Soul food, for most people who hear the word images start to drift into their minds: fields of fried chicken, mountains of collard greens, oceans of rich brown gravy with islands of mashed potatoes. But that doesn't meet everyone's requirement of soul food, one of my friends idea of soul food is a bowl of rice covered with vegetables and bulgogi, his mother happens to be Korean. Everyone has their own idea of soul food it reaches far into our past to sitting at MeMaw's, GramGram's, Bubeleh's, or in my case Grandma Honey's kitchen table and the home cooked meals that just make you feel loved. I'm by nature weary of soul food places, especially ones who are known for their mac and cheese because that IS my soul food, sitting around Grandma Honey's table meant one thing fro me, that the mac and cheese is coming, creamy and rich with a cracker crumb top makes my mouth water just thinking about it... ... ... sorry lost in a memory there.
Enter Sweetie Pie's: Upper Crust, the second of the Sweetie Pie's locations, cafeteria style service with the Grandma's behind the counters. It all looked good, smelled good, and most of it was pretty good, most of it. I'm usually a sucker for neck bones... usually... the texture was decent, the taste was salty... really salty. The mashed potatoes tasted like they were either pearled or flaked, the dried potato taste was still there and the gravy tasted, no joking, like there was chocolate in there somewhere, or as my father who I was dining with was apt to say after trying the potatoes and gravy, "Boxed potatoes and Yoohoo gravy." Then there was the mac and cheese, it was good don't get me wrong, it was good solid mac and cheese, but I'll be the first to admit I'm a mac and cheese snob and I'd give it a 7 out of ten. But there were good points to it, some really good points: The candied yams are candy sweet and perfectly cooked, the cornbread is made in house and perfectly crumbly dense, the green beans while canned were 'bammed' up a couple steps with bacon and onion, the sweet tea was delicious, and the fired chicken was golden, fresh and juicy. Then there was the Carmel coated white cake.... that slice of cake by itself will probably be why I hit Sweetie Pies again.
Since this is St. Louis Baseball is kind of what we do, just growing up here almost forces baseball analogies onto you, when it comes to restaurants I have a three strikes you're out policy. That piece of cake was the twist in the swing needed to change the would be strike to a base gain. The current verdict for Sweetie Pie's Upper crust, I recommend it but be careful what you order, the portion sizes are large so you'll either have a giant pile of succulently sweet candied yams or a mound of Yoohoo gravy covered instant tasting mashed potatoes. And definitely save some room for dessert. As another sunsets Under the Arch I find myself reminiscing about my Great-Grandmother, tomorrow I might make a batch of her Mac and Cheese, sorry guys no recipe for that one, that stays a family secret.
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