City: Pigeon Forge, TN

Category: Restaurants

Telephone: (865) 429-3463

Address: 2944 Old Mill Avenue

Description: This restaurant stands next door to one of Pigeon Forge’s most famous historical sites, the Old Mill. (See the Attractions chapter for more on this working mill.) The Old Mill Restaurant, however, is a veritable newcomer, having opened in 1993. From an architectural standpoint, these two neighbors on the banks of the Little Pigeon River blend together well. The restaurant is a sprawling timber-look building that has gone a long way toward matching the exterior ambience of the mill. Inside the restaurant, wood floors, rafters, and simple country furnishings add consistency to the motif. The main dining room is split between two levels, allowing most diners pleasant views through large picture windows overlooking the Little Pigeon River below. Down-home Southern fare is the specialty here. The country breakfast is based on pancakes with grits, eggs, muffins, and biscuits. You can then add extras like bacon, ham, or sausage. Both the lunch and dinner menus feature Southern specialties, including country-fried steak, sugar-cured ham, and chicken potpie for lunch; or pork loin, chicken and dumplings, and pot roast and gravy for dinner. The dinner menu also has a large selection of both fried and grilled entrees, including beef liver, catfish, and rib-eye steak. Most dinner entrees come with the Old Mill’s trademark corn chowder and homemade fritters plus salad, vegetables, and dessert. For lighter dining, you can choose among the several salad, fruit, and vegetable plates. In 2003 the Old Mill complex expanded with the opening of a restaurant now called the Old Mill Pottery House Café & Grille (formerly the Old Mill Bakery Café). It’s located in a renovated home that used to belong to Douglas Ferguson, a renowned local potter who passed away in the year 2000. Both the restaurant and the cafe use flour and cornmeal that’s ground at the old mill, and they serve meals on pottery from the adjacent Pigeon River Pottery shop.