Alabama Grill

As a teenager, Resa Bates, owner of Alabama Grill in Greenville, Alabama, worked at her family’s nearby 100-plus-year-old turkey farm and turkey-centric restaurant. Bates Turkey Farm and Bates House of Turkey remain Alabama institutions, still raising all-natural, free-range turkeys and serving them roasted and smoked to scores of loyal customers. Bates is proud of this legacy, but on a personal level, she is grateful for the lessons and guidance it provided when charting her own course. “It’s neat that the farm and restaurant are still going and are so beloved, but the gift to me was seeing and learning such a strong work ethic from my family,” she says.

That gift continues to give. Welcoming diners to her reimagined Alabama Grill in 2019 was a dream come true. First opened in 1947 by Greek immigrant Mack Liveakos, the original Alabama Grill thrived for decades before selling and finally sitting empty from 2001 to 2018, when Bates began the process of bringing the spot back. She was teaching art in nearby Montgomery, but when she saw the empty building in her hometown’s downtown, she longed to see life in it again. “I’d loo in the windows and imagine it full of people,” she says. “I had moved back to Greenville, but I’d lived in bigger Southern cities—New Orleans and Charleston—and thought, ‘I can bring Greenville a cool restaurant,’ something like the places I was missing.”

After first peering into the old restaurant in 2011, she began storing ideas for her own eatery, filing them away in a cardboard box. When she finally purchased the property, She was ready to go, digging into her idea collection and relying on her hospitality experience (gained serving in her family’s restaurant and some of nearby Montgomery’s restaurants) to renovate the circa-1850s building—doing much of the work herself—and come up with a menu.

Three complementary priorities anchored every decision and still steer the restaurant today: Eat fresh, eat local, eat healthy. “Eat fresh” is number one, so Grill selections never include frozen meats, always feature local produce seasonally—and no matter how much diners want a snapper special, there will be no snapper special if it’s not snapper season. “I’m not serving frozen fish when we can, at times, get some of the best snapper anywhere fresh from the Gulf,” Bates says. The same goes for the hand-formed hamburger patties. “Fresh meat is always better; there is a difference in the texture,” she says. And all sauces, marinades, and dressings are made in-house.

“Eat local” is evident with Bates turkey filling out the classic wedge salad. Seafood is trucked up straight from Alabama’s coast. The spice and smoke of Conecuh sausage made in nearby Evergreen find their way into dishes. Scoops of Cammie’s Old Dutch ice cream from Mobile and slices of Priester’s Pecans’ pies (baked just down the road) end meals on a sweet note, often paired with a cup of Birmingham’s Domestique coffee. “A big part of the vision here is to promote Alabama food producers,” Bates says.

To keep things healthy, there are scant fried food selections, and veggies from area farms make key menu appearances in Alabama’s long growing season. Specials and themed brunches on certain Saturdays round out the daily menu.

Bates is open about the challenges of running a restaurant in a small town— number one being finding and keeping good employees. But she’s equally effusive in describing the rewards. “The Grill has created community here. When diners come, I want them to talk. That’s why there are no TVs in the bar area,” she says. “It’s a small space, so they can talk across tables.” And they do, comparing what they’re eating and just catching up. “They’re connecting with old friends and making new ones. I love watching that.”