"Welcome to Rhea County" — Returning Home with Raven
The Western Sizzlin, gravel roads and an unforgettable Nonna.
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It's a beautiful February afternoon, the kind that mixes spring and winter together, and Raven Humphrey has hiked to a really special place, far from Chattanooga's bar and restaurant world.
We took some back roads and hopped some No Trespassing fences to get here; no worries, Raven said.
She is right at home.
My home, she said.
There are waterfalls and boulders and blue sky and bare trees. On the map, the spot's called Laurel Falls.
Locals call it something else.
"Snow Falls," said Raven. "It's called Snow Falls to me."
She's already put her hands in the cold water, as if saying hi, then climbs over a few rocks, standing right before the cascading falls.
"Ya'll want to go behind it?"
It is slippery, mossy, but Raven moves in that rehearsed way — she's a dancer, after all — knowing which rock, where to step, like, like a rural choreography practiced a thousand times.
We're behind the waterfall now. It's roaring, but, somehow, also quiet. Rock at our back, the enormous water flowing and cascading before us, this hidden place, sort of two worlds in one.
To look at Raven in this moment is to see a symbol for her life: she's between two worlds. Between the rock and the water, part of both, yet, also independent and free.
She's behind the falls.
She's behind the veil.
You know, Raven, right? Chattanooga's food scene — the best it's ever been — wouldn't be the same without her.
Maybe you first met her years ago at St. John's, Whiskey Thief or Whitebird, where she bartended.
Old-timers may know her from Dirty Nelly's, J. Alexander's or — deep cut here — Mudpie.
Most of you met her at Calliope, the MLK Boulevard + award-winning restaurant she and Chef Khaled AlBanna co-own and co-launched.
She is a premier bartender, events planner, mixologist in this city. Sort of like Cher or Beyonce, she only needs one name: Raven.
But some folks who know her long before this.
"The Western Sizzlin," she said. "My first restaurant job."
Raven's a country girl. You can take her out of Rhea County, but you can't take the Rhea County out of Raven. Raised in rural Tennessee, where going to get food meant the deep freezer in the barn, Raven's plowed a field, canned a mess of beans, mended quilts and knows how to tell a mean story about a bar fight that ended quite badly.
"It taught me hard work and how to cook and appreciate the land," she said, adding: "Farmers are badass."
As a girl, she'd go to the Dayton ball fields with her older brothers. In the stands, she'd tug on her mom: I'm going to say hi to so-and-so over there.
But you don't know them, her mom would reply.
Yes, I do.
"She did," her mom said. "She was always a people-person."
In the last few years, Calliope's gotten attention and nods from around the nation. A James Beard nomination. A top 50 restaurant award. More and more people will know Raven, thank goodness.
But to really know Rachel Raven Alexandra Humphrey? (Her mom got the "Raven" from an 80s soap opera.)
We had to go home.
"Let's go to Rhea County," she said.
Not long ago, we loaded up her four-door Honda, headed north on Highway 27, listening as Raven, 40, told stories about her cattle-farming granddad and uncles, her grandmother, her dad.
"He was a lifeguard in Miami," she said. "A sexy lifeguard."
That's where her mom and dad met. His family was Italian, which opens the door to stories about a woman named Betty Mercer.
"My Nonna," she said.
After her dad died, Raven's mom would load up the kids for Kissimmee, Florida, where they'd spend weeks with Raven's grandmother.
Her Nonna.
"Pepto-Bismol was her color," she said.
It was all fabulous, all magical: Nonna's kidney shaped pool outside, her grand piano and big long table inside. She wore Coco Chanel No. 5, smoked Virginia Slims, dressed in mumus in different colors.
She called Raven her "Angel baby" and "Rachel." Her kitchen was white. She cooked with copper pots.
"She smelled like cooking," Raven said.
This is where the Italian seeped in, where the epigenetics predisposing Raven towards food, drink and amaro got flickered on, lit up, nudged forward.
"I'm Italian," she said. "I love it when people love a good meal or drink. It makes me happy. That's what I do it for. I take it to heart."
Her Honda slows, reaching a string of red lights as we enter Dayton, Tennessee.
"Now we're in Rhea County," she said. "Welcome."
Raised Catholic-Baptist — she laughs, also not sure what that means — Raven graduated from Rhea County High along side musician Lon Eldridge, a good friend, then and now.
We pass a Walmart. A strip mall that once held Movie Station, before Blockbuster. There's the Bamboo Garden Buffett, which used to be the Sizzlin, back when it had a smoking section.
"Where it all started," she said. "My first restaurant job."
Then, a left turn, through a neighborhood, passing a home with a kiddie pool outside, turned over and leaning, its blue underside spray-painted: Free Bibles.
Then, up Dayton Mountain.
"Your ears might start popping," she said.
Stories continue: her blue Ford Aerostar — "we used to take the back seats out and call it the party bus" — or the time she took the riding lawn mower through the woods, like a 4x4, to see a friend. She bent the blade, got it stuck, a neighbor helped haul it back, Raven parking it exactly so, hoping no one noticed. (Her mom did.)
A dancer, she also began to audition for commercials and sit-coms, her mom driving her to Atlanta or flying her to New York.
She made a Tampax commercial in the 90s as a cheerleader.
She auditioned for Nickelodeon, got two call backs on a Nestle Crunch commercial, but then, "things got weird" — as Hollywood sex began selling more.
At 16, she was diagnosed with Bell's palsy; it was terrifying. One morning, she woke up, and half her face was paralyzed. (Multiple people from her neighborhood had similar palsy symptoms. Raven thinks it was a string of tick bites.)
Raised in a family of nurses and teachers — her older brother Brian played for the Phillies (she's got hugging photos with Chase Utley) and is now a coach and teacher at Soddy Daisy High — Raven initially went to nursing school before falling in love with the restaurant world.
Then, we reach her girlhood home.
It's near a protected forest, with her favorite climbing tree still standing just next to a gravel road.
"That's where I would ride my bike, listening to my Walkman," she said. "A pink 10-speed."
The gravel road is probably one-third of a mile, but as a kid, with full batteries and a Walkman — not the fancy yellow kind — it feels like forever.
"Ace of Bass, for sure," she said. "And Paula Abdul."
We head into the forest.
We hike to the falls, neighborhood dogs in tow, the sun beaming.
The moment turns obvious, symbolic: Raven, one foot in the top echelons of the restaurant industry, one foot also in the hidden backwoods, gravel roads and waterfalls.
Behind the veil, behind the falls. Raven is both worlds, both rock and water, between Rhea County and Michelin.
We hike back, hug her mom, hear more stories.
"I love you," says her mom, an elementary school teacher.
"I love you, too," Raven says back.
On the drive back, she talks about friends and folks she admires.
Dolly, Amanda Niel, Chef Rebecca Barron, her best friend.
She laughs at the idea she's a food snob.
"People say, 'I bet you won't eat at McDonald's.' I bet you I do. Give me a Big Mac. Taco Bell for lunch, Calliope for dinner," she said.
A Rebecca story: Raven's daughter Sophie — now 16, and a hostess at Calliope — was in grade school, filling out a Get-to-Know-Me sheet. Favorite food?
She raised her hand, asked the teacher: how do you spell foie gras?
"She learned that from Rebecca," Raven laughs.
These days, Raven's working on launching her own amaro, the ancient Italian digestif.
(Next month, Raven's hosting a special Amaro Evening with Food as a Verb! If you've never been to one of these events, they're hilarious and delicious! More info here.)
She's created 100s of drinks in her lifetime, she says. Beside her bed, she keeps a small book.
"I have crazy dreams," she said.
She'll dream about drinks — drink-dream? — and wake up and jot it all down: an image of a black walnut tree, or rum.
The Soleil Levant? Calliope's eternal drink?
She first dreamt it.
Soleil Levant means the "sun rising," so there's a nod to the East, and Middle East, and a Monet painting, she said.
"The red sun in the painting? I use paprika oil to mimic the same kind of sun, bringing the art literally to the drink art," she said.
Look closely. Inside the Soleil Levant, there are other ingredients: a few drops from Snow Falls, the slightest hint of the Sizzlin', the feel of a good-hugging mom, the faint scent of Coco Chanel.
Raven's between worlds. James Beard and Michelin, Rhea County and rural, Italy and a copper-potted white kitchen in Kissimmee, Florida.
On the drive to Dayton, somewhere near Soddy Lake, the question arose: Raven, are you a city girl or country girl?
"Both," she said.
Story ideas, questions, feedback? Interested in partnering with us? Email: david@foodasaverb.com
This story is 100% human generated; no AI chatbot was used in the creation of this content.
It's a beautiful February afternoon, the kind that mixes spring and winter together, and Raven Humphrey has hiked to a really special place, far from Chattanooga's bar and restaurant world.
We took some back roads and hopped some No Trespassing fences to get here; no worries, Raven said.
She is right at home.
My home, she said.
There are waterfalls and boulders and blue sky and bare trees. On the map, the spot's called Laurel Falls.
Locals call it something else.
"Snow Falls," said Raven. "It's called Snow Falls to me."
She's already put her hands in the cold water, as if saying hi, then climbs over a few rocks, standing right before the cascading falls.
"Ya'll want to go behind it?"
It is slippery, mossy, but Raven moves in that rehearsed way — she's a dancer, after all — knowing which rock, where to step, like, like a rural choreography practiced a thousand times.
We're behind the waterfall now. It's roaring, but, somehow, also quiet. Rock at our back, the enormous water flowing and cascading before us, this hidden place, sort of two worlds in one.
To look at Raven in this moment is to see a symbol for her life: she's between two worlds. Between the rock and the water, part of both, yet, also independent and free.
She's behind the falls.
She's behind the veil.
You know, Raven, right? Chattanooga's food scene — the best it's ever been — wouldn't be the same without her.
Maybe you first met her years ago at St. John's, Whiskey Thief or Whitebird, where she bartended.
Old-timers may know her from Dirty Nelly's, J. Alexander's or — deep cut here — Mudpie.
Most of you met her at Calliope, the MLK Boulevard + award-winning restaurant she and Chef Khaled AlBanna co-own and co-launched.
She is a premier bartender, events planner, mixologist in this city. Sort of like Cher or Beyonce, she only needs one name: Raven.
But some folks who know her long before this.
"The Western Sizzlin," she said. "My first restaurant job."
Raven's a country girl. You can take her out of Rhea County, but you can't take the Rhea County out of Raven. Raised in rural Tennessee, where going to get food meant the deep freezer in the barn, Raven's plowed a field, canned a mess of beans, mended quilts and knows how to tell a mean story about a bar fight that ended quite badly.
"It taught me hard work and how to cook and appreciate the land," she said, adding: "Farmers are badass."
As a girl, she'd go to the Dayton ball fields with her older brothers. In the stands, she'd tug on her mom: I'm going to say hi to so-and-so over there.
But you don't know them, her mom would reply.
Yes, I do.
"She did," her mom said. "She was always a people-person."
In the last few years, Calliope's gotten attention and nods from around the nation. A James Beard nomination. A top 50 restaurant award. More and more people will know Raven, thank goodness.
But to really know Rachel Raven Alexandra Humphrey? (Her mom got the "Raven" from an 80s soap opera.)
We had to go home.
"Let's go to Rhea County," she said.
Not long ago, we loaded up her four-door Honda, headed north on Highway 27, listening as Raven, 40, told stories about her cattle-farming granddad and uncles, her grandmother, her dad.
"He was a lifeguard in Miami," she said. "A sexy lifeguard."
That's where her mom and dad met. His family was Italian, which opens the door to stories about a woman named Betty Mercer.
"My Nonna," she said.
After her dad died, Raven's mom would load up the kids for Kissimmee, Florida, where they'd spend weeks with Raven's grandmother.
Her Nonna.
"Pepto-Bismol was her color," she said.
It was all fabulous, all magical: Nonna's kidney shaped pool outside, her grand piano and big long table inside. She wore Coco Chanel No. 5, smoked Virginia Slims, dressed in mumus in different colors.
She called Raven her "Angel baby" and "Rachel." Her kitchen was white. She cooked with copper pots.
"She smelled like cooking," Raven said.
This is where the Italian seeped in, where the epigenetics predisposing Raven towards food, drink and amaro got flickered on, lit up, nudged forward.
"I'm Italian," she said. "I love it when people love a good meal or drink. It makes me happy. That's what I do it for. I take it to heart."
Her Honda slows, reaching a string of red lights as we enter Dayton, Tennessee.
"Now we're in Rhea County," she said. "Welcome."
Raised Catholic-Baptist — she laughs, also not sure what that means — Raven graduated from Rhea County High along side musician Lon Eldridge, a good friend, then and now.
We pass a Walmart. A strip mall that once held Movie Station, before Blockbuster. There's the Bamboo Garden Buffett, which used to be the Sizzlin, back when it had a smoking section.
"Where it all started," she said. "My first restaurant job."
Then, a left turn, through a neighborhood, passing a home with a kiddie pool outside, turned over and leaning, its blue underside spray-painted: Free Bibles.
Then, up Dayton Mountain.
"Your ears might start popping," she said.
Stories continue: her blue Ford Aerostar — "we used to take the back seats out and call it the party bus" — or the time she took the riding lawn mower through the woods, like a 4x4, to see a friend. She bent the blade, got it stuck, a neighbor helped haul it back, Raven parking it exactly so, hoping no one noticed. (Her mom did.)
A dancer, she also began to audition for commercials and sit-coms, her mom driving her to Atlanta or flying her to New York.
She made a Tampax commercial in the 90s as a cheerleader.
She auditioned for Nickelodeon, got two call backs on a Nestle Crunch commercial, but then, "things got weird" — as Hollywood sex began selling more.
At 16, she was diagnosed with Bell's palsy; it was terrifying. One morning, she woke up, and half her face was paralyzed. (Multiple people from her neighborhood had similar palsy symptoms. Raven thinks it was a string of tick bites.)
Raised in a family of nurses and teachers — her older brother Brian played for the Phillies (she's got hugging photos with Chase Utley) and is now a coach and teacher at Soddy Daisy High — Raven initially went to nursing school before falling in love with the restaurant world.
Then, we reach her girlhood home.
It's near a protected forest, with her favorite climbing tree still standing just next to a gravel road.
"That's where I would ride my bike, listening to my Walkman," she said. "A pink 10-speed."
The gravel road is probably one-third of a mile, but as a kid, with full batteries and a Walkman — not the fancy yellow kind — it feels like forever.
"Ace of Bass, for sure," she said. "And Paula Abdul."
We head into the forest.
We hike to the falls, neighborhood dogs in tow, the sun beaming.
The moment turns obvious, symbolic: Raven, one foot in the top echelons of the restaurant industry, one foot also in the hidden backwoods, gravel roads and waterfalls.
Behind the veil, behind the falls. Raven is both worlds, both rock and water, between Rhea County and Michelin.
We hike back, hug her mom, hear more stories.
"I love you," says her mom, an elementary school teacher.
"I love you, too," Raven says back.
On the drive back, she talks about friends and folks she admires.
Dolly, Amanda Niel, Chef Rebecca Barron, her best friend.
She laughs at the idea she's a food snob.
"People say, 'I bet you won't eat at McDonald's.' I bet you I do. Give me a Big Mac. Taco Bell for lunch, Calliope for dinner," she said.
A Rebecca story: Raven's daughter Sophie — now 16, and a hostess at Calliope — was in grade school, filling out a Get-to-Know-Me sheet. Favorite food?
She raised her hand, asked the teacher: how do you spell foie gras?
"She learned that from Rebecca," Raven laughs.
These days, Raven's working on launching her own amaro, the ancient Italian digestif.
(Next month, Raven's hosting a special Amaro Evening with Food as a Verb! If you've never been to one of these events, they're hilarious and delicious! More info here.)
She's created 100s of drinks in her lifetime, she says. Beside her bed, she keeps a small book.
"I have crazy dreams," she said.
She'll dream about drinks — drink-dream? — and wake up and jot it all down: an image of a black walnut tree, or rum.
The Soleil Levant? Calliope's eternal drink?
She first dreamt it.
Soleil Levant means the "sun rising," so there's a nod to the East, and Middle East, and a Monet painting, she said.
"The red sun in the painting? I use paprika oil to mimic the same kind of sun, bringing the art literally to the drink art," she said.
Look closely. Inside the Soleil Levant, there are other ingredients: a few drops from Snow Falls, the slightest hint of the Sizzlin', the feel of a good-hugging mom, the faint scent of Coco Chanel.
Raven's between worlds. James Beard and Michelin, Rhea County and rural, Italy and a copper-potted white kitchen in Kissimmee, Florida.
On the drive to Dayton, somewhere near Soddy Lake, the question arose: Raven, are you a city girl or country girl?
"Both," she said.
Story ideas, questions, feedback? Interested in partnering with us? Email: david@foodasaverb.com
This story is 100% human generated; no AI chatbot was used in the creation of this content.
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