA Fest 2016

Clare was phenomenal. She sounded great and danced with high energy the whole concert. We even got to meet her the next morning at Fan Fair X.
*Spoiler alert: This was the only fun we had at CMA fest this year.

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After watching Clare, we had planned to go to the bigger free stage to see Maren Morris, Scotty McCreery, and then Terri Clark. However, the stage area was already completely full. There was no standing room anywhere, and they were locking it down due to too many people. So…snack time!

Blog post about Merchants, where I tried duck fat tater tots!
http://twogirlsonedish.com/?p=330

After we ate, we headed back to the Park stage.
We saw Native Run here, who I have never heard of before. However, they were pretty good. I really liked their song “2 for 1”. Funny side note: I told Drew that their guitar player looked like the guy from Eden’s Edge. Drew argued I was being silly. I looked it up. Boom. That was him, Dean Berner. Also saw he is engaged to the lead singer of Native Run. I found this odd since I assumed she was married to her co-lead singer, as they almost kissed while holding each others’ faces during a couple songs. So weird.

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Native Run- CMA Fest 2016

After this, we headed to the apartment we rented in East Nashville. We then walked to Mas Tacos to try this place. Everything online raved about it, and it did NOT disappoint.

Blog post for Mas Tacos, Por Favor.
http://twogirlsonedish.com/?p=320

With not too much else to do in the neighborhood, we headed in to Kroger to get some breakfast food items and snacks, in case we would need anything for the next four days. We headed back to the apartment afterwards. We were pretty tired, so we went to bed early.

At about 10:30 p.m., we were already asleep, and got a phone call that let us know our house sitter wasn’t going to be able to stay. So, we got our bffs…I think you know them by now. Cristianna and Lindsay? (who let the dogs out earlier that day) to take care of them the next morning. We planned to head back home Friday after we shortly hit up Fan Fair X. We had bought four day tickets to it, and I was at least going to see what it was all about before heading home.

So, the next day, we packed up the car, headed straight to Fan Fair X at CMA fest. We didn’t have time for a sit down breakfast, but ended up having the best breakfast at a food truck.
Blog post on Banh Mi and Roll Factory Food Truck: http://twogirlsonedish.com/?p=318

Then, at Fan Fair X, we met Clare Dunn, Ashton Shepherd, got to peek at a few other singers like Jamie Lynn Spears and RaeLynn (didn’t care to stand in line to meet them. No offense, ladies, your lines were long).

We also got to hear Chip Easton (Deacon from Nashville) announce officially that Nashville had been picked up for another season by CMT and Hulu. This was awesome, I was so upset when ABC cancelled it last month. So, me and a million other people got very excited. Can you see Chip way up there? He’s on stage, I promise.

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The last person I wanted to see before heading home was Lila McCann. She was one of the first cds I ever bought and I grew up loving her first cd. However, before she took the stage, the Bellamy Brothers performed. They were pretty great as they sang “Redneck Girl”, “Let Your Love Flow”, and many others.

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Bellamy Brothers: CMA Fest 2016

Finally, we got to see Lila. We only stuck around to hear the two songs I was looking for to: “Down Came a Blackbird” and “I Wanna Fall in Love”. She was good, but a little underwhelming. Oh well.

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On the way home, we HAD to stop for lunch at Loveless Cafe, of course.
Blog post about Loveless Cafe:
http://twogirlsonedish.com/?p=260

Overall, this trip sucked. It was shortened, the airbnb apartment was pretty gross, and the crowds at CMA Fest made getting close to certain stages impossible. I don’t know if I will want to try going to this again next year, depends on who the line up is, I guess.

I do know I want to go back to Nashville, though, to experience the city and finish eating all of the foods on my list.

Food Review: Nashville’s Merchants for Appetizers

Before visiting anywhere, I always do some food research and make a list of anything that I MUST try. On a few different lists, such as the Thrillest 50 Things You Must Eat Before You Die (in Nashville), the duck fat tater tots from Merchants could be found. So, this was my first stop! Here’s the breakdown:

Environment

Merchants Front

Merchants is located right in the heart of downtown Nashville, right on Broadway. Since we were here during CMA fest, it was in the middle of the crazy crowds. This meant it was mostly packed, as people are trying to get out of the heat for a cold drink and nice meal. However, at about 4:00 on Thursday, Drew and I got a table.

There are two floors here. The first floor is what was open this time of day, and is the casual dining room. I haven’t seen it, but the second floor, meant for dinner dining, is supposed to be very upscale.

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Even though we ate in the casual dining area, the interior is very clean, bright, and felt like a fancy diner.  With all black and white tiles, counters, booths, and decor, it had a classic and elegant atmosphere. Since it felt very fancy inside, I was a little uncomfortable in my sweaty romper. But, hey, it was CMA fest, we we were all wearing sweaty rompers….well, the girls anyway.

Free Ranch Popcorn!

As soon as we were seated, we were given two glasses of water and the glass bottle was left at our table for refills. I really appreciate this, since Drew and I both drink a  lot of water and hate waiting on refills.

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Next, our waiter brought us the best popcorn I have ever tried…and I make my own homemade garlic popcorn which I always bragged was the best. Well, can’t brag about that anymore. #ifyourenotfirstyourelast

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This was house-made ranch popcorn. Encrusted with that perfect salty, garlic, and herb flavor that ranch has.  Just look at all that flavor! You know it is good if you can SEE the flavor. I ate every crumb of that free popcorn. It was delicious.

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Duck Fat Tater Tots

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Well, this is what I came here for. I was excited. We got a half order (I wasn’t even hungry after I ate the popcorn) for $5. It came with a large handful amount of tater tots that are fried in duck fat. With those come three sauces: chipotle mayo, bearnaise, and ketchup.

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The tater tots were surprisingly not greasy, which is great. They were very crisp on the outside and very soft on the inside. A perfect texture for tots, in my opinion. The flavor was very one-noted, though. It literally tasted like fat. And not the bacon fat kind of deliciousness, but a more bland, dull version of fat. I guess that is what duck fat tastes like.  They also needed more salt, but there was no salt to be found. So, the tots on their own were not that impressive.

The sauces were fun, though, and made the tots delicious. The sauce that I favored and dipped all of my tots (except for the two that were wasted trying the other sauces) in was the bernaise. It was so sweet, it added a perfect flavor to those savory tots.
The ketchup tasted like a good brand of store-bought ketchup. Nothing special. And the chipotle mayo tasted mostly of mayonaise, with a strong, again one-noted, chipotle heat that hit the back of your throat.

I do not think I would get these again, but I’m glad I tried them. I really don’t understand why these are on so many “must eat” types of lists.

Deviled Eggs

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These deviled eggs sounded great, especially since I love deviled eggs. The menu only stated that they came with pop’s sweet and spicy pickles, and they were only $5.
So disappointed. These eggs were so bland, there could not have been anything in the filling besides mayo, egg yolk, and maybe the tiniest amount of yellow mustard? Where’s the salt and pepper, people?! The paprika on the top was fine. But the pickle under each egg was AMAZING. This really was a spicy and sweet, all at once, pickle. This was probably the best pickle I have tried. Eating the pickle with the egg, in the same bite, made the egg edible. But I just ate the pickles and left the bland eggs. I don’t have calories to waste on anything bland.

After the bad experience with the eggs, we decided not to try anything else at Merchants and save room for a dinner at Mas Tacos that night.

Overall, the restaurant is very beautiful and nice. The service was professional and very good. The location is perfect, making it a nice place to drop by for drinks or snacks on days such as the ones during CMA fest. But I probably won’t be back.