DOE'S EAT PLACE

One of the top 10 steakhouses of 2008 by Gayot Guides, one of America's top restaurants according to Bon Appetit, and a feature in Alton Brown's "Feasting on Asphalt"; normally these sort of accolades are awarded to a 150 year cornerstone of cuisine in Chicago or New York, but not this time. This time, all of this high and lofty praise is lauded on a tiny restaurant in even tinier Greenville, Mississippi.

There are Doe's in Little Rock and in Fayetteville, Arkansas, as well as Oxford, Mississippi, and their steaks are top-drawer; but there is a special magic about the original Doe's in Greenville. Located on the wrong side of town in the back rooms of a dilapidated grocery store, it does not look like a restaurant, much less a great restaurant.

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Every one of America's Classics has a unique story to tell, but together these restaurants represent the country's rich fabric and illustrate how the closest communities cohere around food. As 2007 award recipient Shug Signa said about her family's 68-year-old restaurant, Doe's Eat Place in Greenville, Mississippi, "People come together, never meet a stranger, and it's the American way."

Located in Greenville on Nelson Street—once the epicenter of Delta Blues culture—Doe's Eat Place tells the complicated story of Italian immigration, Delta foodways, and Mississippi social history. In the 1930s, the restaurant's founder, Dominick "Doe" Signa, was working at the Greenville Air Base, where he acquired a recipe for hot tamales from an unnamed co-worker.

Although Mississippi might be better known for its barbecue than for its steak, Doe's Eat Place is justifiably famous. A 1941-vintage restaurant located in a converted grocery store, Doe's has earned praise for its broiled steaks. In 2007, the James Beard Foundation named Doe's Eat Place as one of "America's Classics"; Men's Journal claims their porterhouse is "the best thing to eat in America."

Go Talk to Aunt Florence. At Doe's Eat Place, you'll feel right at home-and Aunt Florence is one of the reasons why.