Off the Wall

Just south of downtown is an exciting new development on the dining scene: the opening of The Monroe. With a mid-century modern vibe, The Monroe is the latest from executive chef Jesse Edmonds, whose other properties—including Liberty Bar & Restaurant, El Cocinero, The Hawthorn, Bar 1903, Black Radish, and South Station—have helped define Tallahassee’s culinary culture. 

The claim to fame for this restaurant, which opened last July as the anchor tenant of the SoMo Walls development project, is a diverse menu and an invitation to explore a new destination. 

“In real estate, we have a saying, ‘Retail follows rooftops,’” says Bugra Demirel, a partner of The Monroe and the force behind the SoMo Walls development project. “But what do you do when you want to open a restaurant but don’t have residences in the area?”

Photos courtesy of The Monroe

Demirel says the planning gets more technical because you need to give potential customers the motivation to venture into an unfamiliar area. As the anchor tenant for SoMo Walls, an arts and entertainment district that spans a city block on South Monroe Street from Oakland Avenue to Harrison Street, The Monroe is up for the challenge. 

Designed to appeal to a variety of customers, The Monroe is a great place for a date night, says Demirel. Yet it’s casual enough for friends to gather and order cocktails and small, shareable plates, such as fugazetta, an Argentinian cheese-stuffed pizza with caramelized onions and chimichurri, or étouffée fritters, a dish of andouille, crawfish, and chicken fritters, garlic shrimp remoulade, grated Parmesan, and chives. 

A unique part of the menu is the “Large Format” options that are served family-style. Designed for two to four people, dishes like the Mediterranean shish kebabs are ideal for a date night or a small outing with friends. Photos courtesy of The Monroe

Have a bigger appetite? The menu also features several pasta selections such as the ricotta-stuffed agnolotti with brown butter, grilled mushrooms, and confit tomato or lobster bucatini featuring butter-poached Maine lobster tail, bucatini pasta, Champagne-grilled leek and brie cream, crispy leeks, wilted kale, and chive oil. 

Entrées also include various seafood options, many of which are sourced from Apalachicola. “Large Format” selections are meant to be served family-style, including Nashville hot chicken—whole fried chicken, collard greens, rice pilaf, crispy sorghum bacon brussels sprouts, jalapeño cheddar biscuits, and hot oil—and chateaubriand, which is cast-iron seared beef tenderloin, cowboy butter, potatoes au gratin, roasted brussels sprouts, carrots, and butternut squash. 

“We call our menu ‘modern American cuisine,’” says Demirel, explaining that the term means items from a variety of cultures. Price points, too, fit a variety of budgets. “We wanted to have all the right items to cover our bases.” 

The Birds of Paradise offers a tropical escape for your palate. This cocktail features a blend of coconut cream, pineapple, lemongrass, and the standout ingredient: shishito pepper–infused rum. Photo by Saige Roberts

The bar features classic cocktails with a twist, including selections from Walls Distilling Co., also located in the SoMo Walls complex. Demirel recommends trying one of the bar’s three espresso martinis; the Birds of Paradise, which is The Monroe’s take on a piña colada with blistered shishito pepper–infused rum; or the Mid Century, a whiskey sour with rosemary, lemon, ginger, sherry, and egg white. 

The management team has sought customer feedback during the early months of operation, tweaking the menu and operations to better suit the clientele.

“Everybody’s welcome, whether it’s game day, just a normal Tuesday, or a date with your boyfriend, girlfriend, or spouse,” Demirel says. “We want to accommodate Tallahassee foodies with a good menu, good environment, and good service.” 

The Monroe
Located at 1327 South Monroe Street, Suite 5. For more information, call (448) 231-2965 or visit themonroetlh.com.

Photo by Saige Roberts

The Art of It 

Repurposed shipping containers have become canvases within an open-air walkable gallery of ever-changing murals. This latest addition to Tallahassee’s art walk culture is part of the newly constructed SoMo Walls complex on South Monroe Street, which is home to The Monroe restaurant, Walls Distilling Co., Burn Boot Camp, and Foxtail Coffee, as well as two tenants yet to be named. SoMo Walls—which caught the attention of the Urban Land Institute, recently winning its New Development Under $20 Million award at the North Florida Awards for Excellence gala—follows in the footsteps of Miami-Dade’s Wynwood Walls, which transformed 10 blocks of warehouses into a destination for outdoor art, galleries, shops, and restaurants. “[SoMo Walls] mirrors not just Wynwood but revitalization projects across the United States,” says developer Bugra Demirel. “There are projects in Detroit, L.A., New York, and Atlanta that were historically underinvested in [but became] targets of creative real estate concepts that integrated a sense of place and entertainment into the design and turned the project into a success story.” Tenants can select the muralist to paint the exteriors of their spaces, and local artists have lent talents to mural and sculpture installations. Demirel says they’ve only just begun, with eight new projects in the works. somowallstlh.com