Magnolia's

Description:

• Magnolias manages to elevate the regional, vernacular cuisine of the Deep South to a hip, postmodern art form that's suitable for big-city trendies but is more likely to draw visiting families instead. The city's former Customs House has been revised into a sprawling network of interconnected spaces with heart-pine floors, faux-marble columns, and massive beams. Many diners fill up on soups and salads at lunch, ranging from a creamy tomato with lump crabmeat to a salmon BLT salad. But blackened catfish, fried green tomatoes, cheese grits, and buttermilk fried chicken breast -- how Southern can you get?

• © Frommer's 2012