One of our favourite restaurants anywhere is Chef Art Smith’s Homecomin’. After falling in love with the place on our 2017 trip, we held our wedding reception there as part of our January 2018 trip. We also really enjoy starting our trip here with supper on our arrival night, and this trip was no exception.

We checked in at the hostess stand outside the restaurant, and we only waited about 5 minutes before I received a text message saying our table was ready and to head inside. As soon as we walked in, I spotted the main man himself – Chef Art Smith! I was fangirling hard, and mentioned to the hostess showing us to our table how excited I was to see him in his restaurant, and how special this place was for us after holding our reception on the patio the day of our wedding. She immediately went over to him and clearly told him that, because the next thing we knew he was making his way over to our table! He was so friendly, and shook our hands and asked if we’d like a picture, and thanked us for coming back to eat again. Eeeeee! I mean, just look at my giant, dorky grin hahaha:

After our famous-person meet and greet, we sat down and started making the difficult decisions about what to order. First decision was drinks!

Since it was our first night and I’d barely slept in days, I decided it was a great time to really overindulge, and ordered a 22-ounce squeeze bottle of Rumshine Punch – Strawberry RumShine, blackberry brandy, banana liqueur, pineapple juice and house-made grenadine, $22.

Look at how adorable this squeeze bottle is! And the drink was extremely delicious, and despite being strong it went down easy. Maybe a little too easy, spoiler alert – I was feeling pretty good by the time this meal was over hahaha. Also – you can take this bottle back and it’s $13 for refills 🙂

Luke’s first drink order was the Florida Crush – Tito’s handmade vodka muddled with orange and strawberries, a splash of fresh squeezed Florida orange juice and agave syrup, $12

Luke had tried this drink here back in December, and he thought that one was mixed a bit better than this one.

Also – we had one of the best tables in the restaurant, along the back wall overlooking the water. It was a perfect way to really kick off our vacation!

We decided to go all out on this meal, and order an appetizer, entree and dessert each. My appetizer wasn’t really exciting, but I was thinking ahead and ordered a basket of Cheddar Cheese Drop Biscuits – $7

I love these so much, and since I knew we had an early start to our day tomorrow these would make a great breakfast. There were 6 in here – we ate three of them and saved three of them for breakfast.

It’s not officially stated on the menu, but you can order a half-order of the Church Lady Deviled Eggs – southern style deviled eggs $12 for 6 eggs ($6 for a half order)

I don’t like eggs, so I’ve never tried these, but Luke has had them a few times and always enjoys them. He really likes putting a bit of the house-made Hot Sauce on them. I also asked for his input, and he called these “Heaven’s Cholesterol Bombs”.

Next up – entrees! We really wanted to try something different, but I didn’t want to change it up too much. I always get the Fried Chicken, so this time I ordered the Fried Chicken & Doughnuts – two pieces of Chef Art Smith’s famous fried chicken served with house-made sugar doughnuts and creamy mashed potatoes, $27.

The only difference from the other chicken dish is doughnuts instead of a biscuit, and I believe the pieces of chicken are smaller with this one (but that’s not based on anything other than the multiple pictures I have of the non-doughnut based chicken dish). The chicken was just as delicious as I remembered. I also ask for a side of their southern gravy every time too, it’s so good on top of the mashed potatoes or used to dip pieces of chicken (or biscuit!) into. The doughnuts were also clearly fresh, and they are served with maple syrup to dip into (or pour over top of them – no judgement). It was really sweet, but such a great contrast to the savoury chicken/potatoes.

Luke really switched it up and decided to try the Cuban Sandwich – house smoked pork, shaved country ham, house made pickles, yellow mustard and Swiss cheese pressed between slices of fresh Cuban bread, served with house-made barbecue chips drizzled with icebox dressing, $18

I didn’t try this (I don’t like mustard), but Luke really enjoyed it! I did steal a few of the chips though, they were nice and fresh and crispy. I really enjoy their icebox dressing as well. In Luke’s words – the bread was toasted to a perfect crispiness, the pulled pork was excellent and complimented well with the ham and mustard. He was also a little apprehensive about ordering it at first because he’s loved all the other things he’s tried here, but he was so happy he took a chance on a new item!

At some point, Luke ordered another drink, Blue Hooch – Blue Flame moonshine, lemon-infused moonshine, blue curacao, house-made simple syrup, fresh lemon juice and a splash of Sprite, $13

This was my favourite of the three drinks we had during this meal, and I might have helped Luke out by drinking half of it… (he did help me with my RunShine Punch too, I’m not that much of a lush hahaha).

Finally, we somehow found room for dessert (ok fine, I packed up half of my mashed potatoes and one piece of my chicken just so I’d have room…). Luke ordered the Shine Cake – Chef Art’s signature dessert. An adult-only butter cake soaked with moonshine syrup, served with seasonal fruit gastrique and a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream, $11

This is always great – I mean, who doesn’t love getting drunk on cake?! It’s a large piece (it’s bigger than it looks in the picture), and I definitely helped him with this buttery perfection. It’s also strong enough to keep your buzz going a little longer…

I went for my favourite dessert on the menu – Hamilton County Chocolate Pecan Pie – a 100 year old traditional Smith Family Farm recipe served with a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream, $11

I know it doesn’t look super impressive from my awesome dark photo, but this is so good! I’m not a huge pie person – but I love this one! It’s served warm so the chocolate is a little melty, and the pecans are nice and salty. I try to avoid ice cream for the most part (dairy seems to be a trigger food for my Crohn’s), so I only ate about half of that scoop, but it pairs perfectly with the pie.

I forgot to take a picture of the receipt, but it was just under $130 with my 10% annual pass discount.

Total food cost: $197