Jerry's

via Facebook.

The big news in my hometown this week is that Jerry's is closing.

I know what you're thinking.  Jerry's? Isn't that like a Frisch's or a Denny's? It's a diner.  That isn't ironic. Why is that worth mentioning?

Well, you're right.  Jerry's is was a Kentucky-based chain of diners that offered up an old-fashioned family-style eating experience.  The menu offered the usual diner fare- country fried steaks, hot fudge cake, and steak fries.  In our small town, however, Jerry's was so much more than a diner.  It was a meeting place for over four decades.  The old drive-in booths were apparently all the rage when my parents were in high school.  When I was a kid, the Prestonsburg Jerry's was the See-and-be-Seen place.  If you ate there on a Friday night, or on the night of a big high school basketball game, you always had to build at least 20-30 minutes of  chatting into your dining schedule.  It really was the town social center.  My granny and her friends used to take in their weekly Weight Watchers meetings at the church next door, then head over for dinner at Jerry's.  Perhaps their tradition was a little counterproductive, but it was just what you do.

via Floyd County Times

Jerry's was just one of those traditions.  Like many traditions, though, its time has passed.  Our little town now offers more exotic (and, arguably, better) fare -- barbecue, Mexican food, high-end sandwiches.  The last time I ate at Jerry's, I found that my tastes really no longer ran toward the fried fish dinner that I adored when I was a kid.  Still, it's sad to know that my hometown's landmark gathering place is facing its final days.  All small towns evolve, but it doesn't always feel like they get better.

In the two weeks before Jerry's closes, I hope to make a visit for one last piece of hot fudge cake and a huge side of nostalgia.  Y'all are invited to tag along, if you have an hour or so to socialize.

Soda Pop

When I moved to Kentucky at the age of twelve, I remember there being such a big shock to my system. No, it wasn't a different accent or slightly colder weather. It was first hearing someone offer me a "pop."

Was this some slang term for beating me up? No, they were offering me a coke. (Not Coke with the capital C, because it could have been a Coke or Pepsi, or heavens forbid, a RC).  Never in my Georgian life had I heard the word "pop" to refer to the fizzy, calorie-laden carbonated beverage.

(image source)

I think I assimilated by calling it pop moving forward, however I still find myself wanting to refer it to Coke. Occasionally I'll get confused at call it soda. Now, when in doubt I just offer people bourbon. 

I noticed in this map of pop vs. soda, the state of Kentucky is divided. It seems like eastern Kentucky and Lexington are more likely to call it "pop," while Louisville and western kentucky call it "coke." 

Perhaps it makes no difference at all, unless you forget your manners and fail to offer anyone a frosty bevvy. That, my friends, is just plain rude.

What do you call it?

Kentucky Places: The Louisville List

Downtown Louisville as seen from Indiana

This weekend, a Nashville-based friend Facebooked me for recommendations for a summer trip to Louisville.  I guess it's where I've lived in (and loved) three amazing Southern cities, but I get  variants of that email all the time.  "Where should I stay in Louisville?"  "Where are the best places to shop in Nashville?"  "Where should I eat after a day at Keeneland?" -- I actually keep my responses on file in my email account and then re-work the answers to compliment individual friends' personalities, tastes, traveling preferences and companions.

Now, my friend is planning for an early June trip to a concert at the Yum! Center and a few days' stay in downtown Louisville.   She's never been to Louisville before, and wants to get a sense of the city.   There are so many attractions within walking/easy driving distance that this trip virtually plans itself.  Even though it's the middle of winter, talk of a Downtown Louisville summer puts me in the mood for Proof's gelato, a ride on the Belle, and a seat on Molly Malone's patio. -- HCW

The Yum Center and Downtown Museums

The Ali Center

I've never really been to the Yum! Center, but it's supposed to be an incredible venue.  It's right in the middle of Downtown Louisville, and you could have a fantastic trip without ever leaving the Downtown area.

The guys on the trip will probably want to see the Louisville Slugger Museum. If baseball's your thing, the RiverBats - the Minor League team - play downtown. The Frazier Museum has a lot of historical war/arms stuff. The Muhammad Ali Center is also quite neat -- it's kind of a walking tour of The Champ's life, as well as a cultural center that supports a lot of education and charity events.  There are also some very cute galleries/museums up and down Main Street, near Slugger, Frazier and the Ali.

Hotels

The Seelbach lobby

As for hotels, I would strongly suggest either 21C or the Seelbach. 21C is a very hip and boutique-y museum hotel. The restaurant inside -- Proof on Main -- is extremely cool. Excellent locally sourced food, insanely good cocktails, and a very artsy decor -- all without being too pretentious. Proof also has a fantastic gelato cart on the street during the summer -- I can't recommend it highly enough.
The Seelbach is way more traditional with four-poster cherry beds, marble lobbies, etc. I feel like a princess every time I stay there.  It has some really cool little bars, the best Starbucks in town, and an amazing day spa.  It also boasts the only five-diamond restaurant in the state.  They're even dog-friendly, and treated Max like a visiting dignitary.  Fitzgerald actually got thrown out of the Seelbach for public drunkenness and then set Daisy's wedding there when he wrote The Great Gatsby.

Outside Jeff Ruby's

The Galt House is kind of a non-descript conventioners' hotel, but it does have an amazing view of the river. There is also a really good high-end steakhouse, Jeff Ruby's, at the Galt House that's like a regional Ruth's Chris. Good, big steaks and a fantastic wine list.

Food/ Entertainment



Max  visits Fourth Street Live.

My very favorite breakfast in the world is at Toast on Market. The Blueberry-Lemon Pancakes are insane, as are the pancakes that are dressed out like a pot roast sandwich. Their hash brown casserole is incredible as well. Also on Market is Garage Bar, which is a high-end wood-fired pizza place that also includes a great oyster bar.

The Belle of Louisville

Downtown, just by the Seelbach, is a kind of touristy entertainment district called Fourth Street Live. There's a Hard Rock, a MakersMark-themed restaurant/bar, and a lot of little restaurants and bars. It's a fun place to people-watch and go out for drinks. I think they even have Yum! Center adjacent parking, and there is often live music and other event-y kind of stuff going on.

Oh, and if the weather permits, you can go out on a steamboat. The Belle of Louisville and the Spirit of Jefferson do lunch and dinner cruises and little sightseeing excursions. It's a very neat way to see downtown from the river.

The Highlands

Molly Malone's

If you want to venture just out of Downtown, the Highlands is a fun, eclectic neighborhood just minutes away. Very cute and cool (we lived there for years) shops and some of the best food anywhere. Lynn's Paradise Cafe is a cute, funky diner with fantastic food. Lunch and dinner are really good, and the breakfast/brunch is legendary. Wick's Pizza is kind of a neighborhood favorite -- huge pizzas with tons of quality toppings. There are some really great nicer restaurants up and down Bardstown Road (the main street going through the neighborhood); if you're up for Latin Fusion, Seviche is our favorite restaurant anywhere -- fantastic seafood and mojitos, and my beau loves their skirt steak, too.

I absolutely love the Louisville Stoneware factory--they do tours, paint-your-own, etc., and their big summer sale should be going on. There are also several really cute Irish Pub kind of places in the Highlands -- Molly Malones and O'Shea's are the kind of places where everyone from college kids to Congressmen go -- very laid-back and fun.

Churchill Downs

The one thing that would be worth driving out of downtown would be Churchill Downs. The summer meet will be in full-force by early June. For just a regular weekend race, you should be able to get tix -- you'd be fine to just dress like you would for an afternoon wedding or a "coat and tie rather than suit" church.  If you're in town on the right weekend, I'd hit up Downs After Dark, which is a fun night-racing event.

Louisville in general

Louisville is a really fun city. It can be a little more Midwestern than the rest of Kentucky -- people talk and walk a little faster and sure do drink in public more than they do anywhere else in the state. I think y'all will really like it, though. It's beautiful in the spring and summer! Also, it has really easy roads to navigate for a city its size; you really can get from one part of town to another pretty rapidly.

The biggest drawback to Louisville in the late spring/early summer is the weather. It's located right along the Ohio river and gets a lot of the river basin storms/tornado watches.

What about y'all, dear readers?  What's on your "Must-See Louisville" list??

(All photos are my own.)

You know who is from Kentucky? George Clooney. And Muhammad Ali. And a bunch of other uber-famous, supercool people.

However.

Those people get tons of exposure - as does Kentucky for bringing them to the world. I think it's time some other awesome (but less famous) Kentuckians get their due.

1. Justice John Marshall Harlan Born in Boyle County, Kentucky, John Marshall Harlan was lawyer and an associate justice on the U.S. Supreme Court. Never heard of him? Ever heard of the Lone Dissenter? The only justice who said Plessy v. Ferguson was a bad call? That's him. Famous for saying "our constitution is color-blind" WAY before it was cool, John Marshall Harlan deserves some respect (AND a building named after him on Transylvania's campus seeing as how he's an alum).

2. Patty and Mildred Hill These Kentucky sisters wrote Happy Birthday...as in THE Happy Birthday.  Enough said.

3. Enid Yandell From Louisville, Yandell was a prolific sculptor who studied with Auguste Rodin and Frederick William MacMonnies. She was also the first female member of the National Sculpture Society.

4. Garrett Morgan An early 20th Century inventor, Morgan invented the first gas mask and the first real traffic signal. Pretty cool.

5. Mordecai Ham Ham was a revivalist and American Independent Baptist evangelical. From 1901-1941, Ham led 289 meetings in 22 states, which produced 303,387 professions of faith in Christ. However, his most memorable feat came from converting just one young man in Charlotte, North Carolina in 1934. The young man was Billy Graham.

~ Sarah Stewart Holland 

I Beat the Breakup Belt Curse.

The Breakup Belt.

Any girl who attended a Lexington-area college in the past 30 years or so knows exactly what I'm talking about.  Those belts that you see all over town -- at ball games, frat houses and country clubs.  The ubiquitous leather-bound needlepoint belts that nearly every Central Kentucky man owns.  Lexington is a preppy little town, and nothing conveys that style more than a needlepoint belt.  They proudly display the wearer's fraternity affiliation or favorite hobbies or profession.  They present elaborate scenes of horse racing, sporting events or even bourbon labels. They're the product of long hours of tedious needlework, lovingly stitched by mothers, wifes, and dedicated girlfriends. 

I tempted fate -- and lived to tell the story.

Now, the girlfriend part is where it gets tricky.  Campus lore at Transylvania and UK alike held that, as soon as you make a needlepoint belt for your beau, he'll break up with you.  And, let me tell you, those things aren't cheap; they're a major investment of time and money.  You spend hours picking out just the perfect belt.  You peruse the huge selection of pre-painted canvases at

M's

, or you order a customized monogram-and-favorite hobbies canvas from

The Eye of the Needle

. You spend all your free time stitching the design.  You obsess about getting it just the right size. (If memory serves me correctly, your finished canvas should be four inches less than the desired belt size... or maybe it's two...) You realize you have to learn the finishing stitch -- the complex braided pattern that binds off the top and bottom and creates a surface onto which the leather backing will be stitched.   Then, when your work is finally finished, you send it off to be leathered.  And you wait.  Finally, when you're utterly exhausted with the project, you give the belt to its intended recipient.  And you hope he doesn't dump you after all that work.

Now, I made plenty of needlepoint belts when I was in college and graduate school.   I made them for myself, my parents, and my brother.  I even designed a custom collar for my beloved dog, Molly.   I was well known as the designated "finisher" of other people's belts.  If a sorority sister was stuck on her boyfriend's belt pattern, I finished it up in a day or two.  If a cousin needed to learn the finishing stitch, I whipped it up for her. But, I stayed far away from making a breakup belt for a boy of my own.   I'm a sports fan and, as such, am as superstitious as a medieval villager.  You don't laugh in the face of a curse -- just ask a Red Sox fan how that works out.  Anyway, I figured that I'd let those cousins, sorority sisters, and other friends tempt fate for me. I'd show those girls the stitches, take them to my favorite leather shop, and hope that I wasn't assisting in a jinx.

Just over seven years ago, I found myself looking for a very special present for a new beau.  We'd only been dating a few weeks, but I knew he was The One. 

Did I dare start things off in such a foolhardy fashion?

Was a hand-stitched UK belt the worst Christmas present ever?

I deliberated for quite a while.  And then, I remembered my aunt saying that she'd made my uncle a Doctor-themed belt during his medical residency -- twenty years later, they were happy as ever and had just welcomed their first grandson.  Maybe the curse had more to do with relationships that weren't meant to be.  Maybe girls just shouldn't be belt 'hos, and throw a bunch of time and money into making elaborate presents for guys they aren't too sure about. 

Seven years later and my then-new beau is now my fiancé.  We've been through three surgeries, three cities, two dogs, and an intensive graduate program. And R's belt -- a UK basketball pattern -- still looks great.  It seems that a piece of thread, canvas and leather doesn't really hold much of a curse.

Mint Juleps

Derby is 100 days from today.

Source: two-tarts.com via Heather on Pinterest

Now, as I write those words, I can't help but picture y'all immediately logging off HerKentucky, and running out to buy a dress and a hat because Derby is just around the corner.  But, I'm sure that our readers are more prepared than all that.  Anyhoo, the Derby Countdown has kept my spirits high on a dreary, wet, windy Thursday.  I've been thinking about fabulous hats.  I've been stalking the Lilly Pulitzer spring line.  But, most of all, I've been craving a julep.

Source: tumblr.com via Heather on Pinterest

The Derby's official drink is an iconic cocktail that immediately conjures images of Southern grace.  They're an emblem of a more sophisticated time.  I think there's just something so elegant about a mint julep -- the simple silver cups, the delicious bourbon, and the whimsical mint sprigs.  It's not a cocktail you just throw together -- you have to make your simple syrup and pick (or purchase) fresh mint.  While not a Southerner herself, the Mad Men character Betty Draper simply won me over when she served juleps to the adults at a child's birthday party.  I keep asking my friends to let me borrow a kid so that I can stage an homage to Betty's entertaining.  Oddly enough, nobody has taken me up on that request.

Source: weddingstyle.ca via Heather on Pinterest

Beyond the imagery of the julep, I find that there is, when done properly, a surprisingly good cocktail.  Now, I'm not much for the pre-made bottles that pop up every spring, but a well-made julep is a wonderful complement to a hot day.   I've always found that Dudley's in downtown Lexington  serves the very best version of the Commonwealth's Cocktail-- sweet, tart, and icy cold, with the slightest fizz of club soda.

Source: amazon.com via Heather on Pinterest

While the mint julep is perhaps the most famous symbol of the Kentucky Derby, it has as many critics as it does fans.  Louisville newspaperman Henry Watterson famously once described his own julep recipe: "Pluck the mint gently from its bed, just as the dew of the evening is about to form upon it. Select the choicer sprigs only, but do not rinse them.  Prepare the simple syrup and measure out a half-tumbler of whiskey.  Pour the whiskey into a well-frosted silver cup, throw the other ingredients away and drink the whiskey."  Here on HerKentucky, Cristina wrote that, while she loves the individual ingredients, she just can't get behind the finished product.  I'm even the only julep afficionado in my own home; my fiancé considers the mint julep to be a waste of good bourbon. 

Whether you love the sweet, minty compliment to your smoky, rich whisky or you simply think it's a waste of good bourbon, you have to admit that julep cups are a classic addition to any Southern home.  Julep cups add a rich look to any flower arrangement or keepsake -- they're small enough to add elegance to any spot without overwhelming your space.

So, while I still have to wait 100 days until I pull out my fabulous hat and dress and sip the season's first julep, I decided to bring a little julep culture into my life tonight.  I made a little flower arrangement using a Louisville Stoneware julep cup and some springy blooms.   Here's hoping it makes the countdown go by a little quicker!!

Kentucky Weather

Growing up in Kentucky, you were likely to see a thunderstorm one week followed by snow the next. I think these last few weeks of weather have proven to keep up with that wacky standard.

Here in Tennessee we've been seeing similar weather, but my parents keep me informed of the crazy Kentucky happenings, including a tornado warning last week following by a chance of snow the next.
I think there was an old saying that if you didn't like predictable weather, then you should probably move to Kentucky.

I know those of you who have been to Keeneland can attest to this as well. You truly never know what the weather is going to be like for the opening of the spring meet. One year it will be sunny and 78 and the next year it will be 38 degrees and snowing.

For example- me at Keeneland opening weekend in 2007:

Bright! Sunny! Beautiful!

And in 2007 a week later:

Huddled in the back of a car with a coat on because it's so cold!

Do you have any wacky weather stories to share from Kentucky?