Sharing an honest review of Tailor, a unique restaurant in Nashville, Tennessee
For the uninitiated, Nashville has a phenomenal dining scene. Honestly, you pretty much have to purposely try to find a bad meal in the city.
Which is great! Except when you’re trying to find just the right place to celebrate a big occasion because every spot is a big contender. Restaurants like The Catbird Seat, etch, Skull’s Rainbow Room, and Husk all mingle at the top of Nashville’s search results, and pinpointing the one that best suits your tastes, budget, and dining style can be a challenge.
To celebrate our fifteenth (!) dating anniversary, we dove into the reviews of all these Nashville restaurants and many more, zooming in on photos of menus and scrutinizing the atmosphere.
“I can hear how loud that restaurant is in this photo.”
“Do we really want to spend $500 on dinner?”
“A steakhouse? Doesn’t that feel… tired?”
When you have so many options, it’s easy to get a little lost in the details. But we were both repeatedly drawn to one restaurant in particular, and so, found clarity.
ABOUT TAILOR NASHVILLE
Though I’ve traveled (and dined) pretty extensively, Tailor is a new-to-me dining experience. Rather than operating as a traditional restaurant, with tables constantly turning over and courses being served independent of one another, Tailor is best described as a dinner party.
Much like when dining at a friend’s house, everyone sits down to eat at the same time, everyone eats the same meal, and each course is served in tandem. Except, of course, this is far more exquisite than any dinner party I’ve ever attended.
Depending on your reservation, a meal at Tailor begins promptly at either 6 p.m. or 8:30 p.m., though guests are welcome to pop into the bar and living room for a pre-dinner drink. Once the clock strikes the reservation time, everyone is led to their seats in sync.
However, unlike the archetypal dinner party with one long, shared table, diners are seated with their party at their own tables. That is unless you’ve booked a seat at the Chef’s Bar, the front row to all the action in the kitchen.
A REVIEW OF TAILOR NASHVILLE
The dining room at Tailor is essentially one open room, with the kitchen occupying one-third of the space and the seating area filling the rest of the room (these spaces are divided by a large countertop with five stools, the Chef’s Bar).
Guests are swiftly led to their seats and presented with the evening’s dinner menu and a list of beverage options. Soon after, Culinary Creator Vivek Surti takes the floor to walk through the dining experience at Tailor.
With the exception of minor changes due to dietary restrictions, everyone receives the same dishes at the same time (again, just like a dinner party). The menu changes each quarter, but the Summer 2023 menu shown here is influenced by the season’s offerings and inspired by the meals of the chef’s childhood.
As a first-generation American of Indian descent growing up in the Southern U.S., Surti’s dishes creatively combine flavors in both familiar and unexpected ways, and each arrives with an ornately detailed and animated description.
I can’t quite do the presentation of all twelve dishes justice, so I’ll gratefully rely on the wonderful technology of photography to carry me through sharing the menu with you (each of these is worth a thousand words, you know!):
The above dishes made their quick journey across the Chef’s Bar to our seats over the course of two hours and twenty minutes. That might seem like a long time, given our culture’s propensity for quick meals, but everything moved along at a very comfortable clip. Enough time was given to linger over and enjoy each dish, but not so much time that it left you anxious for the next one to arrive.
The courses arrived more slowly at the beginning of the meal but hastened a bit as the evening progressed (had they all been served at the same slower pace, we might have been there until midnight!). Truly, the timing was impeccable and that attention to detail did not go unnoticed.
The same care was given to each course, melding flavors beautifully and executing each technique to perfection. My favorite savory dishes are the ones that seem the most humble: the tomato sandwich (with homemade sourdough bread, a peak of season tomato, crunchy cucumber, and herbal mayo) and the grilled chicken (tender and juicy, thanks to a yogurt marinade, and somehow bright, spicy, and smoky all at once). Another standout dish of the night was the lobster-sized shrimp, which tasted of both the sea and earth when swimming in its savory sauce.
The desserts were both off-the-charts, in their distinctly different ways. The first, a complex marriage of many elements (a shortcake, mango puree, whipped cream, crumble, and marigolds), was a high-end take on a seemingly simple dessert. The second, a demitasse of chai with cardamom cookies, was the sweetest homestyle dessert and a charming way to end a wonderful meal.
TIPS FOR DINING AT TAILOR
It feels appropriate to say that availability at Tailor is limited—or maybe exclusive is a better word. The restaurant operates Thursday-Sunday with just two seatings per night.
Unlike making a typical Resy or OpenTable reservation, tickets are purchased online in advance, and you prepay for your experience to secure your spot (note: this is nonrefundable, but can be transferred in the event you’re unable to make your selected time).
While making your reservation, you’re given the opportunity to share any dietary restrictions. As we had seats at the Chef’s Bar, it was evident the staff were mindful of any necessary changes that needed to be made; whether they were swapping out shellfish for a pregnant guest or finding a gluten-free alternative to any pastry or breading, the team was careful to exchange ingredients without compromising the dish.
But one dietary note you might want to consider for the first time is spice level. I love spicy food and appreciated how the chef didn’t hold back on the heat (normally fine dining leaves so much to desire with this particular element, and it was so refreshing to feel the burn a bit), but if you’re likely to, say, order your Nashville chicken at a mild or medium level, you might consider asking the team to cool things down a bit.
On the night of your meal, you’ll find paid parking in the lot next to the restaurant, or you can cruise the neighborhood streets to locate a free spot (that’s what we did, and it wasn’t too much of a challenge to find an opening). Of course, you can also take a rideshare, which are plentiful in Nashville.
The dress code is relaxed, and we saw a mix of style choices in the dining room (I’d say at least aim for smart casual—I wore a jumpsuit for comfort while sitting on a high stool and a pair of heeled sandals). My one regret is that we went elsewhere for a pre-dinner drink. This being a short visit to Music City, we were just trying to squeeze in as many spots as we possibly could to our itinerary. Next time, I’d try to mingle with other guests over a drink in the lounge out front.
Lastly, my top tip for dining at Tailor is an easy one: book a seat at the Chef’s bar! It’s fascinating to watch each dish come together so precisely (and serves as a great reminder that it’s time to beef up my knife skills!).
HOW MUCH IS A MEAL AT TAILOR NASHVILLE?
For our Summer 2023 meal at Tailor, we prepaid $327.75 for our meal for two ($125 for each ticket, $50 gratuity, and $27.75 in tax). And at the restaurant, our total for cocktails was $37.98, inclusive of tax and tip. A beverage pairing is available as well (with a price of $80 per person).
Had our reservation fallen on a Thursday or Sunday, we would have reaped a bit of a savings, as the base ticket is $100 per person on those nights (edit: all reservations are now $125 per person). And if you’re wondering, there is no difference in price whether you choose to sit at the Chef’s Bar or a dining room table (so sit at the counter, if you can!).
FINAL THOUGHTS ON DINING AT TAILOR
With a seasonally changing menu, Tailor is one restaurant I’ll be happy to return to over and over again during my visits to Nashville. And with the costs of dining out rising ever higher, I’ve grown more selective with my restaurant choices, making sure each one is an opportunity to enjoy an experience we couldn’t (or wouldn’t) choose to create for ourselves at home.
Dinner at Tailor fits that bill perfectly, thanks to its innovative and globally-inspired cuisine, refined ease of service, and animated telling of each dish’s origins. If you’re looking for a unique and exceptional meal while in Nashville, look no further than this Germantown spot.
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Questions for you
Which dining experience has stuck out to you the most? What made it feel so special?
On a scale of 1-10, what is your ideal spice level?
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