Good Locally-owned Restaurants in Durha/CH (Raleigh, Durham: chapel, university, price)

[esquire]

Hi,

We are headed your way for 5 days to house-hunt and would love some suggestions on good non-chain restaurants in the Durham and Chapel Hill area. We would like to find some great Tex-Mex, Bar-B-Que, greek, sushi and New Jersey style pizza restaurants. We love everything from fried okra to humus so please post any of your favorite hang-outs. We'd love to give them a try. Hopefully, I won't be narrowing down our choices too much but we only want non-smoking establishments.

Thanks in advance for your suggestions!

[Esperanza27713]

In Durham, given your interests, I would recommend Bullock's BBQ for North Carolina authentic, and the Q Shack, for a locally owned twist on BBQ (not your average NC barbecue joint).

Throw your net wider and you would not believe the number of fabulous, locally-owned restaurants waiting to entertain your taste buds here.

[chloemom]

in Chapel Hill, try Allen n Sons barbeque - (recently on Oprah), two locations, check their hours, kind of limited. Tylers (Durham and Carrboro) is fun, pub sytle, anything on Franklin street - runs the whole range of what you are looking for!

[sbanawan]

There are lots of great restaurants in Chapel Hill all up and down Franklin St. In Durham, check the Federal (early before it gets too smoky), Mad Hatter's, Elmo's, Guglhoph for breakfast. There's also Foster's for any meal (we like breakfast there, too).

[feistync]

head for jujube (asian) in chapel hill. visit a southern season (one of the largest gourmet stores in the us) - for brunch and/or shopping. 411 west for italian. there are several pizza places along franklin street in chapel hill; you may like i love ny pizza. cosmic cantina is in both durham and chapel hill. in durham, we also like the blue corn cafe. magnolia grill in durham is allegedly one of the top restaurants in the country. i loved their desserts but didn't care for the steak - i think fish/seafood is their real strength. for more recs, i'd recommend asking on the chowhound boards.

[teqtonik]

durham and chapel hill seem to be LOADED with fine restaurants! I haven't seemed to find such good selections in Raleigh

[toot68]

These are our favorites, and it hardly scratches the surface. There's alot of great Tacqueria in Durham too, that I have no clue of the name of.

Durham:

Pizza - Satisfaction Pizza (brightleaf area)
Pub food - Federal, James Joyce (brightleaf area)
Hot Panninis - Toast (Downtown...fantastic hot sandwiches, best new restaurant in the area)
Mexicanish - Cosmic Cantina (fresh burrito), Blue Corn Cafe (both on/near 9th street), Tonali (off Mt Luther King in Target/Sams area)
BarBQ - Bullocks (Hillsborough Rd)
Thai - Thai Cafe (University Rd)
Indian - Sitar
More upscale - Magnolia Grill, Another Thyme, Pops, Rue Cler, Nana's, Four Square

Chapel Hill:

Pizza - Peppers
Sushi - Sushi Yoshi, Aki Hana
Mexicanish - Carrburito, Margarets Cantina
BBQ - Allen and Sons
Turkish/Mid Eastern - Tallulahs
More upscale - Elaines, Lantern

[MrsSteel]

Great suggestions so far! One other place you simply must try is Locopops. They started out in Durham (near Duke) and now they have additional locations around the Triangle, including Chapel Hill.
LocoPops
This is not a proper restaurant. They serve nothing but homemade paletas - gourmet frozen popsicles. It's easy to just pop in, eat a couple, and run along. It's definitely worth it!

[smithiekat]

Shiki Sushi in Durham is my absolute fave.
Also I second Elmo's in Carborro for breakfast (or in Durham).
And the Lantern is phenomenal, though pricey and fancy.

[esquire]

Thanks so much for all your suggestions! We plan on trying out as many as we can!