Southern Inspiration, Culinary Innovation And Hospitality Converge At Elephant In The Room

The dinner, lunch and drink menus are creative and thoughtfully curated. The staff members are approachable and knowledgeable. The food itself is a superb addition to the local restaurant scene. So, let’s talk about the elephant in the room: Barely open a full month now, Millersville’s newest restaurant is already so popular that you may encounter a short wait to be seated, even if you arrive early on a Friday evening.

That’s likely not a problem for owner and U.S. Navy veteran Jeremy Allen Sr., and it wasn’t an issue for my husband, Scott, and I when we went to check out Elephant in the Room in late February. The Southern-inspired restaurant and bar had officially opened its doors just two weeks prior, and that evening, it had a packed house and was hosting a birthday party for another Navy vet.

We used the extra moments to study the menu online, knowing we’d have tough choices to make from among many enticing options. The website advertised “soulful Southern influence,” so we mapped out a meal that would take our taste buds on a road trip across the south, from North Carolina to the Lowcountry, down to New Orleans and beyond.

We were seated at a large community-style table between two other couples who both stated that they were dining at the new haunt for their fourth time. Green flag.

I was stoked to try the bacon-wrapped dates, something you don’t see on many local menus, but due to the success the restaurant had enjoyed in its first two weeks, it had temporarily run out of them. That made the fried green tomatoes ($16.50) and the pulled pork sliders ($12.95) easy selections as starters.

Our attentive server hooked us up with something to drink, and our food came out in short order. Golden-fried and served over arugula, the trio of fried green tomatoes were rich in flavor and had a satisfying crunch accentuated by corn salsa and crab meat.

Carolina style pork can be hit-or-miss for me depending on how strong the vinegar comes through; the pulled pork sliders were a definite hit, though, with flavorful pork and tangy slaw. We rounded out our first course with a side of cornbread with hot honey drizzle ($4.50), a nice complement to the other southern staples.

My aversion to vinegar – and therefore collard greens – almost steered me away from ordering the Elephant Stack ($25) as my main course, but it was labeled a signature item, so I went for it. The dish’s short rib, mac and cheese, and collards were served layered in a bowl, a pleasantly surprising presentation of what I expected to be a more standard plate of ‘cue. The short rib was melt-in-your-mouth tender, and the mac was comforting and creamy, but the greens were the plot twist.

I not only liked them; I loved them. I couldn’t put my finger on why, so on our way out I stopped the owner and basically asked, “what gives?” Allen shared that his greens are prepared with turkey and a unique blend of seasonings. Whatever the X factor was, he had converted me.

My husband opted for the Creole pasta ($28). A large bowl of penne came coated in Creole marinara and generously filled with shrimp, sausage, chicken, peppers and onions. The shrimp – his favorite part – were large and plentiful; the chicken was tender and the sausage brought just the right heat.

The entrée portions were sizable enough that we both took a little home (they were good reheated, too), and of course we were saving room for dessert. Our friendly server informed us that the restaurant was offering red velvet Smith Island cake and bread pudding that evening.

We opted for the cake ($11.50), described on the restaurant’s Facebook page as “made by hand from a local bakery using a recipe passed down for generations by the ladies of Smith Island.” The thin, alternating layers of red velvet cake and cream cheese icing were a sweet finale to our meal.

The Elephant in the Room describes itself as a place “where comfort food gets dressed up.” The food was certainly dressed to the nines, but the crowd and the environment were inviting and unpretentious. The restaurant is a casual place to savor the company of family and friends or perhaps meet new ones.

We left looking forward to our next visit – and our third and fourth, to catch up with the “regulars.” After all, I still need to try those bacon-wrapped dates, Scott wants to know how the shrimp and grits stack up to our Charleston favorites, and the menu offers much more to explore.