Austin continues to churn out new forms of restaurants. An upcoming addition comes from East Side Show Room’s Sonya Coté and will be located on East Eleventh Street. Hillside Farmacy, as the name suggests, will have elements of a traditional drug store of the early 1900’s, offering fresh food for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Like many East Side establishments, unique design features will highlight Hillside. Welder and industrial designer Mickie Spencer of Show Room and Swan Dive fame is the design lead and plans to use vintage pharmacy cabinetry and display cases. The building Spencer and her team are renovating was actually home to Hillside Drugstore about 60 years ago.

In addition to detailed design and a creative concept, expect quality food and drinks. It will somewhat resemble a deli with its selection of fresh sandwiches, but anticipate a diverse offering with oysters and charcuterie. Most of the products used, as we would hope in Austin, will come from local farms.

Regardless of what time of day you visit, they’ll have a fitting beverage option, be it locally roasted coffee, beer, wine, a soda fountain or something from the full bar. In addition to the restaurant menu, Hillside Farmacy will also offer a small selection of grocery items to take home. Keep an eye out for details on its upcoming opening by checking their website.

While Nashville is known as one of the country’s best cities for music, the art scene here is no less alive. Many of the city’s painters’, sculptors’ and photographers’ work is on display the first Saturday of every month as galleries around the city participate in the Nashville Downtown Art Crawl.

What began as an effort to get fellow artists together to display their work and enjoy an evening with enthusiasts has grown exponentially in participants, galleries, collectors and admirers. The Downtown Art Crawl’s roots are found in one particular art lover, Anne Brown, and her gallery on 5th Avenue, The Arts Company. The event’s humble beginnings were simply to gather friends and celebrate their work, but as the city grew and changed, so did the art scene.

As more galleries began opening around 5th Avenue, a few of them including The Arts Company, Twist Gallery, and what is now Tinney Contemporary, decided that an organized monthly celebration of art was a necessity for the expanding community. As Nashville evolves, Brown stresses that the art crawl will as well, “our plans for the future are even more dramatic,” she says.

The Downtown Art Crawl is free to the public with shuttles available to transport visitors between galleries. A map and gallery listing can be found online.

Jonathan Swift had it right when he said, “He was a bold man that first ate an oyster.” However, over the centuries the oyster has become quite popular; the Romans opened banquets with them, the Greeks believed them to be an aphrodisiac, peasants ate them by the bushel in the 19th century (almost leading to their extinction) and today restaurants often charge several dollars for one of the 100+ varieties available on the market.

Oysters tend to come to mind more often in the winter for many, which likely stems from the belief that they can only be eaten in a month containing the letter “r” and the fact that heat is no friend to these bivalve mollusks. Fortunately, with modern day refrigeration, the concern about those warmer non-“r” months is no longer a threat to the health of the oyster – or consumer – if they’re stored properly.

Regardless, this is a great time of year for oysters and backyard oyster roasts. (Low country jewel, Charleston, agrees and hosts their Oyster Festival this Sunday, January 29th.) In celebration and anticipation of this surprisingly nutritious seafood, we wanted to offer a few preparations for your feast.

Carolina Kettle Toppers – Use one of these fire-pit tray tops for your group oyster roast.

Edisto Oyster Knife – Recently recognized by our friends at Garden & Gun, Chris Williams is a Lowcountry native who began making knives as tools to facilitate his lifestyle of hunting, fishing and oyster shucking.

Gold Band Oysters – Whether you live far from the coast or just don’t enjoy the work to open it, Gold Band uses high pressure processing to pre-shuck the oyster and reduce bacteria, leaving you with easy to open shells that offer award-winning flavor.

Oysterpedia – Choose the free “lite” version or the more robust $1.99 version of this iPhone app for details on the size, flavor, location and photos of more than 200 oysters – segmented by East Coast and West Coast.

Oyster Buckle – As a tribute to this Southern delicacy, Sid Mashburn offers an attractive gold oyster buckle that pairs well with your favorite pair of denim for the oyster roast, or anywhere else for that matter.

Photo credit, left to right: Chris Williams, Carolina Kettles and Sid Mashburn.

February fourteenth is on the horizon, so you’re supposed to just grab some flowers, chocolates or jewelry for your lady, right? Well, not exactly. Women don’t want a token gift for Valentine’s Day. They want thoughtfulness and intentional effort – and a little creativity wouldn’t hurt. For a bit of direction, here are a few of our recommendations for a romantic evening in Austin.

Drinks at Hotel San Jose
A favorite hotel among visiting celebrities and musicians for its accommodations, locals can enjoy drinks in the courtyard. Expect a calm, dimly lit, romantic atmosphere, quiet enough to hear each other talk. They don’t serve liquor, but their drink selection of wine, local brews and unique creations doesn’t disappoint.

Don’t forget to: pay her a genuine compliment when you pick her up. It’s a gift that doesn’t cost you anything, yet affirms who she is and acknowledges something unique about her.

Dinner at La Traviata
Positioned in the heart of downtown Austin, this quaint Italian restaurant’s stone walls and lighting make it a date spot that she’ll remember. Because of the small size and limited seating, you’ll want to make reservations. The best part about it: you don’t have to sacrifice high quality food for the ambiance. Here you get both. Make sure to try the homemade ravioli.

Don’t forget to: give her your undivided attention, so turn off your cell phone and put it away. You can survive one night without email, social media and text messages (if you can’t, then read this).

Conversation at Mozart’s Coffee
With plenty of indoor and outdoor seating, this West Austin coffee shop roasts their own beans and offers an array of coffee, espresso drinks and desserts (including gelato). With a location on the banks of the Colorado River and lights strung in the trees, the outside deck is an ideal spot for late-night conversation.

Don’t forget to: ask thoughtful questions that are specific to her life and interests. Vague questions are boring and reflect the same about you. Whether it’s a first date or you’ve been married for years, you can’t go wrong learning more about her passions.

When it comes to Tennessee barbeque, Memphis gets its fair share of attention, but Nashville has been stepping up its smoked game. The latest worthy addition to our city’s Que roster is Edley’s Bar-B-Que in the 12South neighborhood, combining classic barbeque with the tradition of a meat-and-three restaurant.

Edley’s is a rustic, yet comfortable, joint, with plenty of booths and tables for seating, exposed wooden rafters and TVs on the wall behind the bar. But as with any good barbeque restaurant, the setting takes a back seat to the food. After placing your order at the counter, you can rest easy knowing that the pork, chicken and/or beef you’re about to feast on was smoked that day.

After a few visits, we’ve especially liked the Turk’s Special (shown above) – a nice, smoky brisket sandwich with a generous spread of house-made pimento cheese, a poached egg and pickles to top it off. The textures found on the sandwich were only outdone by the flavor. Beyond the meat, the fried pickles are golden, crispy and flawlessly tart – certainly a nice Southern starter. And while good sauce can often mask mediocre meat, at Edley’s both are executed nicely, providing the proper balance of smoke, sweet and spice.

Note that the brisket is generally only available at lunch and the ribs are only served at dinner. Edley’s Bar-B-Que is located at 2706 12th Avenue South. 615.953.2951

Photo by Chad Davis.