Tag: Little Tea Shop

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Food & Wine Food & Drink

Little Tea Shop: Still Closed for Now

CREDIT: Michael Donahue

Little Tea Shop was my lunch mainstay. I walked down the alley from my office almost every day for owner Suhair Lauck’s Lacey Special — baked chicken with cornbread and rice.

But Little Tea Shop is closed — for now.

“We’ve been closed since the last week of March,” Lauck says. “I started carryout the last week before we closed. It’s not worth it. Just a few people showed up. I cooked a lot of food.”

Michael Donahue

Suhair Lauck

Reopening a restaurant is not easy. “You have to start from scratch. It’s like a brand-new restaurant because you have to start new rules and regulations.” And, she says, “I’m not taking chances for me, my employees, my customers.”

Since 1918, Little Tea Shop at 69 Monroe has been a gathering place. The iconic restaurant also is the subject of a documentary made by Molly Wexler.

“I think it’s tradition,” Lauck says. “I think everyone’s used to it.”

And, she says, “Everybody wants to see who’s there. Friends meet friends. Even if they don’t meet for lunch, they always see each other. And it’s a powerful lunch. You want to be seen. You want to be heard. You want to be noticed. Especially during election time or if you’re campaigning. It’s a fun place to be.”

Now, Lauck says it feels eerie to enter the dining room. “I came downstairs and you could drop a needle and hear it. It was quiet. No cars. No restaurants open. Like I’m isolated. I felt trapped. I haven’t had that feeling in a long time.”

Lauck cooks for herself, but — even though friends want her to — she hasn’t made the Lacey Special or, basically, any of her Little Tea Shop fare since she closed. “They want me to make chicken salad [or] corn sticks. I don’t want to turn on the oven. Usually I make hundreds a day. You have to downsize it for one or two people.”

Lauck did make chicken salad and corn sticks for a neighbor. “They take care of me,” she says. “The least I can do is make them corn sticks.”

She’s been spending time gathering up possessions for a “big, big sale in the Tea Shop.”

And she’s going through family photographs and memorabilia. “I was born in the Depression, so I don’t throw anything away.”

Lauck, who was born in Bethany, Palestine, learned to cook from her mother, father, and grandmother. But, she says, “I do better cooking my own way, [with] my own techniques.”

She moved to Memphis in 1967 after marrying her first husband, who lived in Memphis. “I came in the middle of winter. It was freezing. I had never seen icicles in my life. They were coming through the windows. They looked like daggers. I was scared to go under … scared they were going to fall and kill me.

“I loved Memphis after it was spring. Spring is gorgeous in Memphis. People welcomed me with open arms. Strangers took care of me from day one. This is my home.”

She worked at La Baguette for five years, but 33 years ago she married James Lauck Sr. and went to work at his restaurant, Little Tea Shop.

They enjoyed traveling. “We used to go all over the world.” Her husband died in 2012. “I have not had a vacation since my husband died.” The quarantine, she says, “is vacation.”

Little Tea Shop will reopen “sooner or later,” Lauck says. “But it’s going to be different. Right this minute I have ideas in my head, but at the same time I don’t know what I’m doing.”

People tell her to post a limited number of meals a day online and say, “Come and pick it up. Take it home and reheat it.”

“Something like that, maybe,” she says. “Because it’s less work, less groceries.”

That might be an option. “If you limit it to certain food every other day, it will be easier. Maybe.”

Meanwhile, customers are checking up on her, Lauck says. “Every day they call and say, ‘Let us know when you’re going to be open ’cause we’re coming. I want to be the first one.’

I tell them, ‘Without you, I can’t exist. Without my customers, there is no Little Tea Shop.'”

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We Recommend We Saw You

Halloween and Other Fall Happenings

CREDIT: Michael Donahue

Michael Donahue

No. This isn’t me. It’s Avery Poynter at a Halloween party.

I got a text saying, “We have a Michael Donahue at our party!!” about 10 p.m. on Halloween. It was a photo of a young guy in a big wig and glasses.

I texted back and was told Lainey Felsenthal threw the party. And Avery Poynter was the guy in the wig.

I called the number the next day. Anna Campbell, who took the photo, answered. I asked her if Poynter came to the party dressed as me.

“I think he was something else and we changed it half way through when he put on the wig,” Campbell told me.

Well, I love it and I hope Poynter lets his real hair grow so he won’t have to wear a wig next year if he trick or treats as me.

I saw a lot of scarier costumes at the 19th annual Lodge Halloween Masquerade Ball, which was held October 26th at Black Lodge.

“We do it every year,” says Matt Martin, Black Lodge founder and co-owner.

No more than 20 or 30 people showed up at their first party in 2000, Martin says. This year “at least 400 or 500” people showed up, he says.

What makes this party so popular? “The Lodge aesthetic pretty much year ‘round is kind of Gothic. We’re that kind of people.”

So, people know their Halloween parties are going to be exceptional. “We’re already known for being kind of mysterious and strange.”

And, he says, “Seems like we’re always trying to bring into it a little something extra to make the party a little more memorable and a little more offbeat. Above the top.”


Michael Donahue

Black Lodge Halloween Masquerade Ball

Michael Donahue

Tripp Anderson, Reagon Mason, Sarah Thompson, Millie Mason amd Rick Cannon at RiverArtsFest.

“I’m gonna love you like nobody’s loved you – come rain or come shine.” Those song lyrics were echoed by the folks who made it to RiverArtsFest on a misty Saturday as well as those who showed up on a nicer Sunday.

More than 200 artists, which included all juried fine artists and some invited local demonstrating artists, participated in this year’s event, which was held October 27th and 28th on Riverside Drive.

A total of 11 food vendors/food trucks were on hand along with five beer and wine tents, which featured some local Memphis beers and Old Dominick spirits.
And lots of live music.
Michael Donahue

RiverArtsFest

Michael Donahue

Chef Tory McPhail from Commander’s Palace in New Orleans was among the participating chefs at the Memphis Food and Wine Festival.

Third time is a charm, but so were one and two when it came to the Memphis Food & Wine Festival.

This year’s event, which was held October 12th at Memphis Botanic Garden, drew about 2,400 people, says Sherry Chementi, one of the festival founders.

“It was an absolute perfect fall evening for our third festival,” she says. “Plenty of good food, plenty of good wine, and plenty of good music filled The Live Garden. People are still talking about tasting this dish or that wine. And I can’t tell you how many chefs and  vintners were already asking to be invited again for the next Memphis Food & Wine Festival. It speaks well for Memphis and our culinary scene – not to mention our Southern hospitality, of course.”

MIchael Donahue

Isiah Thomas and his Cheurlin Champagne at the chef’s party for Memphis Food & Wine Festival.

Felicia Willett held a fundraiser – “Cocktails & Cornsticks”  – October 17th at her restaurant, Felicia Suzanne’s, to help raise money for the documentary about Molly Wexler’s documentary on The Little Tea Shop.

“We raised about $1,000 that night,” says Wexler. “We have raised $17,500 out of a goal of $22,500 – so closer, but still a ways to go.”

October 15th was the last day of filming, Wexler says. “We are editing now and the goal is to have the film ready in late winter, early spring 2020.”

Michael Donahue

New Wing 0rder took first place honors at the Bluff City Hotwing Fest, held October 26th at Compass Midtown. Wingy Dingy came in second and TBD-Q was second. Angela Fox was event chairperson for the Compass Community Schools fundraiser and community awareness event.

Michael Donahue

Chefs, including Brad McCarly, Nick Scott, Franck Oysel, and Dave Krog took part in a City Block butcher’s dinner, which was held October 17th at Puck’s Food Hall.

Michael Donahue

Burns’ Chili Wagon took first place honors at the St. Ann Fall Fest Chili Cook-Off, which was held October 18th at St. Ann Catholic Church. Mike Burns is with Jamie Coggins and Stephanie WIlson Nichols.

Michael Donahue

Geoff Davis, Dex McCune, and Drew Fleming celebrated at the 10th annual Cooper-Young Beerfest, which was held October 19th at Midtown Autowerks. More than 40 breweries were represented. Proceeds support the Cooper-Young Community Association.

Michael Donahue

Todd Hansen, Robin Cooping, Karl Schledwitz, and Mike Raemo were at the eighth annual Meat Me in Memphis, which drew more than 600 people and raised more than $700,000, reports Schledwitz, chairman/CEO of Monogram Foods, which sponsors the event. Chefs prepare dishes using Monogram products.

MIchael Donahue

Tom Clifton, Whitney Jo, and Michael Detroit were at the Chefs’ Celebrity Gala. A total of $250,000 was raised at the 30th annual gala, a fundraiser for the Memphis Child Advocacy Center. The event, held October 30th at Holiday Inn at the University of Memphis, included a ‘Star Chart’ that tells how many years chefs have served. Jim Prentiss Jr. has the most seniority – 29 years.

Michael Donahue

Sabor Caribe restaurant was one of more than 20 restaurants that participated in Taste of the District, which was held October 7th at Premiere Palace. Memphis Medical District Collaborative hosted the event to showcase the array of food and beverage options available in the Medical District.

MIchael Donahue

Shawn Danko was given a surprise 50th birthday party, which was held October 26th at The Warehouse. That’s his wife, Lana, with him.

                                         WE SAW YOU AROUND TOWN

MIchael Donahue

Ryan Marsh at Main and Union.

MIchael Donahue

Jeremiah Jones and Becca Jarvis at Carolina Watershed.

Michael Donahue

David Shull at Felicia Suzanne’s restaurant.

Michael Donahue

June James and Myra Whitney at Molly’s La Casita.

MIchael Donahue

Ethan Williford, Mary Jones, Sam Prager at Front Street Deli.

Michael Donahue

John and Ashley Yacoubian at Gibson’s Donuts.

Michael Donahue

Lori Miller and Carol Miller at Molly’s La Casita.

Michael Donahue

Kayla Webster, Jackson Lyons, Trenton Lyons, and Carly Webster at Gibson’s Donuts.

Michael Donahue

Reggie Taylor and Compton McMury performed in Sound Fuzion at Meat Me in Memphis.

Michael Donahue

Dylan Powell at Felicia Suzanne’s restaurant.

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News News Feature

A Documentary on Little Tea Shop Is in the Works

CREDIT: Michael Donahue

While eating at another restaurant, Molly Wexler got the idea to make a documentary on an iconic Downtown lunch spot.

“It was exactly one year ago at the grand opening of the Global Café, and I saw Suhair,” says Wexler, referring to Suhair Lauck, Little Tea Shop owner.

Wexler told her husband, “It’s amazing that the Little Tea Shop is still around, and it hasn’t changed.”

Little Tea Shop has long been the “business person’s go-to place,” Wexler says. She told her husband, “Imagine the conversations they had there. If only the walls could talk. I’ll bet some of the biggest ideas that have changed the trajectory of Memphis happened at the Little Tea Shop. That would be a great short documentary.”

Michael Donahue

Everybody loves Suhair Lauck and Little Tea Shop.

Now, Wexler is making Little Tea Shop’s walls talk through the film she’s making about the restaurant at 69 Monroe.

“I [researched] to see if it was worth moving forward with this idea. People got so excited. People love the restaurant. They love Suhair.”

Little Tea Shop “was founded by two women in 1918, which was unheard of,” says Wexler. Lillie E. Parham and Emily A. Carpenter “wanted a place for their friends to have lunch whenever they were shopping Downtown.”

They served tea sandwiches and “had a little shoebox at the front where they made change — a low-key operation. And, for a long time, that’s what it was,” Wexler says. “What I had trouble figuring out was when it became the business person’s place to go.”

She believes it was when Vernon Bell bought the restaurant in the 1940s. It was close to Cotton Row and the Memphis Cotton Exchange. Its popular Lacey Special — baked chicken, corn sticks, and rice— was named after cotton broker C. A. Lacey.

Customers included politicians, bankers, lawyers.

“I tried to talk to well-respected Memphians to find out if they remember some significant conversations,” says Wexler. “I got some great stories on film.”

Fred Davis, who is black, and Jed Dreifuss, who is Jewish, told Wexler about a breakfast group they formed there after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. “[They] said it was such a scary time in Memphis, of course, but they wanted to do something about this to try to bring blacks and whites together.”

Why Little Tea Shop? “Blacks and whites had been eating there,” she says. “It was sort of a naturally integrated place. Both black and white people felt comfortable being there.”

Former Mayor A C Wharton told Wexler everyone “was on the same playing field. Everyone had respect for each other,” and it “felt like people hung up whatever it was that made them different from other people at the door — like the coat rack. You hung up your biases and came in and you were all the same.”

Since it began, women played an important role in the operation of Little Tea Shop. Betty Cunningham was manager when Bell owned it. Bell eventually sold the restaurant to his daughter, Sara Bell Stewart, who now owns Mortimer’s restaurant. Lauck bought the Little Tea Shop in 1982. “There’s a huge female component to the operation and staff of that restaurant,” Wexler says.

Lauck is the “third aspect” of the story, she adds. “Here you have a Palestinian immigrant who is the quintessential Southern hostess. She’s amazing.”

Wexler has raised $12,000 of the $20,000 she needs to complete the film through Fractured Atlas.

The documentary speaks to everybody. “A lot of people who are from other places will see this film and say, ‘I remember the restaurant like that in my town.’

“To me, it speaks to all the good in the world,” Wexler says. “Everybody is kind, happy, and they have some cornbread. We’d better say corn sticks.”

Find The Little Tea Shop Film on Facebook for more info and a link to the fund-raiser.

Categories
Opinion

Little Tea Shop and Suhair Can Make Your Holiday Sides

CREDIT: John Branston

Suhair Lauck

This was a hard year for Suhair Lauck and the hard-working staff of the Little Tea Shop, the downtown lunch place that is as famous for its hospitality as it is for its corn sticks, vegetables, and chicken dishes.

Suhair’s husband Jimmy Lauck, owner of the Little Tea Shop since 1982, died in July, and the restaurant was closed for several weeks after that. A holiday business boost would help make up for lost earnings, and there’s an easy and tasty way to help.

With 48 hours notice, Suhair will cook your side dishes to go with the turkey, ham, or wild game main dish you might be serving. She suggests you bring your own serving plates and she’ll arrange the veggies to fit them. If you’re lucky and extra nice, there might even be some corn sticks in the bargain, but don’t try to pass them off as your own creation — as if anyone would believe you.

Downtown, Memphis, the Memphis Tigers basketball team, and the Memphis Grizzlies have no better ambassador than Suhair Lauck. Good time to show the love.

Categories
Opinion

No Tweets at the Tea Shop

Suhair Lauck

  • Suhair Lauck

On Wednesday, President Obama held a news conference and the first question (from himself) came in the form of a tweet.

Also on Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal reported that privately owned Twitter, which was created in 2006, hopes to value itself and its 200 million registered user accounts at $7 billion. Only seven months ago Twitter was valued at $3.7 billion by a venture-capital firm.

For the record, Obama’s question to Obama was “In order to reduce the deficit what costs would you cut and what investments would you keep — bo.” It came in at just under 140 characters. There followed a stream of less friendly tweets from Republican members of Congress.

On my way to lunch, I picked up a copy of The Memphis News and read a column that began, “It’s official. Twitter is not a passing fad.”

I tried to digest this over a bowl of spaghetti and some corn sticks at The Little Tea Shop downtown, my favorite retro restaurant. Co-owner Suhair Lauck is surely one of the friendliest people in Memphis. She greets customers by name, and often with a hug if her hands are free for a minute. But she does not tweet and she is not even on Facebook, although there are some links to the restaurant.

She has friends and a wall all right, but they’re the old-fashioned kind. The walls of the Tea Shop are decorated with color pictures of her customers, who are also her friends, that she has been given or taken herself.

“I have this,” she said, pointing at her cell phone. “Why do I need to do this?” she asked, punching keys on the phone. She joked that “my VCR says 12/12/12” because she doesn’t know how to set the display, but the kicker, of course, is that nobody has a VCR any more.

Many of Sue’s regular customers are in the autumn and winter of the actuarial calendar. One of them, John Malmo, joined me for lunch. Malmo is cofounder of Archer-Malmo, the advertising agency, and writes books and columns on business advice. In short, he’s a communicator. But he doesn’t tweet or use Facebook either.

“Why would I?” he asked incredulously. “I mean, really, why would I?”

One crank to another, I suggested it could just be that he doesn’t have any friends.

He entertained the possibility for a minute and laughed.

“There is a danger of a breach of privacy,” he said. “Maybe one in a million, but who needs it?”

I concur, but I suppose, like Obama, I will break down sooner or later. Mayor A C Wharton tweets a lot and has thousands of Twitter followers and friends on Facebook. My real-life friend Henry Turley, who is even older than I am, has 1,833 Facebook friends. WMC-TV anchor Joe Birch has 4,997.

Marketing necessity. $7 billion. Questions from tweeps. Another day at the office.