At Elizabethton's City Market, order dessert first

I love restaurants with secluded tables and hidden nooks. But I really love restaurants where everyone dines in one big, open space. City Market in Elizabethton is just such a place. There are no dividers or partitions. No matter where you sit, the entire dining room is within view. And I like it that way. The City Market clientele is a cross-section of people who make the community work. On our last visit, we saw a school administrator, a teacher, a retired journalist, and a funeral director. Writers and editors from the Elizabethton Star newspaper are regulars. The City Market feeds their desire for fried chicken salad and their need for news content. Reasons for the restaurant's success start with the constant presence of owner Jennifer Hughes, a native Carter Countian and a graduate of Hampton High School. Jennifer has a sophisticated culinary education from Johnson & Wales University, and she combines that knowledge with a love for the country cooking of East Tennessee. Soup beans with onions and cornbread are on the City Market menu every day. Fried hamburger steaks come to the table redolent of the flattop griddle and covered in what Jennifer calls a "rich brown gravy glaze." Her chicken salad, packed with almonds and all white meat, is one of Carter County's most coveted foods. City Market is a family enterprise. Jennifer's youngest son, Matthew, works there full-time and runs the grill. Her middle son, Mibby, who recently earned a master's degree from East Tennessee State University, cooks and serves alongside his mother and brother. Jennifer's sister, Michelle Ward, a social worker with the Carter County school system, pitches in on days when school is out. City Market is a restaurant without pretense or complicated protocols, but there is one unwritten rule: Order dessert immediately upon arrival. Rarely do Jennifer's pies and cakes last past one o'clock in the afternoon. The dessert case is strategically positioned just inside the door. We typically claim a table, get a full description of each dessert, and then order slices of cake or pie. Before the main meal arrives, we are, without embarrassment, halfway through the Hershey Bar Cake, Pig Pickin' Cake, or chocolate pie, all made in-house. We refer to the procedure as "reversing dessert." City Market is one of the few places in East Tennessee where Pig Pickin' Cake can be found. It's a dessert most closely associated with Eastern North Carolina and that region's tradition of whole hog barbecue. Made with pineapple and Mandarin oranges, the yellow cake with white icing is a lighter, citrusy counterpoint to a big plate of barbecue and side dishes. Another taste of nearby North Carolina can be found in the soft drink case. City Market stocks Cheerwine, the cherry-flavored drink created in Salisbury, North Carolina, in 1917. In that same case is East Tennessee's own Dr. Enuf, in all its variations. Per capita consumption of Dr. Enuf in Carter County has always been high, and the product was sold at City Market long before Jennifer converted the building into a restaurant. City Market's name is a reminder of its original identity. For decades, it served the Elizabethton community as a source of fresh produce, eggs and meats. Building on that heritage, Jennifer sold her first pimento cheese sandwich there in 1997. City Market quickly became one of the town's most popular eateries. A vacant table is a rarity during lunch or breakfast, and the restaurant does a brisk carryout business. Jennifer is deeply connected to her community. After Hurricane Helene devastated parts of Carter County in the fall of 2024, she and her staff helped feed hundreds of people who had been displaced from their homes. She brought breakfast biscuits, lasagna, baked spaghetti, and more to aid stations at Hampton Elementary School and to her home church, Valley Forge Christian. Saved from damage because of its location on a hill, the church became a hub for rescue workers. "Over 200 people a day, who had been put out of their homes, came there for help," Jennifer said. "There were tons of non-perishable foods sent in from other states. A church from Alabama fed the whole community one Sunday. You would not believe the money that poured into the church in the form of donations, which the donors allowed the church to distribute as it saw fit." The Carter County Emergency Management Agency reported soon after the hurricane that 74 homes in the county had been destroyed and 649 were damaged. Bridges were washed away all over the county, and 84 miles of road required repair. After the storm, Carter Countians gathered at City Market to share stories of suffering and survival and to confirm their belief in the healing power of a home-cooked meal. Fred Sauceman is the author of "The Proffitts of Ridgewood: An Appalachian Family's Life in Barbecue."