Just like Mama’s: Restaurants to soothe your Southern soul are hidden west of the Congaree
“Country cookin’ makes you good lookin’.’”
So goes the saying from the popular Lizard’s Thicket restaurant chain that has become the flagship for down-home country fare in the Midlands. It has been serving up chicken fried steak, collards, salmon patties, cornbread dressing and all the rest since 1977.
If the saying is indeed true, then the folks in Cayce and West Columbia are mighty pretty. This area is the Midlands’ Mecca for down-home country eats.
Hidden away in and around Triangle City is a cluster of five old fashioned, family-owned restaurants, where the tea is sweet, the okra is fried and the servers will probably call you “hon.”
The five — George’s Southside, D&D Country Cooking, The Original Brunches, Carolina Buffet and Compton’s Kitchen — are the real deal and have been for decades.
But blink and you might miss them.
“We’re definitely a hidden gem,” said Martha Cooke, owner of Compton’s Kitchen, which is tucked away on B Avenue in West Columbia, just off 12th Street.
For the uninitiated, a meat ‘n’ three is a restaurant that for lunch (or supper) sells a plate of one protein and three vegetables for right around $10.
This is not health food, folks. It stems from hard-working country folk who needed a high-calorie diet to get through the day — meals made from whatever they could gather in the woods, raise on the farm or pull out of the water, from chicken livers to blackberry cobbler to shrimp and grits.
There’s the standard fried chicken and mac and cheese and country fried steak and gravy, but you can also get fried bologna, onion sausage and liver puddin’, if that’s what moves you.
Lunch is great, but breakfast is often the busiest part of the day.
The restaurants open dang early (5:30 or 6 anyone?) and serve up all you would expect — eggs, omelettes, pancakes, country ham and just about any kind of meat on a biscuit. Compton’s even has a fatback biscuit.
“It’s what you’re brought up on,” said Gil Brand, owner of The Original Brunches. “Grandma made it, and people still love it.”
Here are five eateries on the west side of the Congaree River that uphold the beloved tradition (with Lizards Thicket thrown in for good measure).
Compton’s Kitchen
1118 B Ave., West Columbia
(803) 791-0750
Hours: 6 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Monday-Friday; 6 a.m. to noon Saturday; closed Sunday
Perry Compton opened the restaurant Nov. 1, 1977, at the corner of Platt Springs Road and Charleston Highway. He moved the store first to Sunset Boulevard and then in the mid-’80s to B Avenue.
The restaurant’s buttermilk biscuits and cornbread are made from scratch with locally milled Adluh flour. Eggs benedict share the breakfast menu with a fatback biscuit.
Martha Cooke managed the restaurant for 13 years before buying the place in 2000. When she first started, she asked a fellow server for advice.
“You got family?” the colleague asked.
Cooke has been treating customers like kin ever since.
- Meat and two $8.49
- Meat and three $9.49
- Three vegetable plate $6.99
- Four vegetable plate $7.99
D&D Country Cooking
1824 Platt Springs Road, West Columbia
(803) 794-2263
Hours: 5:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Monday-Friday; 5:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday; closed Sunday
Owner Richard Chong, the fifth owner of the restaurant through the years, isn’t quite sure how old the place is. ”I don’t know, 50 years?”
He said the best sellers are meatloaf, pork chops and “anything with bacon.”
For the past 25 years, Columbia developer and restaurateur Richard Burts has hit the place every Saturday morning for country ham (well done), eggs over easy, grits and toast — a break from his usual healthy breakfast of yogurt and fruit.
“It’s just where the car goes on Saturday,” he said. “It hits the spot.”
- Meat and three $8.50 - $9.95
- Four vegetable plate $7.50
No website or social media
George’s Southside
2333 Charleston Highway, Cayce
(803) 791-1046
Hours: 6 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Monday-Saturday; 7 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Sunday
George Xanthakos opened the restaurant 44 years ago. It’s tucked between Xanthakos’ gas station and the Cayce Farmers Market.
A unique offering is stewed rutabaga. And the menu has a Greek flair, serving gyros and a popular Mediterranean salad made from Xanthakos’ grandmother’s recipe.
The restaurant has a small outdoor deck, and the lunch counter will likely be anchored by regulars sipping coffee and shooting the bull.
“We’re not just a restaurant; we’re a meeting place,” co-owner and manager Peter Fikas said.
- Meat and three $9.25
- Meat and two $8.25
- Four vegetable plate $8
George’s Southside Restaurant on Facebook
Carolina Buffet
3122 Platt Springs Road, Springdale
(803) 661-7881
Hours: 11 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Tuesday-Friday; 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sundays; closed Saturdays and Monday.
OK, Carolina Buffet is not a meat ‘n’ three, per se. It doesn’t serve breakfast; it does serve lunch and dinner. And it’s in Springdale, not Cayce or West Cola.
So why is this place on the list? Because it’s country to the bone, close enough to Triangle City to count and is on a heckuva lot of people’s “best” list.
Nestled in a nondescript strip mall on Platt Springs Road, just down the road from the D&D, the only sign advertising the place is on the front door.
“We don’t need to advertise; it’s word of mouth,” owner Jonathon Reason said.
The restaurant serves all the country favorites from fried pork chops to BBQ hash and a rotating list of specials. Some days fried green tomatoes, or catfish stew, or shrimp and grits and more.
And it’s a buffet, so it’s all you can eat! Repeat: It’s all you can eat!
“Eat ‘til you bust,” a staffer advised during a recent visit.
But be patient. The buffet, especially on Sunday, is packed, with waits of 30 minutes or more. But trust us, it’s worth the wait.
- Lunch and dinner $13.75; kids 7 to 12 $5.99; kids 4 to six $1.99.
- Sunday $15, $6.99 and $1.99
The Original Brunches
(803) 791-7477
2245 Leaphart Road, West Columbia
Hours: 6 a.m. to 2:30 “ish.” Closed Mondays
Brunches has been a fixture on the west side of the river for nearly two decades, first on Knox Abbott Drive and now on Leaphart Road.
Like the other joints on the list, the place is hidden away, just down Leaphart from the Augusta Highway Walmart.
“We get a lot of people from Columbia, politicians,” owner Gil Brand said. “They can kind of hide away.”
Brand bought the place three years ago, just in time for the COVID outbreak.
“It wasn’t what I expected,” he said with a wry chuckle. “It’s been a battle, but we made it.”
Brunches has all the country favorites, including onion sausage and liver puddin’. “Stuff you can’t get at Cracker Barrel or IHOP,” Brand said.
And unlike some restaurants, the full menu is available all day.
So you can have a catfish biscuit for breakfast if you like, with broccoli casserole and a slice of pie.
“Whatever you want,” Brand said.
- Meat and two $7.25 - $11.49
- Four vegetable plate $7.25
- Daily specials $8 and $9
Lizard’s Thicket
501 Knox Abbott Drive, Cayce
(803) 791-0314
Hours: 6 a.m. - 9 p.m. daily.
The first Lizard’s Thicket opened in 1977, and the chain anchors the west side of the Blossom Street bridge with a store on Knox Abbott Drive at State Street. It hosts the “Welcome to Cayce” sign.
Anna and Bob Williams opened the first restaurant in a house on Broad River Road in Columbia, using Anna’s recipes.
Today, the chain has 13 restaurants — all in the Columbia area except for the newest in Florence — and is still run by the couple’s children and grandchildren.
- Meat and two $9.29
- Meat and three $10.99
- Three vegetable plate $7.29
- Four vegetable plate $8.99
