🚄 Midtown MARTA dining guide
Thursday, July 2 — Hello, internet friends.
🥒 It’s July, which means grills are sizzling and homegrown vegetable gardens are overflowing with summer produce. Our plot is especially lush with cucumbers and cherry tomatoes at the moment. But now that we’ve reached a hellish clime, there is a lot of fresh eggplant in my household’s future. Maybe planting eight of them was a little much, but we love gifting fruits to my Persian grandmother, who turns eggplant into khoresh.
👀 In this week’s Quick Bites, get updates on restaurant openings at Pittsburgh Yards and in Midtown, restaurant closures in Chamblee and Duluth, and Joystick Gamebar’s upcoming departure from Edgewood Avenue. (Don’t worry, the popular gaming bar plans to reopen elsewhere.)
Keep reading for our latest MARTA dining guide, which highlights two dozen restaurants and bars near the Arts Center and Midtown stations. The newsletter also features Beth’s exclusive story on the closure of Spiller Park Coffee on Moores Mill, and Katie Burkholder’s piece on the new Taichi Bubble Tea location in Tucker.
Plus, I’m highlighting a new ice cream and cookie spot off Briarcliff you should check out.
🇵🇱 Don’t forget to read this week’s “Family Meal,” which includes Hayden Sumlin’s fantastic profile on Baltic Deli in Roswell. (It’s one of my favorite Roswell-area restaurants.) And you’ll find Beth’s ode to Pan American Bakery in Chamblee and a recipe for the brunch burger from Buttermilk Kitchen.
See y’all next week (if we don’t melt first),
🍰 Sarra
🍑 PeachFest is back! PeachFest returns July 12 to Underground Atlanta for an unforgettable celebration of Georgia peaches. Enjoy chef-crafted dishes, creative cocktails, live music and experiences from Atlanta’s top chefs, bartenders, artisans and farmers. Bring your friends. Learn more and buy tickets today. SPONSOR MESSAGE
Quick Bites
Openings
🇮🇹
Fiorenza Italian is now open in Alpharetta.
🛒 Nourish + Bloom Market, a cashless, AI-powered grocery store, has opened in Pittsburgh Yards, as first reported by WhatNow Atlanta.
🔥 Bellini Osteria Toscana in Roswell reopened following a fire in March.
🍦 A location of Van Leeuwen Ice Cream opens at The Forum in Peachtree Corners today.
🥟 Dumpling Master’s new location in Midtown is now open. Customers can enjoy a free drink through July 8.
Closings
🎮 Joystick Gamebar announced its upcoming departure from Edgewood Avenue after 14 years there. The last day of service will be July 12. However, Joystick will reopen elsewhere and reveal the new location soon. We’ll have the story when the news drops.
🍺 Joey Riley’s (Kaleidoscope) Mosaic Bistro & Pub in Chamblee closed, as first reported by Tomorrow’s News Today.
🥩 G. Garvin’s LowCountry Steak in Midtown also closed, Tomorrow’s News Today reports.
☕ Cafe Rothem in Duluth will close after service on July 18.
Coming attractions
🇮🇳 Pataaka, a new Indian restaurant in Midtown’s Spring Quarter development, plans to open soon.
🍹 Felipe Rivera, Eduardo Rivera, and the team behind Palo Santo will open Botánico Cocina & Social Club in the former Lure space later this summer.
🥗 Alere, a new restaurant from the team behind The Chastain, will open at 1397 North Highland Ave. NE, as first reported by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
🍻 Stillfire Brewing will open a new location in downtown Tucker this fall.
Community announcements
❤️ A fundraiser for David Dicorpo of Grant Park Market posted this week, following a small cell carcinoma diagnosis.
🇻🇪 Our friends over at 285 South compiled a list of organizations raising funds to help earthquake victims in Venezuela.
Add to your calendar
🍵 The Matcha Market’s July 5 event has been relocated to 3800 Wendell Dr. But people can still get free matcha for the first hour.
🍔 NFA Burger and Roshambo are teaming up to host a late-night pop-up on July 18, starting at 8 p.m. Expect Billy Kramer’s classic double cheeseburger and Roshambo’s disco tots topped with pimento mornay, bacon, and scallions for $12. Make reservations on OpenTable here. Burgers and tots are first ordered, first served and available in addition to Roshambo’s regular dinner menu. (pictured)
🍽️ Rough Draft’s dinner club will meet on July 21 at 6:30 p.m. Reserve a seat in your neighborhood here.
🥕 Join Vegan & Friends ATL, The Veggie Taste, and The Black Vegetarian Society of Georgia for Vegans Be Munchin’, a block party at Plant Based & Juiced, July 3, from 5 to 9 p.m. Vegans Be Munchin’ will return every other Saturday through Aug. 28.
🍰 Lonely Sweets and Gingko Bakery Cafe will host cake swaps on Aug. 1 in Duluth. The first swap runs from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., and the second runs from 4 to 7 p.m. Tickets cost $7.61 and are available on Eventbrite
🎂 Suwanee Arts Center will host Pastry Plug for cake decorating classes on Aug. 22 and Sept. 26, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tickets start at $150, and the events are open to all skill levels.
When the Matches End, the Dining Begins
SPONSORED BY LIVABLE BUCKHEAD
⚽ After cheering on your favorite teams across Atlanta, treat yourself to the city’s best tables during Buckhead Restaurant Week, July 27-Aug. 1.
More than 50 participating restaurants are serving exclusive prix-fixe menus and inventive pairings crafted to turn post-game energy into an unforgettable evening. Whether you crave bold flavors or a relaxed celebration with friends, Buckhead delivers.
➞ Explore the lineup and discover your next favorite meal. The final whistle is just the beginning of a delicious night.
Top Stories
MARTA Dining Guide: Arts Center and Midtown stations
🖼️ Our MARTA dining guide series is back, and this one’s a doozy. Our latest installment covers both the Arts Center and Midtown MARTA stations and includes two dozen restaurants, bars, coffee shops, and a food hall.
Both MARTA stations are stops on the Red and Gold Lines and offer direct access to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. Together these stations also anchor one of Atlanta’s most walkable and transit-friendly neighborhoods.
⏩ Read the Midtown MARTA guide here.
Spiller Park Coffee closing on Moores Mill
😢 Spiller Park Coffee will close July 3 on Moores Mill after four years in the Publix-anchored shopping complex.
Founder Dale Donchey cited financial reasons for the closure but hopes to bolster Spiller Park’s baking program, including more bagels and sandwiches at the other locations around town.
⏩ Read Beth’s story on the closure here.
Surprise! Glide Pizza will open in South Downtown, ahead of the World Cup
Taichi Bubble Tea opens in Tucker
🧋 Taichi Bubble Tea, which serves bubble tea, ramen, poke bowls and sushi burritos, recently opened in Tucker on Lavista Road. And Tucker officials came out to celebrate the new restaurant and welcome it to the city.
⏩ Read Katie’s story on Taichi’s Tucker location here.
At the Market
IN PARTNERSHIP WITH COMMUNITY FARMERS MARKETS
🍑 Every week, Rough Draft Atlanta and Community Farmers Markets partner to bring you two recipes you can make at home using ingredients from your local farmers market. This week, it’s peach season, baby! We’ve got a peach-centric bread pudding for you to try, as well as a peach and basil salad. Check out both recipes here.
🍑 PeachFest is back! PeachFest returns July 12 to Underground Atlanta for an unforgettable celebration of Georgia peaches. Enjoy chef-crafted dishes, creative cocktails, live music and experiences from Atlanta’s top chefs, bartenders, artisans and farmers. Bring your friends. Learn more and buy tickets today. SPONSOR MESSAGE
That Slaps
🫠 It is hot, y’all, and that means ice cream season is in full swing. On Friday night, I discovered a new thrill: seeing a new restaurant pop up upon running “ice cream near me” in a Google search.
Alpharetta-based Meltaway Ice Cream & Cookies opened on Briarcliff Road this spring. Fortunately for dessert adventurers, Meltaway offers a few not-so-standard flavors. Oh, and the frozen dessert itself is ultra creamy.
🍪 I tried the miso butter almond brittle (pictured), which is Meltaway’s top seller, and the pistachio. My husband enjoyed the cookies and cream and the salted butter pecan. We also split a gargantuan cookies and cream-flavored cookie. It was so large, we wound up finishing it over the weekend.
We’re always looking for recipes to highlight on Rough Draft. If you have a favorite dish from a restaurant you want the recipe for, please send me an email to sarra@roughdraftatlanta.com.
