Restaurant blends Southern dishes, flavorful creations

The White Tiger
217 Hiawassee Ave.
706-353-6847

By BRITTNEY HAYNES

In Athens, Ga., where tourist traps like The Varsity and acclaimed spots like Speakeasy dominate the food scene, it’s easy for The White Tiger go unnoticed. Nestled at the corner of Boulevard and Hiawassee Avenue, The White Tiger blends in with the Normaltown neighborhood homes – some well kept from their Antebellum days, others dilapidated. The restaurant falls into the latter category with the diner housed in a small white shack on a patchy grass lot. Passing by, one would expect to find an elderly cat-lady living in a mothball-scented house dimly lit by her cherished analog television. (Maybe it’s the tall rusted figurines in the front yard or the porch weighted with fruit-themed tablecloths.) But in this case, the look would deceive. This characteristically eccentric sandwich shop boasts a menu of savory gourmet versions of this simple lunch staple.

Chef Ken Manring, who co-owns The White Tiger with wife Amanda Crouse, brings together down-home Southern dishes and flavorful creations – some classics, and some one-of-a-kind. The menu offers breakfast items, vegetarian fare, “meaty lunches,” ice cream and homemade chocolates. Menu items like the pecan wood-smoked pulled pork sandwich, half-pound onion-smothered “happytop burger” and smoked chicken salad with apple chunks on a toasted croissant live together in the same happy family. Here, all of the sandwiches get along – there’s no boundary between the classic, the indulgent, and the down-right sinful.

One of the restaurants’ boldest creations, the seared salmon ciabatta, is a cacophony of tastes but is everything a salmon salad wishes it was. Served on a fresh-baked ciabatta roll, the salmon is seared and topped with a cream-cheese-and-capers sauce, then topped with a zesty citrus vinaigrette dressing that serves the freshest spinach greens well. Between this ciabatta, the spinach salad meets the seared main course of salmon and crème sauce and the result is decadent. This full-course sandwich will let you forget you’re not at a dinner spot, that is until you check the menu prices or smell the barbeque cooking through the open doors. All sandwiches are under $10 – a bargain deal for the filling plates.

The restaurant also serves fresh fruit, mostly grown organically and picked locally. If you’re lucky enough and owner Ken likes you, you may see some magically appear on the side of your order, “on the house,” and served with a wink. Seasonal sides include macaroni and cheese, carrot ginger soup, roasted beets, peas, okra, grilled asparagus, and other fresh veggies to compliment their dishes. And although a meal of cheese-stuffed portobello mushroom “burger” or pulled pork sandwich and veggies sounds like it’d be poorly followed by chocolate candies, consider taking the challenge. If not, try some while you wait. In the 10 minutes it takes to cook your order fresh, you can sit agonizing in hunger and anticipation or you can try some of Amanda’s delectable chocolates.

The homemade chocolates, as quirky as everything else in this restaurant, include pecan clusters, turtles, chocolate-and-sprinkle covered candied apples, basil truffles and green tea truffles. The green tea truffles and chocolate-covered Oreos are the perfect end (or beginning) to a White Tiger Meal. In a restaurant where nothing matches or flows, it seems that part of the experience is trying a bit of everything – sometimes all together.