James Beard award-winning chef John Currence opens Big Bad Breakfast Nov. 4 in Atlanta

James Beard award-winning chef John Currence will open an Atlanta location of his Southern breakfast and brunch restaurant Big Bad Breakfast on Nov. 4. It takes over the former Cultivate Food & Coffee space just north of I-75 along Howell Mill Road in Buckhead. 

Currence, who also owns City Grocery, Boure, and Snackbar in Oxford, MS, first opened Big Bad Breakfast in 2008. He styled the Oxford-based breakfast spot after 1960s lunch counters and iconic New Orleans restaurants. Big Bad Breakfast took off, with Currence opening additional locations over the years in Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas, North and South Carolina, and Kentucky. Atlanta becomes the 26th location of Big Bad Breakfast.

But Currence has been plotting an Atlanta location since before the COVID-19 pandemic. 

“We really started looking in Atlanta because it made sense to be there. But we’ve been extraordinarily cautious about it,” Currence said. “There’s so much white noise in all facets of restaurant space in Atlanta, that finding somewhere you can really make a mark and stand out and hit a home run, you’ve got to find the exact right place.”

For Currence, that place was at the intersection of Howell Mill Road and Channing Drive in Buckhead. A longtime friend and Southern Foodways Alliance member-turned real estate broker secured the space for him. Coincidentally, the broker dined at the Homewood, AL location of Big Bad Breakfast while visiting Birmingham for a wedding. They fell in love with the restaurant. 

“[The Buckhead location] happened to check all the boxes for me that I felt like we needed. The demographic is right in the neighborhood,” Currence said. “It’s a very walkable space [and] feels homey. It feels kind of like a version of Homewood. So when I saw it, I felt like it was absolutely the right spot for us. This is [the most] excited I’ve been about opening a store in a very, very long time.” 

Big Bad Breakfast prides itself on hearty Southern classics: fried chicken and waffles, “redneck” eggs Benedict with biscuits instead of English muffins, shrimp and stone-ground grits, and from-scratch biscuits that can’t be ignored. Biscuits can come topped with fresh jelly, beneath tomato gravy (a Mississippi specialty), as a sandwich, “crumbled” with poached eggs, grits, and essential toppings, or cathead-style, topped with fried chicken, cheddar cheese, and sausage gravy.

But even leaner dishes, like the avocado toast and “original hippie” granola, are satisfying on their own. 

Beverages include cocktails like bloody marys, screwdrivers, and breakfast margaritas, as well as fresh juices and coffee. The cold brew, which blends dark roast and chicory coffee, is especially potent. 

Currence is also introducing a few Atlanta-specific dishes to the menu, like peach and blueberry coffee cake and Shiitake on a Shingle, a vegetarian take on the creamed chipped beef on toast his father made for him as a child. 

While Atlanta may be number 26, Currence said that each franchise location maintains a unique identity and relationship with the community. Like other Big Bad Breakfast locations, the Buckhead spot will sell merchandise such as t-shirts and hats, and Currence confirmed the existence of an Atlanta-centric postcard. 

And for anyone wondering about where to park, Currence said they’ve got that covered, too.

“[Parking] was the one thing that made me a tiny bit apprehensive, but when they told me the post office was closing and we would have access to all that parking plus the parking in the apartment building behind us, it gave me a sense of relief,” he said. 

Check out a sample menu for Big Bad Breakfast here.

Big Bad Breakfast, 1952 Howell Mill Road, Buckhead. Opening Nov. 4. Open daily, 7 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.