I didn’t know how much I was yearning until I stopped. During my 21 years as an expat Southerner up north, I was so used to my cultural displacement that I barely even noticed it anymore. In fact, longtime readers might remember that when I finally moved back to Tennessee, I still had a Yankee’s restless energy.
But I settled down. It helped that I met folks who have the patience to forage honey in their own backyards and people who are so tied to this area that they build gardens and freeze tomatoes in its honor. It helped that I became a poll official for the Davidson County election commission, which made me feel engaged with civic life. And it helped that I reconnected with high school friends I hadn’t seen in decades, because they were suddenly my neighbors again. To paraphrase Emily Dickinson, my alienation slipped away as imperceptibly as grief, until one day it was gone.
Twice last month, I had meals that clarified how rooted I feel. I was eating with people who left their cultures to come to Nashville, and for once, I was the local in the room. But also, I was a visitor.
At a community center in downtown Nashville, a group called the Hawaiians of Middle Tennessee welcomed me to their Christmas pa’ina. (A pa’ina is a party with food.) It’s one of several events the group hosts every year, and thanks to its 900 Facebook members, the gatherings are always well attended. Founder Lokelani Tangaro told me, “When we started, we just wanted everybody to know that we can gather, share our culture, and let the next generation know who they are. And it’s really exceeded my expectations.”
There were around 80 people at the pa’ina. Most of them live in the area, including Tangaro, who works for a publishing company in La Vergne, but I did meet a group of women who had driven up from Alabama. I met a young woman who had just moved from Hawaii that week and was attending with her cousins. I met half a dozen people who hugged me on sight.
“That’s our aloha,” Tangaro said. “Whenever our people get together, we’re sharing the traditional greeting of hugs and kisses, and then we pour our heart and soul into our cooking.”
The food certainly got people passionate. There were tables loaded with homemade dishes, including Hawaiian staples like poi (mashed taro), pan sushi (basically sushi casserole), and butter mochi (chewy coconut custard). When the passionfruit-orange-guava punch was passed around, I heard a man say, “This tastes like my childhood.” When a man passed out bottles of his chili pepper water, people said the homemade hot sauce was so good they wanted to make it last all year.
“It’s just expected that you’ll make something,” Tangaro told me. “You want to show your culture in the dish, because we have such a grandiose amount of different cultures that everyone has blended and adopted each other’s recipes, foods, traditions, morals. With every dish, you have an opportunity to bring out who you are. Like for me, I am Hawaiian, Filipino, Puerto Rican, Native American, Spanish, and Chinese. I can pick from all that, and everybody has their own influences to draw on.”
They haven’t traveled as far as the Hawaiians, but the Chicagoans in Nashville are equally invested in celebrating the food from back home. In fact, the city’s enjoying a Chicago food boom, thanks to everything from Jay’s Chicago to Campione’s Taste of Chicago, which my colleague Hanna Raskin profiled after they were inducted into a hot dog hall of fame. And just like the folks at the pa’ina, many of these restaurateurs are as invested in preserving their traditions as they are in delivering great meals.
That’s certainly true at Staley’s Chicago Italian Dining in Goodlettsville. Though it opened in 2022 as a Campione’s franchise, the owners went independent in 2024. Now they strive to make the place feel familiar to anyone from the Windy City.
For one thing, the restaurant is named after A.E. Staley, who founded the Chicago Bears in 1919. There’s also a Chicago police jacket framed on the wall (it was donated by a customer) and TVs ready to show every imaginable Chicago sporting event. Naturally, there are loads of Chicago food brands. Vienna hot dogs are a must, and owner Tom Shukas makes regular drives north to stock up on Garrett popcorn, Jays potato chips, and Tom Tom tamales.
Staley’s has even imported some Chicago feuds. Notably, customers are asked if they want cheese on their Italian beef sandwiches, which Shukas told me is a hot topic in his native city. “Cheese is probably the biggest debate,” he said. “I never heard of cheese on Italian beef, other than Portillo’s [a legendary Chicago restaurant] has a croissant with beef and liquid cheese on it. But you know, the one thing Chicagoans have is strong opinions. We get half the customers who say they want cheese and half the customers who say they don’t.”
Shukas, who worked in event planning before opening this restaurant, was talking about his customers with Chicago roots. There are plenty of them. He said, “I’ve had rough construction workers who are from the Chicago area, and when they eat here, they lean over and bear hug me because the food takes them back.”
He understands. “Before I moved to Nashville, I took this food for granted,” Shukas said. “There’s such an emotional connection to it. I have my own connection to it. I bought this place because this is my comfort food.”
I’ve known that comfort myself. There’s a place in Manhattan called Jacob’s Pickles that really knows how to make a biscuit, and I got emotional the first time I ate one. I absolutely would’ve bear hugged the chef who transported me back to Tennessee for a few bites. And now that I’ve transported myself back to Tennessee, it’s striking to consider all the people who’ve uprooted their lives to come here.Everyone’s hometown is inevitably someone else’s outpost, where they must tend the life they’ve left behind. As I start my second year at The Food Section, I will keep telling stories from both sides. After all, it’s a pleasure to be from here, and it’s enriching to eat like I’m not.
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