For a city like Columbia, even being nominated is an honor when it comes to the annual James Beard awards. Until last year, the city was overlooked in favor of other, more oft-praised cities like Charleston and Greenville. But our moderate metropolis was finally given a look two years in a row now.
Three Columbia-area restaurants are officially in the running as James Beard semifinalists — finalists for the culinary world Oscars will be announced April 3 with the awards ceremony slated for June 8-10 in Chicago.
One of last year’s nominees is once again in the running, albeit for a different category. And two newcomers to the nominations are competing against one another for the title of Best Chef Southeast.
They all have different stories and aspirations but have similarly given Columbia a taste of what great food can be in many distinctive ways.
A second dance
Lula Drake is back in the game for a second time, but this time under a more fitting category — Outstanding Wine and Other Beverages Program. Owner and head sommelier Tim Gardner and his cozy little wine bar on Main Street are up against 19 other establishments from around the country. Last year, they were in the running for Outstanding Hospitality.
To speak with Gardner about wine is to know someone who has a pure and authentic passion for what he loves. The light in his eyes, the joy in his voice and the pauses to contemplate his answers before educating someone about specific bottles, vineyards and varietals shows he is right where he wishes to be, at the helm of the restaurant-in-reverse that focuses on wine first, where the food pairs with the wine instead of the other way around.
And what sets Gardner and Lula Drake apart, perhaps, from its competition is the commitment to be exactly who they are. After being nominated last year, he didn’t want to change a single thing moving forward.
“We’ve made no changes at all,” Gardner said. “I’ve never talked about this before, but when we got nominated the first time, the question was ‘what do we do now?’ I said we were going to do exactly what we’ve been doing, that’s why we are here.”
In 2023, Lula Drake Wine Parlour joined City Grit Hospitality Group and Jessica Shillato of Spotted Salamander as semifinalists in the prestigious James Beard Foundation awards.
Though that isn’t completely the case, as he said Lula Drake has started to do a few new things and they see many people they haven’t seen before.
“It’s been interesting to come in and walk through when it’s hopping, and in the past, I knew the majority of people here, but now I may only know a few people — there’s so many new faces,” Gardner said.
But the steadfast commitment to showing up every week, educating folks about fine wines and making Columbia look cool to visitors continues to shine through in everything they do.
One might think that being in this spotlight would go to one’s head, but not at Lula Drake. A new grandfather, Gardner said he isn’t interested in big, glitzy plans to open bigger spaces, start a franchise or open in more well-heeled cities.
Lula Drake owner Tim Gardner
“There’s not any room for me to expand here (in this space),” he said. “I’ve toyed with other locations many times, but right now, I’m just loving being a grandad, and my focus is here and on my family.”
While the Lula Drake crew went on a trip together to the awards ceremony last year, they’ll be sticking closer to home this year. But they are just as excited and humble about the possibility of winning, and the one in a million honor of being nominated.
Hope from the start
Mathematically speaking, it makes perfect sense how Chef Robbie Robinson of City Limits Q became so skilled in the art of Texas barbecue in such a short amount of time — he’s got a background in numbers and high-pressure analytics, which translate perfectly to sweating out the multiple concurrent ratios of cooking over an open flame.
The size, weight and various components of the meat, the temperature of the fire in different spots on the smoker, the length of time needed, the wood coal composition and so much more make barbecue a complex formula. But it’s the escapism into the creativity of cooking that makes him love it.
Pitmaster Robbie Robinson takes customers' orders at his restaurant City Limits Q in West Columbia on Jan. 27, 2024.
Lexington born and bred, Robinson never imagined he’d be at the helm of a cooking operation, much less one nominated for one of the highest honors in the food world.
“I don’t remember visualizing a scenario where being a semifinalist for a James Beard award happened because it was such a remote probability,” Robinson said.
But this recognition was a goal all along. “But I knew James Beard was the symbol of excellence, though I never really dreamed it could happen.”
As for how he came to bring Texas’ best-loved beef brisket to South Carolina, it starts like any other love story: he followed his lady love out West, where they settled in Houston for a few years.
The ironic part is that he doesn’t have any Texas-barbecue restaurant specific memories attached to their time out there, he said with a laugh.
Add in a little smoker from Lowe’s to try to cook pork barbecue in Texas, a move back to South Carolina and a longing for the Houston food scene, and a seedling of an idea began to form in his mind.
“I thought there was an opportunity to do something better in South Carolina,” Robinson said. “When we went back to Texas to visit family, I’d drive from sunrise and hit as many barbecue places as I could to learn the culture. The more I went to these like-minded barbecue places, I knew that this was the right thing to do, and this food was something that we had to bring home.”
The biggest glow-up to City Limits Q came in 2023, when Robinson went from pop-ups and a food truck to a sizable brick-and-mortar location on Methodist Park Road in what he affectionately calls “West Coal-umbia”.
He knows the brick and mortar absolutely contributed to his nomination for two reasons: the ability to cook consistently every weekend and perfect every bite of food, and being able to retain his highly trained and passionate crew that he speaks highly of at every chance.
“Without a doubt, there’s no way I could do it without these guys.”
No stranger
Chefs Kitwanda “Kiki” and Tyrone Cyrus of Kiki’s Chicken and Waffles have served some pretty well-known and discerning palates of celebrities and politicians in their time cooking in Columbia.
University of South Carolina’s women’s basketball coach Dawn Staley was an early fan, President Joe Biden — when he was vice president — stopped in on the campaign trail, and coach and former pro athlete Deion Sanders has been by, to name a few.
“Everybody likes soul food,” Kiki Cyrus told The Post and Courier in 2019.
The Cyruses did not responded to multiple requests for comment. And, as of March 18, have yet to acknowledge the awards publicly or on their social media profiles.
The popular chicken-and-waffles restaurant has two locations. The first one, at 7001 Parklane Road, opened in 2012 and was followed by a food truck and sales counter at the Colonial Life Arena before a second location opened at 1260 Bower Parkway in northwest Columbia along the busy Harbison corridor in 2019.
Chef Kitwanda “Kiki” Cyrus cooks in her restaurant, Kiki's Chicken and Waffles.
During a visit to the Bower Parkway location, it was bustling. Every table was full, even at 3 p.m. on a Saturday, with people busy enjoying chicken and waffles, and all kinds of soul food that fills the menu.
The menu ranges from breakfast items — waffles heavily featured, of course — to smothered chicken, barbecue ribs, a mess of sides including collards and fried okra, and the famed red velvet dessert waffle served with cream cheese icing and topped with sliced strawberries and powdered sugar.
What’s next
These three Columbia-based semifinalists will find out, along with all other semifinalists, on April 3 if they’ve made the short list to go on to compete for the award. The James Beard Awards will be announced June 10 from a ceremony held in Chicago.
In the meantime, these semifinalists will continue to dish out the food and drink that got them recognized in the first place, but it’s sure to be more crowded now with people eager to give them a taste than ever before.
