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Pick a meat, your favorite sides and a seat at the table. Camden’s Haile Street Grill has roots going back nearly a century.
Photo by Sam Wolfe
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Connie Ward Covington, owner of Genesis Family Restaurant in Bennettsville, walks in the comfort-food culinary footsteps of her mother, Annie Mae Ward.
Photo by John D. Russell
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Genesis Family Restaurant started as a catering business and evolved into a popular community dining spot specializing in homestyle cooking.
Photo by John D. Russell
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When Scott Edwards (standing) and his wife purchased Camden’s Haile Street Grille, former owner Jimmy Garner was delighted to help them return the grill to its roots, sharing advice and family recipes.
Photo by Sam Wolfe
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For almost a century, sticking to the basics has kept Haile Street Grill popular among Camden locals.
Photo by Sam Wolfe
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Plates piled with fried chicken, macaroni and cheese, green beans and other traditional country sides fill the kitchen window at Spartanburg’s Wade’s Restaurant, which was honored in 2024 with a James Beard Foundation America’s Classic Award.
Photo by Matthew Franklin Carter
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Wade Lindsey, Anna Lindsey Liles and their dad, Hamp Lindsey, have carried on the tradition of Wade’s Restaurant that started nearly eight decades ago with Hamp’s parents, Wade and Betty Lindsey.
Photo by Matthew Franklin Carter
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Quashona “Q” Thomas-Moore serves up a mouthwatering meat-and-three plate at Wade’s Restaurant.
Photo by Matthew Franklin Carter
It’s a quiet Sunday morning in the Pee Dee town of Bennettsville. Church services are winding down, as a few hungry strategists wait outside the soon-to-open café. But its locked doors can’t stymie the stimulating aromas and their collective promise of a soulful, rib-sticking dinner.
Fried chicken, steak and gravy, chicken and dumplings, stew beef, oxtails, macaroni and cheese, lima beans, stewed okra, collard greens, cabbage, sweet corn, rutabagas, biscuits, cornbread, fatback—a whiff of the riches to come both tantalizes and torments.
For a modest set price, you get creative license to build the lunch plate of your dreams. Choosing might not be easy, but it’s part of the fun of eating at a meat-and-three.
In a time when many restaurants are vanishing from the culinary landscape, the staying power of a strong handful of true meat-and-three restaurants across South Carolina, rooted in family traditions and timeless recipes, is truly remarkable.
In many ways, the local meat-and-three is more than a restaurant. It’s a special “citizen” of the community, a welcoming presence that invites folks of all backgrounds to sit down to a home-cooked meal and find common ground. Here, diners are united in their love for good cookin’, a reverence for tradition and a belief that macaroni and cheese counts as a vegetable. If any divisions arise, chances are good they center around the question: Gamecocks or Tigers?
So, pick a meat and three sides and find a seat. But before you dig in, don’t forget to bless the cooks and give thanks for the nourishing food before you. For at the heart of every great meat-and-three experience, there’s a dedicated family working hard to keep a time-honored Southern tradition alive.
Genesis Family Restaurant: Honoring a matriarch
It is baked chicken and dressing day at the Bennettsville café, so lining up early is smart insurance against disappointment should the coffers run low. Not that Connie Ward Covington would condone skipping church to get a leg up on her most famous dish. There’s a reason she named her bustling meat-and-three operation Genesis Family Restaurant.
“My mother was a biblical woman,” she says, “and it was a rule in our house that we all went to church on Sunday—no excuses.”
These days, Covington might not spend her Sunday mornings at a house of worship, but she is in a sacred space, nonetheless. Behind the unassuming facade of the restaurant, she and a team of family members pay homage to her late mother, Annie Mae Ward, the matriarch who influenced today’s space where folks can sit down to a home-style meal and find fellowship.
“After church, everyone gathered at my grandmother’s home to eat dinner,” says Covington’s daughter and marketing manager, Rhonda Covington Norman. “The family then began to cater weddings, family reunions and various private events. As the church and family crowd outgrew the home, we had to begin a restaurant. It really started as a mom-and-pop operation and grew along with the ‘Ward’ name, which now stands for quality food in our community.”
Save for the 2020 coronavirus pandemic blip, operations have not deviated in the 16 years since Covington added a restaurant to her catering business. The formula remains unchanged: Pick your meat, favorite sides, choice of bread and drink, then find a seat.
During peak hours, it might be necessary to share a table, but don’t be shy. While lots of customers know one another by name, the first time you break bread as a stranger here will be your last. New friends are another perk of the meat-and-three experience.
Genesis Family Restaurant is located at 516 Cheraw St., Bennettsville, and is open Thursday and Friday from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. and on Sunday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. (843) 479-3344. Find the restaurant on Facebook.
Haile Street Grill: Three families, one meat-and-three
As a youngster, Scott Edwards and his pals would pedal their bikes to Camden’s Haile Street Grill for cheeseburgers and bottled colas. Three decades later, Edwards would be the one flipping burgers for old-timers as well as a new generation of grill patrons.
When the Camden native returned home with his wife, Michelle, for the 2018 Carolina Cup Steeplechase, Edwards discovered his old haunt was up for sale. With years of joint restaurant management experience between them, the couple took their shot and became the proud owners of one of Camden’s oldest restaurants.
But before they signed on the dotted line, there was one condition.
“The only way I would make the purchase was if the former owner, Mr. Jimmy (Garner), agreed to help me get it back to where it was,” Edwards says. “I wanted to recreate the homemade dishes and desserts that made everybody—including myself—love Haile Street Grill.”
The grill’s history goes back to 1928, when the Horton family opened a store that also offered short-order eats. It eventually morphed into Haile Street Grill, a hub of delicious meat-and-three commerce and community chit-chat. Rather infamously, it also became a magnet for school kids who craftily cut classes to snag hot-off-the-grill burgers.
The classic Southern dishes and desserts served there over the decades not only solidified the grill’s local appeal but drew diners from across the region. When Mr. Jimmy and his wife, Margaret, assumed the business, they kept the spirit of the historic café alive into the new millennium. But when Margaret passed away in 2016, Mr. Jimmy took her parting request to heart.
“‘Close the grill and live your life’—that’s what she told him to do,” Edwards says. “He had devoted so much of himself to the restaurant that it was time to step away.”
For Camden, the closing of the restaurant was simply unthinkable. Another owner came in and revamped the menu, but the new approach never quite took off. It wasn’t long before the grill was back on the market, and just in time to catch Edwards’ eye. Luckily for him, Mr. Jimmy was thrilled to help restore Haile Street Grill to its former glory by sharing advice and family recipes, including those for Margaret’s legendary cakes and other desserts. The community was ecstatic.
Longtime regulars Gregg and Debbie Riley are among the many Haile Street enthusiasts who believe the restaurant is better than ever. You can find them nestled in a booth most Wednesdays, when the wildly popular meatloaf is on the meat-and-three lineup.
“Can I tell you why we love this place?” Debbie asks, then rolls out her reasons. “The food is homemade, delicious, reasonably priced. The people are always warm and friendly. And every time we come in, we run into friends from our church.”
“And don’t dare miss the meatloaf!” Gregg adds.
While great meatloaf can be gratifying, it does not compare to the sight of Mr. Jimmy enjoying breakfast in the place where he and Margaret made so many cherished memories.
The warm fuzzies don’t get much warmer than this.
Haile Street Grill is located at 1350 Haile St., Camden. Hours are Tuesday–Saturday 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. (803) 432-7182. hailestreetgrill.com.
Wade’s Restaurant: A family heirloom
Ask anyone in the Upstate for directions to the best Southern cooking, and they likely will point you toward Spartanburg. The Hub City is home to one of the most dynamic meat-and-threes in the state: Wade’s Restaurant.
The one-time grocery store, established by Wade and Betty Lindsey in 1947, catered to the needs of local mill workers. But when Betty began working her meat-and-three magic at the lunch counter in the back, those mill workers let their priorities be known. It wasn’t long before the entrepreneurs shut down the store and channeled their energies into a full-service restaurant.
“My grandparents obviously laid the foundation for our success,” says Anna Lindsey Liles, who manages marketing for the restaurant. “My grandmother Betty is responsible for the amazing Southern recipes our customers know and love, while my grandfather’s sharp business sense paved the way for our focus on excellence in customer service.”
When Wade and Betty moved on to their heavenly rewards, their children and grandchildren carried on the family business. But future growth depended on an honest assessment of the restaurant’s direction and a willingness to make changes.
By the late 1970s, the business had lost its way for a bit, Liles explains.
“It was time to get back to our roots,” she says.
Her father, Hamp, and her Aunt Carole made a bold decision around that time to transition from a restaurant that did most of its business on alcohol, burgers and fries to a “family-focused meat-and-three restaurant,” Liles says.
By making Betty’s recipes the core of their business model, Hamp and Carole restored Wade’s winning dynamic. They’ve been rewarded with rousing accolades from the growing number of faithful who come again and again to fill up on turkey and dressing, fried chicken, hamburger steak, mac and cheese, creamed corn, sweet potato souffle—and those highly addictive yeast rolls, hand-mixed multiple times a day by the restaurant’s legendary lead cook, Sonya Hunter.
Liles estimates that over 30 years, Hunter has baked more than 2 million rolls. Million.
In 2024, the decision to embrace Wade’s meat-and-three roots brought home the gold when the establishment became the first Upstate recipient of the James Beard Foundation’s America’s Classics Award. The honor recognizes locally owned restaurants for quality food that captures the character of the communities they serve.
Those who kept the faith in Wade’s and invested decades of sweat equity earned a right to take a bow.
“I have always felt that every staff member who worked with us along the way contributed in some way to our success,” Hamp Lindsey says.
The common thread
From rural Bennettsville to the equestrian town of Camden to the quickly rising city of Spartanburg, the environments in which these restaurants operate are distinct. Perhaps the key to their longevity and appeal lies more in commonalities than differences. And when it comes down to it, besides their menus, community is what’s common.
When Edwards described the pandemic’s effects on Haile Street Grill, there was a hint of revelation in his words.
“Our business blew up in a big way,” he says. “It was amazing how the community showed up for us.”
Considering the many ways these restaurant owners give back—by donating food, participating in charitable events, sponsoring kids’ sports or offering space for special events—it’s no wonder people stepped up to reciprocate.
“Being a part of the Spartanburg community as long as we have is quite special,” Liles says of her family’s Wade’s Restaurant. “As our city grows, things change, and new people move here. We are proud to be a constant fixture in the community as a restaurant and business that our town can count on.”
Wade’s Restaurant is located at 1000 N. Pine St., Spartanburg, and is open Monday–Friday 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Sunday 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. (864) 582-3800. eatatwades.com.