May 29, 2025

When I think of soul food, the first thing that comes to mind is the Key and Peele sketch where they ask their waitress for increasingly ridiculous Southern “staples” like mosquitoes and honey-glazed donkey teeth. That’s not to say I have a bad opinion of it at all- honey glaze sounds quite good to me – but eating at Virtue taught me what soul food is really supposed to be.

Our server, Joe, was super friendly and talkative, which usually seems suspicious to me, because how can someone work a service job and actually like all their customers? But he was either a genuine person or he at least had a flawless impression of one. We asked questions about probably every single dish on the menu. Honestly, I felt kinda bad we kept asking him things because I had no idea how he’d have time to do the same for the other people he was waiting on. He even managed to convince the chef to make an off-menu order of dirty rice specifically for my dad.

We ended up getting every single dish he recommended. I guess you could say he charmed us into it? But it was definitely worth it. The fried green tomatoes were unlike anything I’ve ever had. They were the lightest fried food you could possibly make and I could hardly even tell they were tomatoes. Because they were so mild, they brought out the flavor of the shrimp that topped them. A side note: I have sort of a shrimp allergy, but in my experience, it’s only triggered on bad shrimp. (I don’t really understand it either.) So if I trust the shrimp, I have to really like your establishment.

My mom and I wanted to try some other foods we don’t normally get, so we ended up with things like asparagus with thin strips of crispy pig ears. We tried the ears and were shocked by how good they were. They were basically just umami chips. I’ve had my fair share of weird meats before, like tripe and chicken feet. But neither of those were as easy to eat as pig ears. It ended up that even my dad, who at first wanted to stay far away from any organ meat, wanted to try them because my mom and I kept raving about them.

But then there were some upscale versions of simple dishes, too. The mac and cheese was crispy on the outside but creamy inside, which I realize sounds like a normal mac and cheese but I can promise it was better than any you’ve had before. It convinced me that no matter how much of a food snob you are, you’re not above mac and cheese. Sorry for all my lactose intolerant friends out there.

By the time the dessert menu rolled around, we were totally full, but Joe’s suggestions had been so good throughout the meal that he somehow managed to convince us to purchase all four desserts on the menu. This was more my mom’s decision than mine or my dad’s, but I didn’t go against it. You know a restaurant has you in a chokehold if you can’t eat anymore but you still believe ordering more food is a good idea. Objectively speaking, I think ordering four desserts was a terrible idea, but I didn’t even feel that bad after we had to (slightly ashamedly) throw all of them into to-go boxes. I would’ve regretted not trying them.

If I were to guess what soul food is based just off our visit to Virtue, I’d say it feels like home. Sometimes that means it surprises you into thinking there’s no way you’ve never tried this before, like fried pig ears, and other times it’s just something familiar but done absolutely perfectly, like their mac and cheese. But home also has to do with the people who’re around you. Joe catered to us like we were in his house, not his workplace. I think having that human connection is essential not just to soul food, but restaurants as a whole. Why not just DoorDash everything or have kiosks to order all your food? It’d certainly be easier, but kiosks can’t tell you what dishes they like. They can’t talk with the chef to decide whether it’s possible to get a side order of dirty rice. In a world with so much automation, where humans are taken out of the equation as often as possible, having a meal that prioritizes the soul made me very happy.