Smith House Restaurant — Restaurant in Dahlonega

Love love LOVE the Smith House! It’s located in a historic 1898 inn on top of a real gold vein. Alert! This place has the best collard greens I’ve ever eaten. My MeMa always told me if a place serves good collards, it means they are going to do you right with everything. Wifey and I ate here at 5:30 PM on Saturday, Jan 21, 2023. Epic! As always. Delicious, dependable and comforting. We are both native Georgians and been eating from time to time here since the mid 1980’s. Work had called us away to Texas for four years, but recently relocated to the Buford area and made the 50 minute trip just to eat at this special place. For $23 each we got ample servings of many items, and were unable to finish them all so we took home a to go container. This price included excellent, well seasoned, perfectly cooked, yet moist fried chicken. We had a choice of white or dark and I chose the breast, see my attached picture. The pieces were huge! This meal also came with fork tender, hefty seasoned pot roast in a thick, rich brown gravy with potatoes and carrots. Vegetables were tender and not mushy or hard. We learned Friday and Saturday you can get a pot roast meal with 2 sides for $12.50, along with other single meat choices, like fried chicken or country fried steak. Anyway, this meal came out it’s excellent mash potatoes, savory Kentucky wonder style green beans, crisp fried okra, tasty cream corn, homemade yeast rolls and corn bread, Mac and cheese, and even strawberry short cake and choice of beverages, I chose sweet tea with a lemon slice, which hit the spot. Getting down to business I can’t stress enough how excellent those collards are, and it’s great they have Louisiana brand pepper sauce, the kind with the visible whole peppers in vinegar. They also had Louisiana hot sauce on the tables. The mashed potatoes were chunky, buttery, and tasted like they had just been made by someone who knows and loves what they are doing. Speaking of love, all the servers treated us like family. As time went on a group of college kids and their parents came in, numbering 33 people at a long table that sat all of them. Closer to 6pm many other families came in. Everyone looked happy. Lots of younger children, all well behaved. It’s such a cozy spot loaded with many historic photos and local artifacts, we read where they have been serving food there since 1922. So over 100 years later they have a packed dining room of happy people at 6:15 PM on a Saturday night. As we exited and strolled down Dahlonega’s inviting sidewalks on this chilly January night we were already talking about when we can make it back next time. I want to try their baked ham plate and get mashers and collards with it, and that way I can get the chocolate Oreo pie, or maybe the banana pudding, or the Boston Creme pie. We also noticed they sell a Smith House cookbook we plan to get on our next visit. Also another thing to consider, there is no way you can make all the things that came with this meal for that price at home for 2 people. Maybe a group of 33 can make the numbers work to do this at home but where are they going to find a table that seats...

Went with friends and daughters for my birthday for lunch. We paid over $20 a piece and the food was awful. Not one person in my party liked it. I have heard amazing things about their food and still hear people say how good it is but either we went on a bad day or people don’t know what good food is. The fried chicken is cold, soggy and the breading had a weird old oil or something taste. The fried okra was under cooked and the vegetables tasted canned. I eat canned vegetables occasionally but when I do I season them and use bacon grease or ham. Over priced and over rated was our experience. I absolutely love fried chicken but good fried chicken. I had high hopes for this place since I live here and finally decided to try it after years of not but I don’t think I will give it a second chance. Not that it matters because they along with most of our restaurants rack in most business from tourists. We need a good fried chicken restaurant home cooked southern food/soul food. Edited to add I know I’m not the only person that left a bad review because I’ve read them good and bad for Smith House and this is one of only two or three bad reviews I’ve ever left for any place in the years I’ve left reviews around five thousand reviews. So I don’t do it lightly. If I felt that there would have been something they could have done or would have done to have fixed it I would’ve asked for a manager but shocked to hear there are three on the floor at all times because there was barely anyone there...

First time visiting, and it was not disappointing. The food is brought to the table based on the established menu. Therefore, no ordering is necessary. Farm to table country style food that was delectable. A couple of the vegetable dishes were lukewarm, thus 4 stars but still seasoned well and not overly cooked. Husband enjoyed the fried chicken and pot roast (I don't eat meat). His was impressed with the way the pot roast did not require a lot of chewing, and it was so savory. The staff and servers, top notch! So polite and attentive to every need. And not just the same server came to our table. This place was very busy with large groups of people but there was no long wait. To top off the evening, you can learn a little history about the hotel and the mine shaft discovered during...