Episode 3923

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- This week on "Tennessee Crossroads," Miranda Cohen revisits the old Miller's Grocery store. I'll show you a special laboratory where they make new technology out of old items. Laura will sample some good country biscuits, and Joe Elmore meets artist and photographer Anne Goetze. Hi, everyone. I'm Ketch Secor. welcoming you to another episode of "Tennessee Crossroads." Remember when your mother always said, "Don't go to the grocery store hungry"? Well, she was right. But in our first story, Miranda Cohen travels to Christiana, Tennessee, to find an exception to that rule and to have a great Southern meal at Miller's Grocery.

- [Nathan] Did you say a booth or a table?

- Booth, please.

- Okay, come on down.

- [Miranda] About 40 miles southeast of Nashville, you will find a very special grocery store, one that has always been the place to go when you are hungry.

- Yeah, it's good stuff. I haven't tasted it this morning, but I'll go try for you real quick.

- [Miranda] Miller's Grocery store has stood the test of time, for almost 100 years, to be exact. This rail stop on Main Street in Christiana was once the center of commerce. The Miller family sold groceries to everyone in town. Somewhere along the way, groceries turned into bologna sandwiches then to hot food, and the rest, as they say, is history.

- [Nathan] I mean, this place is iconic. It's been here a long time. I hear a lot of stories about bubble gum and peanuts and Coke, and they come and buy their grain here and their bolts. If these walls could talk, I'd love to hear 'em.

- [Miranda] The groceries are long gone. Since 1995, Miller's Grocery, a country cafe, has concentrated on serving up delicious homemade Southern classics and meat and threes with all the trimmings. Nathan Daniel has been at the helm since 2022. He added some updated equipment and technology, but he has kept all of the same tried and true recipes that put Millers on the map with favorites like chicken livers, fluffy biscuits, fried corn nuggets, delicate catfish, and tangy barbecue meatloaf.

- Fried catfish is our number one seller. We have made-from-scratch meatloaf with barbecue sauce. It's different in the sense that most people use a tomato-based ketchup, which is not how we do it. Salmon patties are very popular with our chicken and dressing, and of course, our desserts. And then we also added grilled chicken sandwich, Cajun chicken sandwich, fried chicken sandwich, and a Philly cheese steak. So I'm kind of a sandwich guy. That was kind of like my flare.

- [Miranda] And if all of that sounds good, well, you don't have to play favorites. Daniel created a huge sampler platter named for the original owner.

- [Nathan] So I wanted to pay homage to him, right? So Stanley Miller was the guy that owned Miller's Grocery. And so I just created a dish and it's a piece of catfish, salmon patty, 1/3 of a meatloaf, and chicken tender and two sides. So it's kinda like a sampling, right, of some of the more popular items that we have.

- We've been taking pictures of the plates 'cause they're bigger than your face. I mean, it's delicious. I got chicken tenders, and the breading was so good. He got okra. I was eating all of that. It's just delicious, every bite, really, and then the staff is great too.

- Cheeseburger. Love a good cheeseburger. The bacon's cooked right. I like my bacon cooked right on it. And then the meat is juicy. It's got some flavor to it. You can't go wrong with it.

- [Miranda] And there is one thing that keeps folks coming back. It is the sweet ending to every meal.

- [Nathan] They're fresh, homemade, always good. It's not a complete meal without a dessert here.

- [Miranda] Locals and travelers alike will offer one piece of advice about Miller's Grocery, save room and get dessert. This colorful chalkboard spells out the ever-changing goodness. It is all served packed to go, but rarely makes it home.

- No, yeah, there was no way I was gonna take this one home. It's too good to hear. Yeah, I mean, every bite is better than the last.

- [Miranda] With an expert baker, an old recipe book, and a commitment to keeping up the legacy of sweet desserts and lots and lots of choices.

- [Nathan] If you can think of it, we make it. We got red velvet cake, Snickers cake, Mimi's banana nut bread. That was a personal item that we brought to the table. Then we got pineapple jubilee, banana hummingbird. We have chess pie. We have lemon cake. We have lemon ice box pie, strawberry cake, brown sugar peach cake, pecan pie, pumpkin pie, cobblers of all sorts, all flavors. I mean, you just name it. It just goes on and on and on and on. We produce about, depending on the week, 4 to 500 individual desserts.

- The desserts and, of course, the made-from-scratch cooking has made Millers a must of Southern dining hotspots. Diners will eagerly make the trek to Rutherford County and often leave a little token of their appreciation. Miller's Grocery is truly a destination, and people come from all over to get here, from Texas, from Michigan, from Idaho. You name it, they will drive here. and it takes a long time to drive from Alaska to Christiana, Tennessee.

- That's actually what the license plates are for. It's not decoration. It started people came here, and then they went back and sent their license plate. So all these license plates are from people that have visited, went back home, and sent it to us. They love to get away. They love to slow down. And it's cool that people think and care enough that they enjoy their time here.

- [Miranda] So no matter where your journey takes you, take the time to go back in time and visit Miller's Grocery Country Cafe.

- It's nice to have somebody like this in the community that's just down to earth, good home people, and you know, you can come here and get a good meal and enjoy yourself.

- [Nathan] Everything look good?

- [Diner] Yeah.

- All right, y'all, enjoy. It means a lot, and it help keeps a part of history going that I want to see stay alive. You know, we were founded on faith, love, and community, but I love to please people. Just to see their face and everybody come together over food and breaking bread is pretty special.

- That's great, Miranda. Thanks. Well, these days, smartphones and digital music are everywhere, but did you ever long for the time when you actually had to turn a knob or handle a wax cylinder to hear your favorite song? Well, folks at Hazelwood Laboratories, they're bringing that feeling back, but in an updated form. Joseph Hazelwood's shop in Downtown Columbia, Tennessee may not be what you'd expect to find in this area.

- I had a shop in Nashville for a long time, close to downtown, right around the corner from Third Man Records. And it was great. But my time was limited there that just like a lot of folks, my rent went sky high, and I wasn't able to stay there. And I had gotten to know Mike Wolfe a little bit, and my family was thinking about moving to Columbia. And I talked to him about, you know, where might I find a shop, and he said, "I have one for you."

- The Mike Wolfe he's referring to is the eagle-eyed collector from the show "American Pickers." Turns out he might have an eye for talented craftspeople as well as antiques.

- [Joseph] This whole thing started because I was an audio installer and started to become a little disenchanted with the equipment I was installing. It just wasn't providing the kind of creative stimulus that I wanted. So I started a little bit of a side hustle in my basement, making fun little audio gadgets and personal Bluetooth speakers out of random antiques.

- [Ketch] In 2012, Joe formed Hazelwood Laboratories, producing a mix of high-end audio equipment, professional installations that were meant to be seen as well as being heard, and some Bluetooth speakers that have to be heard to be believed.

- [Joseph] Maybe my favorite is making old wares that were never speakers at all into Bluetooth devices. like this World War II naval lantern that I found years ago and retrofit a speaker into. And I love the sound of it and the look of it. I make a little speaker out of a jewelry box. That started out as me trying to build a low price point audio device that was fun. I've retrofit speakers into space heaters and battery chargers and a little hot plate thing from the '60s, and all these things, they became just really fun conversation pieces for someone.

- [Ketch] But Hazelwood Labs isn't all just fun and games. Joe has poured hours and hours into perfecting his flagship product, the HazeTable,

- The one you see here is an older version, and since then, I've sort of worked through the kinks and created, to me, what is the ultimate speaker in terms of that balance of sonics and design and user functionality. I really try to balance all of those things. Rather than compete with elite Hi-Fi brands, My systems are for folks that care about design.

- [Ketch] And while the majority of the work that comes out of Hazelwood Labs is meant for listening, there are also some quirky side projects. So Joe, tell me about this.

- [Joseph] Well, it's a vintage hand lantern that I just love. So I upcycled it with all new technology. It has a big lithium battery in there that's rechargeable through that port. It's got LED bulbs in it, bright and dim. And the coolest feature, I think, is that it has a USB port so that you can charge your phone off of it If you're camping or something like that, and you need a a phone charger on the go, there it is. And you can open it up and the charger is stored inside of there. I'm more of an artist than a technologist or a technical person. For me, I made music before I did this, and this is another manifestation of that. And if I wasn't doing this, I'd be creating something else. So resistors and capacitors are kind of paints in my palette in a way. In the audio world, everything has gone to the phone. So that's what excites me, is sort of bringing the best of what's old back and still making things that are distinctly modern.

- [Ketch] And while Joe says he does a lot of business through his website, his shop in Columbia is definitely not a wasted space.

- Mike Wolfe will have a car show here once a month. And this place is covered up with people. There's just a huge crowd in here, and I love this reaction. They walk in and just say, "What is this place? What am I looking at?" And I love that response, and I love explaining it. But getting that person to digest that to the point that, "Oh, I need this thing," there are some steps in between there.

- [Ketch] But Joe will keep taking those steps, creating beautiful and sometimes unexpected pieces of art that function as conduits for other art. And he'll keep bringing his love for tangible, old school devices that function in futuristic ways to the people in his neighborhood.

- I'm kind of an old soul, and I've always imagined as I get older that I would be that kind of weird old electronics guy in some small town. I think I'm slowly becoming that because we do stick out a little bit like a sore thumb in this downtown. Even though it's up and coming, there's not a lot of businesses like this around. And I just love that. I love being a kind of unique component for Columbia and bringing this to town.

- Everybody knows when you live in the South, it's a high honor to have people say that you serve the best biscuits around. Tennessee has a lot of places that do biscuits well, but Laura Faber found a little country store in Coffee County where the biscuits just might rise to the top.

- Since 1938 along Highway 41 in Coffee County, there has been a country market. It recently has had a name change and a facelift. But what hasn't changed? You can still get the best biscuits in the South here. This is Gregory's Beechgrove Country Store & Kitchen. When you walk through the door, the sign on the floor suggest an attitude, "Mind your own biscuits, and life will be gravy." It's gonna be 7.68. You doing okay today?

- Yeah.

- [Laura] It's here. You can get what might truly be the best biscuits in the South.

- [Phyllis] We have smell-o-vision.

- [Laura] Golden brown, light and fluffy, served with egg and cheese, and either chicken, sausage, bacon, country ham, bologna, or tenderloin.

- Because if you leave them down, they will sweat. They don't sit that way, so we flip 'em so they don't sweat. Like to get the eggs just right too. Like to put some good hot eggs on that cheese, and it melts it up.

- [Laura] Phyllis was the first employee at Gregory's. She is the owner's grandma. Don't get in her way in the kitchen.

- In fact, we're working on the order now for 30.

- [Laura] That would be Steve Mitchell's regular order every Thursday.

- So I drive by this place twice a day, and just one day on a whim, I'm like, "You know what? I'm gonna pop in there." 'Cause I kept seeing a sign, "Best Biscuits in the South." And I took them into work, and the guys absolutely loved them. So I did that for a couple weeks, and then the third week, I didn't bring any in, and they were freaking out on the job. So they're like, "Where are they at? Where are the sandwiches at?" So ever since then, it's been every Thursday.

- [Laura] This building has been around a century. It's been a feed store, a deli, hardware store, a gas station, and market. Alexandria and Caleb Gregory discovered it when they moved to Beechgrove, and Caleb stopped to try a biscuit recommended by a friend.

- [Caleb] And one time, I went hunting, and he goes, "Hey, stop in there and get you a biscuit." But it didn't look anything like it looks now, and like, you couldn't even see inside. It looked like it was just closed.

- [Laura] Was a biscuit the first thing you ever ordered here?

- Yeah, sausage biscuit.

- It was grab and go.

- Yep.

- Yeah.

- [Laura] What do you remember about that first biscuit that you ever ate?

- I was like, "It's really good."

- [Alex] Well, Levi, our 2-year-old at the time, was not really eating anything. He was the pickiest eater, and he devoured this biscuit, and then it basically became the biscuit store. And then he wanted one every morning.

- [Laura] When the former owners put the market up for sale, Alexandria felt moved to save it.

- [Alex] We really had no idea what we were doing. We just knew that we loved this community, and we love people, and we love a vibe. I mean, we are kind of like vibe junkies. I think they thought of us as this young couple. Is it still gonna give you that hometown Southern feel?

- I was a little concerned.

- I was, yeah.

- Well, just because we just moved out here, and we bought it, and I'm like, "Either everybody's gonna love us, or they're gonna hate us, one or the other. Like you're going in ruin our biscuit store, or you're gonna make it great again."

- Yeah.

- [Caleb] And we just set aside two weeks. We knew we were gonna be shut down.

- [Alex] Yeah.

- So we just shut down for two weeks, then redid everything, pulled everything out. And we had a all hands on deck for two weeks. This was all, like, wood-style paneling. And we were actually a little bit worried 'cause we planned on doing some other stuff to it. While we're ripping everything out, we're like, "Well, let's see what's behind this." And we start to tear it off, and I'm like, we're like, "What? The old tongue and groove is still under here? It's been covered with paneling?" So we just start tearing it off, and that's all the original wood. We actually hardly did anything to it. We sanded it a little bit and put a little bit of like wax on it just to kind of help preserve it.

- [Alex] A great surprise. It was like Christmas. Well, I mean, first off, it saved us so much time and work, but also it was rewarding to preserve its history. You know what I mean? It was like, "Why would you ever even cover this up?"

- [Laura] Caleb's mom, Marlena, used her interior design skills to decorate and paint much of the artwork and murals you see on the walls. The Gregorys' boys even have menu items named after them.

- [Alex] So Levi is a two-pancake plate with a choice of meat, and then the Lane is a meat and veggie omelet with hash browns.

- [Laura] Open for breakfast and lunch and closed by 2:00, Gregory's goes through seven dozen eggs and 90 grab-and-go biscuits every morning. Their lunch menu is incredible too. How about an inch-thick slice of fried bologna sandwich or a patty melt, a fried catfish, or hot chicken sandwich?

- [Phyllis] This is our Beechgrove Hot. All of our sauces are made in-house.

- [Laura] Or Miss Jane's homemade Butterfinger cake. Andrew Todd is a friend of the Gregorys. He helped them renovate the place and eats here two to three times a week. Andrew says, "While the food is great, customers get much more."

- I think, you know, they just kept like a small time feel with it, and everybody knows each other. Everybody's pretty much regulars, and you know, it's the place you wanna be.

- [Laura] Great food, atmosphere, history, and community, preserved for many more years to come in Coffee County.

- When anyone thanks us, really, you know, it's like, "Okay, it worked." Like I saw this, I thought we could do it, but I've had people actually cry and just say, "Thank you so much. Our community really needed this."

- [Caleb] We're kind of out in the middle of nowhere here. So if it honestly wasn't for the local community, we couldn't make it happen. So all their support and help definitely is what keeps it going, for sure.

- I'm getting hungry. Thanks, Laura. Well, next, you'll meet a Middle Tennessee artist whose work reflects her profound passion for nature and its preservation. Anne Goetze uses paint, photography, and even filmmaking to create inspiring, even whimsical works of art.

- [Anne] You know, we have the Tennessee Hills back there, those blues, and then there's that field that has the gold on it.

- [Joe] Anne Goetze is an accomplished Tennessee photographer, painter, and filmmaker. Her subject matter is often the life and landscape of our surroundings here in Williamson County.

- Nature can influence us in a very profound way. Sometimes we just don't even realize it unless maybe we're away from that, and then you get around it, and then you start to feel that peace or that influence or your appreciation for the beauty of it.

- [Joe] She grew up in a family of five girls, and her father, Ray, was an avid photographer. So small wonder that Anne inherited his passion for capturing life through a lens. However, painting would also share equal billing. Her style combines plein air, which simply means painting outdoors, and Impressionism. She also worked as a photographic touch-up artist for years, and that somehow led to her special technique of combining photography with painting. This one's called "Ellie and Her Chickens," and this is one of Anne's favorites she calls "Hillbilly Happy Hour." Years ago, Anne had a true life-changing experience when she traveled to the village of Annecy, France. That's where her aunt lived as a nun at the Sisters of the Visitation Monastery.

- And so I was able to start visiting her, and all these little layers started either coming off or opening up to, like, another world. So I had a lot of respect for her always. But then I got an insight into what that life was really like because they're behind walls. They live behind the walls, but they have joy, a lot of joy. And right, they're still in the long black habits, and they have the vow of poverty, which means that they don't own anything materialistically. They don't even own the crosses that they wear. They trade them out every year.

- [Joe] Her visits to the monastery resulted not only in an art series, but also a recent book titled "Pray to Love." Where'd that title come from?

- That's one of their mottoes. The full motto is, "Pray to love, love to pray." They have a lot of great little mottos, you know? "Beauty will save the world."

- [Joe] As if painting and photography weren't enough, Anne Goetze is also a filmmaker. Her devotion to nature and preservation was captured in a documentary she produced called "The Living Land."

- [Narrator] It is the very fabric of our lives. The living land is a seasonal journey inviting us to reconnect and fall in love with nature while encouraging and helping us become more active in protecting and conserving the resources of this Earth for future generations.

- If not one organization owns it, then other people can use it, and that is gonna be the thing that would inspire, right, children maybe that they are in a neighborhood, and they can watch that and really let nature sink into them because that's imagination.

- [Joe] She'll move on to other projects that will delight and invigorate her audiences, always on the lookout for new subjects for creative expression with no plans to ever put down her camera or her paint brushes.

- I just think that I'm living what I wanna do so I don't have some maybe pie in the sky. It's like here. It makes us be present in the moment, right? It's like, "Okay, this is great." I've been wanting to do this. Thank you, God, for giving the opportunity and opening doors. I'm just really thankful.

- Well, that's all the time we have for this episode, but go to our website, tennesseecrossroads.org, and you can watch all your favorite segments anytime, anywhere. And be sure to join us right here again next time. We'll see you later.

- [Narrator] "Tennessee Crossroads" is brought to you in part by.

- [Narrator] students across Tennessee have benefited from over 7 1/2 billion we've raised for education, providing more than 2 million scholarships and grants. The Tennessee Lottery, game-changing, life-changing fun.

- [Narrator] Discover Tennessee Trails & Byways, where adventure, cuisine, and history come together. With 16 scenic driving trails, you can discover why Tennessee sounds perfect. Trips can be planned at tnvacation.com.