As a lot of you know, Clarksville, Tennessee is my hometown. Similar to everyone’s hometown, it has it’s flaws, memories (good and bad), and things that you’ll always remember and eventually tell your kids about; but it’s always home. Thankfully, I still have a lot of family and friends there and visit pretty often. One of my biggest complaints about Clarksville as I’ve gotten older is their seeming inability or desire to see their downtown businesses flourish and to really utilize that area of town. For the past few years, Clarksville’s mayor has done a wonderful job that I think is going to continue pushing the city forward. All that to be said, I am really proud of one of my longtime friends for doing such a wonderful job representing his community, and that is Wes Cunningham. Wes and his brother, Matt, have taken up the mantle of their father in recent years and have championed business development in Clarksville. Not only is Wes a great representative of hard work and the desire to show the best of Clarksville, he’s a wonderful person and the perfect guy to do just that. Enough lauding praise on him though; let’s talk about my favorite restaurant in town, Strawberry Alley.

As all meals do, I’m going to start off talking about the appetizers. I am a sucker for a hot pretzel. Not sure why, but I guess it has to do with the fact that there aren’t many things better than hot bread, butter, salt, and warm cheese dip. Strawberry Alley also carries three vegan options on their app menu (avocado toast, fried green tomatoes, and potato chip nachos), so they cater pretty well to a wide array of customer. The one appetizer item I really want to try though, is the southwest egg roll, with chicken, cheddar and pepper jack cheese, beans, black beans, corn, and jalapeños. The perfect appetizer to pair with your entrees as we get out of the sweltering heat and move into the fall season. They also have three salad options that you can upgrade with chicken or salmon.

Moving on to the entrees and burgers, I have to take a second to talk about another hard-working friend of mine, Walt Askew. No one works harder and is a more honest man than Walt Askew. I lived with him for about a year as I finished up college and got to see a bit of his daily life. Up before the sun, home after it goes down every day. Walt and his dad run his seventh generation family farm just across the state line in Kentucky. Walt also runs their beef business, Barker Beef. Locally sourced, minimally processed foods are the current trend in America-as it should be- and it’s only been accelerated by COVID and the meat production industry restrictions that have surfaced in 2020. Meanwhile, their prices have stayed the same and they continue to give the stellar service they always have. If you’re looking to buy beef from a local, wonderful family that is going to surpass all of your expectations (and save you money comparatively), go check out Barker Beef at www.barkerbeef.com.

It just so happens that Barker Beef supplies the beef for my favorite burger at Strawberry Alley. The standard cheeseburger is a hard thing to beat at most places. Sure, you can go and get your fancy egg and avocado topping, your sloppy chili burger or a deep fried patty with cream cheese and jelly, but sometimes you just need a good ol’ burger and cheese. This one is my favorite. I’m not a big mayo guy, so I replace that with spicy mustard (the best burger condiment by the way; I got into a big argument with Gavin this weekend about the fact that ketchup is gross on anything other than French fries). And almost as important as the burger itself, Strawberry Alley has stellar fries. If you have a good burger but crap fries, no one wants to hang out with you. The burger that is next on my list to try is the bourbon burger. It has a beef patty topped with gruyere cheese, smoked gouda, and a bourbon mushroom sauce. Sign me up.

If you include their burger and sandwich options with their main entrée menu, Strawberry Alley has sixteen options to choose from for a main course. That is plenty of things to choose from, and everything I’ve ever had there is great. If you start off with a pretzel and Helles Lager, you can finish off the German hattrick with the Jagerschnitzel. If you’re wanting to go a bit more fancy with the entrée, they carry a New York Strip Frites entrée, paired with the great fries I discussed earlier and a house-made steak sauce. Wes and I share a deep connection in our love for a particular Tex-Mex restaurant that is much better than the other, lesser known Tex-Mex restaurant that is known by the same name as one of The Three Stooges. If you’re feeling southwestern, grab the chicken burrito bowl topped with extra Cojita cheese. For the entrée vegan options, Strawberry Alley has a veggie burger as well as Roasted Vegetables and Farro dish, consisting of a wide variety of veggies, an herb vinaigrette, kale chips, and basil oil.

Sticking with their pub style atmosphere, Strawberry Alley is partially known for brewing and selling their own beer. In my less-than professional opinion, I feel like too many breweries focus on IPA and niche products. I’m about as mainline as I can be when it comes to my beer preferences- German or English style lagers, thick and full of heavy flavors that inspire me to stop after one. I get that that isn’t the goal of most businesses, but that’s what I’m looking for. The Alley knocks it out of the park on their beer in my opinion. The “Joe B’s Brown Ale” is one of my favorites that you can get anywhere. The 1820 Kolsch is mild enough that you can drink it without feeling like you’re drinking a liquid version of a barley plant. I’m planning on going up and having lunch with Wes in the next few weeks and the beer that is on my radar is the “Sammie”; 5.4% ABV, so light enough that it won’t sit too heavily throughout my meal and is a dry stout with hints of roasted chocolate. Literally right up my alley. You can get any of their beers to-go in growlers, so you don’t have to go in for a meal to be able to try out their house-made brews.

It’s still pretty nuts to me that we’re about to be 75% through 2020. This is a year that we will all tell our kids about decades from now as one of the most upside down years of our lives. Now, more than ever, small businesses in our community need our continued support. As life begins to work back to normal, look around you and see who you can support financially. When it comes to Clarksville and people that want to improve the city and the people who live there, I can think of no one better to throw that support behind than the Cunningham’s. Thankfully, Strawberry Alley is not just a place to try out for the sake of supporting locally owned businesses; it’s a place to frequent because they have delicious food as well as great beer.

Monday Munchies- Strawberry Alley Ale Works

DREW SMITH, REALTOR

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