Blue Ridge Country March/April 2024 - 71

We took it home and held a sorghum syrup tasting
on Christmas Eve that year. Then in February of
2023, we spoke about sorghum and served sorghumflavored
dried apple stack cake at the annual convention
of the National Sweet Sorghum Producers and
Processors Association in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.
The convention always includes a sorghum competition.
That year there were over 50 entries, and Terry
Hughes' Georgia sorghum captured first place.
While we were walking around the courthouse
square in Blairsville, we noticed a restaurant called
Hole in the Wall. Despite the fact that we have made
many food forays into northern Georgia and despite
the fact that the business dates to 1931, we had never
come across any references to Hole in the Wall before.
Very few articles have been written about the place,
and there are only a handful of cursory reviews online.
Since we love courthouse-square towns and restaurants
with longevity, we stopped in for breakfast,
which is served all day.
In doing some research, we discovered that Hole
in the Wall actually began as a food truck during the
Great Depression. Margie Henson sold sandwiches
out of the back of her truck on the square before
purchasing the building and establishing a more conventional
eatery. According to the Union County
Historical Society, she made history by " becoming
Union County's first independent and divorced business
woman. "
During World War II, we learned, the restaurant
(then called the Blairsville Restaurant) served as a
Trailways bus stop, where tickets were sold inside.
With the draft board located right next door, it was
the place where soldiers boarded buses to take them
off to war. And, a couple of times a year, an itinerant
dentist stopped in to pull teeth.
Hole in the Wall actually began as a
food truck during the Great Depression.
Margie Henson sold sandwiches out
of the back of her truck on the square
before purchasing the building and
establishing a more conventional eatery.
" Elbows up, " our server says, as she delivers big
platters of breakfast fare at Hole in the Wall. The restaurant
calls them " Down Home Mountain Breakfast
Specials. " The Moonshiner includes two eggs, bacon
or sausage, and a choice of biscuits and gravy, French
toast or pancakes. You can get a big slab of country
ham with redeye gravy, too.
Our favorite, and the standard by which we judge
all breakfast places in the South, is the pork tenderloin.
Chef Mark Cox at Hole in the Wall does it in a grand
way, breaded and fried. Throughout the day, other
Southern favorites include blackeyed peas, fried okra,
liver and onions, rainbow trout and catfish. Hole in
the Wall is the kind of place where you feel like staying
all day, and the coffee just keeps on coming.
On our way back to Tennessee, we take a detour
through Mineral Bluff, Georgia, attracted by the largest
collection of metal sculptures we had ever seen,
at a hillside business called The Zoo. We purchase
a metal aloe plant and a handsome metal rooster as
lasting reminders of our good times and fascinating
discoveries in northern Georgia.
Fred and Jill Sauceman study and celebrate the foodways
of Appalachia and the South from their home base in Johnson
City, Tennessee.
MARCH/APRIL 2024 71
Blue Ridge Country March/April 2024

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