The Appalachian — Restaurant in Sevierville

This is an excellent restaurant if you are looking for extremely high quality food made with care.

There are not too many of these all locally sourced restaurants in East Tennessee, so this was a pleasant experience to try.

I’ll start with the only reason I give it 4 and not 5 - the noise. While tables are pretty nicely separated, rowdy guests can make the place much louder than you would expect.

But on to the reason why the food is a 10/10.

We started out the meal having several appetizers since we thought these would be small. These are HUGE. Each appetizer could nicely feed 3 people easily. We overestimated what would be needed and got 4 huge but delicious appetizers.

Their fried okra is a perfectly coated whole slit of okra that is served with a paprika ranch. Some okra pieces may be too fibrous which can happen when okra grows too large.

Their cornmeal breaded eggplant with herbed goat cheese and agave nectar was on a different level of food that I loved. The eggplant was made like little “chips”, and the goat cheese with agave was a mountain of the best salty, savory, and sweet topping.

I had to go with the fried chicken skins next. This was fried with a sweet honey and served with picked, hot peppers on top. I was blown away with how crispy the skins were yet how much flavor they could pack.

Finally, I was curious to try the Buffalo frog legs. I haven’t had frog legs before, so the thought scared me at first. But they were incredible. A nice, scattered amount of breading surrounded the frog legs, and the homemade Buffalo sauce had the perfect balance of tang and heat.

If I had to rank appetizers, it would be: Eggplant with goat cheese Frog legs Chicken skin Okra

Now onto the drinks. They had an excellent selection of whiskeys, beers, and wines. We had to go with a local East Tennessee hefeweizen with our appetizers, followed by a robust, tart with sweet notes on the tip, bottle of wine.

The main courses were something tough to forget.

The rainbow trout was a nicely seared, pan fried filet served with fresh arugula, chunks of amazing plums that were glazed with ginger, and finally some yummy, spiced pecans. This meal was massive, yet did not make you feel too heavy.

The other meal was an insane, 18oz dry-aged Kansas City strip. I had to get some add-ons for this, deciding to add some bone marrow as well as their onion/herb butter. Let me tell you, this steak was incredible. This was the first time I’ve had a dry aged steak on its own, and the flavors kept hitting you with every chew. Not to mention then having an amazing herb butter melting into the meat, and a generous side of bone marrow to add the umami flavor bomb to the meal.

The sides I added were their potato cakes and grilled squash. The squash was really well done, charred lengthwise and seasoned. The potato cakes were my personal favorite, 2 huge cakes of potato, spices, peppers, onions. It paired perfectly with the steak.

Finally, they gave a cash iron cornbread. This was really solid cornbread. Not as good as mom would make, but still a really nice portion of bread to eat with the meal.

During our meal, the head chef came to our table to talk to us about our experience so far and discuss where his food was sourced from and prepared.

Overall, food-wise this spot is easily a 10/10. The quality of food was top notch. The experience was very good. I would definitely come here for special occasions, as if you go with their steaks, expect to spend at least...

We dined with a party of 29 people and found out pretty quickly the restaurant was not equipped to handle large parties. Although there were only 3 or 4 other tables in the entire building , it took over 38 minutes to receive our appetizers. The waitress actually forgot my appetizer. I asked two different times and finally received it after everyone else had finished their appetizers. The waitress seemed new and extremely nervous so we tried to be understanding. The chicken skins were ok , the artesian cheeses were great. A member of our party had to ask for a sprite 4 times and when it finally came it was watered down. Throughout our meal our waitress seemed to disappear often. At one point I had to flag another employee down to ask for the sprite a 4th time. Entrees finally came out after over an hour and a half of being seated. The food was pretty good, we are from New Orleans and can be hard to please in the flavor department so I’ll just say it was different. My husband said the porter house was awesome ! We did get a visit from the manger after entrees came and decided not to complain. We could tell the waitress was overwhelmed. We ordered desserts , that took another 40 minutes to come out. At this point we started to take the smaller children out on the porch because they became antsy. We were there for over 3 hours now. We actually ended up getting all desert to go because it took so long. Things seemed to go downhill at this point….Although we told the waitress who was with what party when we started ordering, we had a feeling when it was time to bring the checks it wasn’t going to be good. And it certainly wasn’t. Two sections of our party received their bills after 15 minutes and were able to leave. The rest of us waited over 35 minutes for our checks. At one point the manager came and glanced at our table kind of giving us this when are you guys leaving look. We glanced back wondering where the waitress was , he seemed oblivious to everything that had transpired. You would think as we walked around the restaurant waiting and waiting , half of us standing looking pretty agitated he would have caught the drift but he did not. Finally my husband and myself went to the front counter to ask the manager when the waitress was coming with the rest of our checks. He checked with her and I could hear her apologizing, I could tell she had no idea who ordered what. Instead of trying to help her he came back and told us it’s coming. I was pretty agitated at this point, we had been there close to 4 hours. I said , we were told that over 35 minutes ago , do you need us to tell her what we ordered , would that be easier? He sort of seemed annoyed by me and just said it’s coming again …. To which I responded this is ridiculous, I’ve never experienced this. The manager then responded with. “Oh really, never??” as if I was thee problem. He then proceeded to tell me that since we wanted separate checks and we moved around the whole time ( we did not move until after we ate, and we only did so because we had small children and this dining experience took 3 1/2 hours) basically blaming us. He made some other snarky comment and was all around rude. After 4 hours and each party spending an average of $300-400 we never got an apology. Just ugly stares . We also still had the wrong food on our bills and had to sort it out via Venmo...

This restaurant definitely has potential. I wanted to give it five stars just for their effort to please but it isn't deserving of five just yet. All the staff we encountered were friendly and eager. We were dining at peak time: 7:30 on Saturday (yes, I made reservations the day before online). Our waitress, Madison, in particular was especially winsome and hospitable. The cocktails were mediocre. I had the Mountain Girl and while the first sip was fruity and delicious it seemed to get more dry and less flavorful the more I drank. Our waitress said this was their sweetest curated cocktail, which seems unbelievable. My friend had a Moscow Mule and it wasn't anything to write home about. You could get the same cocktail in any restaurant for half the price. We ordered the chicken skins appetizer and I would absolutely recommend them. The honey glaze was just the right accompaniment and they were perfectly crispy. Then came the salads. They were edible, but not something I would order again. They were made up of spinach leaf, with soft croutons (very strange, and kind of gross), and the dressing was some sort of vinegarette that tasted more like bacon grease with vinegar. It was almost like killed lettuce. No tomatoes or cheese or anything. My entree was the duck. I had it prepared per the chef's suggestion, as medium rare. This is how I like my steak so I'm not opposed to barely cooked meat. It was fine, fattier than I was prepared for, but definitely edible. The bed of grits were good. My friend had the grouper over rice with carrots. The carrots were still crunchy, the rice was dry, and she was not impressed with the fish. She said it had little flavor. The steaks are outrageously priced and the sides are à la carte, which works out to be nearly unaffordable. The entire meal took exactly two hours, so plan for that. The atmosphere is highly pretentious overall. I think it's wonderful that Sevierville has upscale dining and we were dressed accordingly...but I also believe a place that boasts of locally sourced ingredients and calls themselves "Appalachian" should try to infuse a cozier atmosphere. The entire.restaurant is polished concrete with lots of black. It felt industrial and uncomfortable. Which is not what the name calls to mind. I think a color bank of smoky blues and mossy greens would do much for the appearance and to put diners more at ease. If nothing else, cushier chairs since you're going to be there so long. Maybe a few pictures of the Park before it became the Park. I know lots of restaurants already have this theme but again...with the name you expect a certain level of locality. I would also RUN back if they ever put quail on their menu. I hope to see them in business for years to come and I hope this review doesn't sound too harsh, just honest. I'm merely one local voice. A native, to be precise. They'll probably get plenty of locals, and it will probably appeal more to those who have moved here from elsewhere and have...