Into the wild (game): Check out the unique menu at the new Vista restaurant The Hollow
If you’ve been hankering for some boar shank braised in red wine, or perhaps a good rabbit pie, then you’re in luck. A new restaurant has debuted in downtown Columbia with those things and more on the menu.
The Hollow, a new forest-to-table concept restaurant serving a host of wild game items, has opened its doors at 823 Gervais St. in the Vista. It’s located in the spot that formerly was home to Jason’s Deli.
The space has been totally overhauled for The Hollow, with the restaurant offering a forest aesthetic, with deep brown and bright green highlights throughout the dining room. There are exposed brick walls, large windows along the east side of the restaurant allowing diners to see into the kitchen, and a sprawling, 10-foot tree that fans out above the bar in the back.
And the menu is stuffed with unique options.
For instance, The Hollow offers an 8-ounce elk filet with a fig balsamic reduction, cremini mushroom risotto and rainbow carrots. Or the Famously Hot Fried Pheasant with squash hash, sauteed winter greens and blackberry gastrique.
The appetizer menu includes, among other things, a flight of deviled duck eggs, and the “nibbles” menu has duck-fat hot fries with habanero dust and bleu creme fraiche. And there are items on the menu for those who are less meat-inclined, including a host of fresh greens, and a doppio ravioli with a butternut squash and sage ricotta filing.
The Hollow owner Chris Fitz, who has spent a career working in the restaurant industry in South Carolina, said he wanted to introduce a restaurant that would stand out in Columbia.
“I started to see that we had a lot of talent in this industry that was really untapped,” Fitz said of the local scene. “We thought that, if we could take a concept that was so familiar to Southerners where they are out hunting, all seasons, why couldn’t we bring that to the table at an elevated level?
“So, we started to play with the concept a little bit. Now we feel like we’ve taken something that may be exotic to people looking from the outside in and taken it to a comfortable level.”
Fitz said The Hollow has been able to source many of the items on its menu from ranges across the country, including some in Georgia, Texas and Wisconsin.
The Hollow executive chef Dante Serra said he relishes the opportunity to help plan and prepare the offerings at the new Vista restaurant.
“Chris came to me with this idea and this concept,” Serra said. “I love working with different meats. Proteins are some of my favorite things to play with. It’s amazing to have a whole platform to do a bunch of different types of game meat from elk to venison to duck to boar. There are a lot of options.
“I’m really excited to bring them to the table to let people try. And we’ll throw a mix in it to help make people more comfortable if they are timid on trying game meats.”
Serra smiled broadly when asked his favorite item on the menu. Being a self-described “kid from Buffalo,” he said he has an affinity for wings. He noted The Hollow offers sticky bourbon duck wings.
“Those have a dual sauce that you don’t really see too often,” Serra said. The duck wings are first tossed in a blood orange bourbon sauce, then finished with a cherry glaze, the chef said.
“It’s a wonderful, wonderful dish,” Fitz said of the duck wings. “You don’t have the South without wings. We knew we had to do something that would play to comfort. We were blown away when our distributors brought duck wings to us.”
This story was originally published March 7, 2024 at 11:53 AM.
