TRIANGLE TODAY | THE NEWS & OBSERVER
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 2, 2019
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FUN FINDER on page 2
LULA’S MOVES INTO FORMER SPANKY’S SITE WITH SOUL-SATISFYING
SOUTHERN COMFORT FOOD Greg Cox for Triangle Today
Chapel Hill Restaurant Group has an enviable record for opening restaurants with staying power.
LULA’S 101 E. Franklin St., Chapel Hill 919-967-2678, lulaschapelhill.com Cuisine: Southern Rating: 3 1/2 stars Prices: $$ Atmosphere: casual Noise level: moderate to high Service: friendly but spotty Recommended: fried chicken, Southern “carnitas” sandwich, fried green tomato sandwich, biscuits, green beans, fried okra, baked squash, desserts Open: Lunch and dinner TuesdaySaturday, brunch Sunday. Papa being D’Auvray’s grandfather, source of the umami-rich lacquer of Worcestershire sauce, lemon and butter that glazes the bone-in breast.
Even Page Road Grill, the baby of the family until recently, is 6 years old — a venerable age by restaurant standards. Mez has been open for a decade, Squid’s since 1990, and 411 West since 1986. Spanky’s, the granddaddy of the group, opened in 1977. Famous for its burgers and its caricatures of UNC alumni, the place was a Franklin Street institution. But the old boy had grown tired in recent years, and finally gave up the ghost in March last year. Three months later, Lula’s was born at that location. The newest member of the CHRG family brings a different cuisine — you might even say a family of her own — into the fold. Named for the great-grandmother of executive chef William D’Auvray, Lula’s offers a menu inspired by recipes passed down from three generations of the chef’s Salisbury family. Best known locally as the former owner/ chef of Fins and bu.ku in Raleigh, where his menus were a culinary travelogue of his extensive travels in Asia, D’Auvray has long nurtured a dream of exploring his Southern roots. Lula’s is the realization of that dream. Lula’s signature “shallow fried” chicken is a tribute to the chicken D’Auvray remembers his grandmother frying up in a cast iron skillet. The chef tweaked her recipe (she fried in lard, for one, while he uses peanut oil) and adapted it to the restaurant kitchen. D’Auvray’s method — brining, marinating in buttermilk, and air
Named for the great-grandmother of executive chef William D’Auvray, Lula’s offers a menu inspired by recipes passed down from three generations of the chef’s Salisbury family. Juli Leonard drying before dredging in seasoned flour and frying in an enormous cast iron skillet that covers several burners of Lula’s commercial eight-burner stove — yields a juicy, crisp-skinned bird that would surely make his grandmother proud.
cast on a streamlined menu of salads, sandwiches, plates and table sides (which the menu accurately describes as enough for two).
You get two pieces to an order, choice of dark or white meat (including a worthyof-the-splurge two breast option), with a biscuit on the side. Alternatively, you can opt for a boneless thigh on a biscuit or on a locally baked bun with a spicy pickle slaw. There’s even a gluten-free version, fried in a pan reserved exclusively for gluten-free dishes.
You’ll probably find yourself craving more of those excellent biscuits — an itch you can scratch with an à la carte order, served with spun sage honey that makes the offering even more irresistible. And by all means, round out your meal with at least a couple of down-home sides. Scratch green beans with onions are a must, but you won’t go wrong with Lula’s creamy mac and cheese or greens seasoned with a splash of cider vinegar.
Fried chicken is clearly the headline act, but it’s backed up by a strong supporting
If fried chicken is not your thing, Papa’s grilled chicken is a winning alternative.
You won’t go wrong with the fried green tomato sandwich, either, stacked with avocado, Vidalia onion and buttermilk dressing between sturdy slabs of grilled white bread. Or with hickory- and applewood-smoked pork shoulder “carnitas” with chow chow on a locally baked bun. Or braised beef short rib, finished to order on a flat top grill and served on a bun with pepper relish and pan gravy on the side — though why it’s listed under the Plates heading instead of Sandwiches is a mystery. Maybe it’s to fill out an otherwise anemic section whose only two other listings are grilled chicken and the catch of the day (fried catfish both times I was there, but anything from NC waters is possible, from grilled wahoo to speckled trout).
Read the full review at triangletoday.com.