One Eared Stag

The burger was excellent I would put it right behind Holeman and Finch as the best burger I’ve had in Atlanta. Now the service that day… not so good, my friends had to send their fries back because they were over cooked. Honestly I think the hostess overbooked our server’s area. I do plan on revisiting.

The meat stick burger is awesome! Definitely top 5 in Atlanta. Sadly, I was unable to finish the burger… the thing is massive! Had a great time hanging with the fellas to celebrate my birthday. Rachel our server took great care of us and engaged us in great conversation throughout the evening. I love the cozy ambiance of the restaurant and the tucked away Inman Park location.

Grave sadness. I was so ready to love this place. A friend went for her anniversary and sent me exquisite food porn. Granted, she was there for dinner and I went for brunch, so there is no comparison, but my brunch experience didn’t make me want to come back.
First of all… it’s June in Atlanta. Call me picky, but I need the ac to work. Literally sweltering inside. The poor servers appeared to be melting. I know I was. Maybe the air wasn’t working, maybe they don’t really turn it on until, um, I don’t know, 2pm? Either way, it was crazy hot.
Our service was very poor. And sooooo slow! It wasn’t even crowded. Our server appeared to be in the weeds the whole time. Just kind of flustered, inattentive and scattered. I’ve waited tables and am known to give a pretty generous pass, and this was not good.
Then the food. Meh. Maybe my picker was off. I had the catfish sausage and grits which is decidedly an odd option. It actually was very interesting, served up in generous chunks, not in a link or casing, and over some very lumpy grits. I’m a grits fan. All types. Finding an acorn sized hunk of dry grit ball in my bowl did not make me happy. But kudos for an interesting flavor mix… fermented lemon, picked okra… the whole shebang needed a pinch of salt. My other friend had the lamb neck hash. Super oily and vaguely flavorless, aside from the lamb taste. I will say the eggs were perfectly poached… if only our food hadn’t had to sit in the window for so long. Chefs breakfast was supposed to be a hit… but it was kinda lackluster as well. The whole platter just looked greasy, and the yogurt with macerated berries… well, it just died while waiting to come out. I tried a bit of my friends hoecake with bacon and goat cheese; it was her favorite item on the platter. Very nice flavor, just so so greasy. No light crispy bits at all. Black pepper biscuit with bacon looked so sad, almost like it was just thrown on as an after thought. Biscuit was cold, dense yet crunchy. Meh. Brunch sadness basically.
I could perhaps be persuaded to return for dinner if friends wanted to check it out, but as it stands, I wouldn’t rush back for sure. Oh, one good thing… it’s super cute inside, but you can’t taste that.

We want fried chicken. And Monday night is where it’s at. Unfortunately, by the time we got here around 7:30, they were all out. But we still took our chance on the rest of the menu and One Eared Stag didn’t fail to impress!
Service was a little slow, but we were seated in the back, where few people were sitting. While it made for slower service, it also gave us a quieter and more intimate seating arrangement. After much deliberation, we finally settled on an ordering strategy of one small cold dish, two small hot dishes and one entrée to reach a comfortable fullness. The boo ordered the hot pastured chicken (which we wondered why they would have enough ingredients for this dish but not for the Monday Night Fried Chicken) while I picked out the corn chowder and the dry aged ribeye tartare. And of course, I had to order the «Meat Stick,» One Eared Stag’s burger stack.
The dry aged ribeye tartare was just ok. I wasn’t extremely impressed — I just couldn’t taste the dry age of the meat in a tartare. Guess my palate isn’t as refined as I thought. The potato chips were super thin so they seemed drenched in grease.
The corn chowder looked very simple. Our server poured out the soup from a small pitcher. The garlic croutons were super flavorful. The soup itself was heavily concentrated pureed corn. Other than the croutons, there wasn’t much variance to the purée consistency. It was delicious, but I don’t know if I would order it again.
The hot pastured chicken was one of the best dishes of the night. The bread was soft and buttery; the chicken hot, crispy, spicy and juicy; and the pickles were a perfect touch. Chickfila, meet gourmet brilliance.
The Meat Stick was probably the most anticipated order of the night. A double patty burger stack stabbed in the middle by a steak knife, this burger is no joke. Meat was tender and juicy and the bun was perfection. Wasn’t a fan of how cheesy it was, but it may have been more of a «I’m basically full before I even started this burger» sentiment.
Overall, the dinner was a great meal, even after the initial disappointment on missing out on the Monday Night Fried Chicken. Guess I’ll be waiting until next Monday to try again…

Unreal. Best brunch I’ve had in ATL in a while. Got the buttermilk fried chicken with biscuit and incredible gravy with bacon and fried egg. Friend got the egg sandwhich and liked it but was jealous of the chicken. Hope to try the the chefs breakfast next time. Great meal

Good Burger
We went there for lunch for a dish recommended in Creative Loafing, but it wasn’t available. So we settled for a soup which was OK, but lacked any richness in the flavor. The pea salad was nice, but some peas and slices of radishes for $ 12?
Our server told us that they did have an off-​menu item of their hamburger which had been voted best burger in «Atlanta» magazine. It was an excellent burger and came with some OK but slightly soggy fries.
It isn’t a particularly fancy restaurant, but prices are quite high. The setting is pleasant and service was perfunctory.
Around the corner is the very nice «Proof» bakery which has excellent coffee and desserts.

This is amazing! Amazing service and food! Totally recommend. James was incredible.

Stopped in for lunch yesterday. Arrived just before noon and the place was empty. By the time we left there were only a handful of tables, so I would say this is a great lunch spot if you don’t like crowds. We found parking on the street fairly easily.
We went strictly for the burger (which is not listed on the menu). It came out pretty quickly and took my breath away at first sight. It was greasy and smelled delicious. It also tasted delicious. I could taste the bacon without actually seeing it. The onions, cheese and pickle were right on time and the bread was lightly toasted but still buttery and soft.
The fries were underwhelming. I wouldn’t even bother getting them the next time, and I LOVE fries.
Overall, it was a really good burger for $ 15, but it was a $ 15 burger. If I return to OES, I would probably try something else because the menu looked pretty good.

I came here on a Tuesday night alone while on a business trip. I sorted through restaurants that a) had interesting menus b) were near the MARTA c) were in interesting neighborhoods and d) had reasonably good reviews which led me to the one eared stag.
I sat at the bar to eat alone as I often do on business trips. The place was slow so the bartender was super attentive and we discussed the food menu as well as the huge wine, cocktail and one-eared-stag+creature comforts beer/​tail list.
Overall very good experience. I opted for 3 appetizers (duck liver terrine, English peas and pastured hot chicken). All were good and interesting in their own right.
The peas were probably my favorite– Think a light English pea salad w/​vinegar based dressing+mint+Parmesan. Made me think of England. (Mushy peas minus the mushy+vinegar).
The hot chicken is a deboned fried chicken thigh but pretty spicy (cayenne/​paprika) & served on a piece of white toast with tasty pickles. Think Jake & Elwood Blues but with cayenne. (If you go to the Amex Centurion club at SFO or LGA they serve the same thing but NOT spicy)
The duck terrine is foies gras served in a little pot with croutons plus tangy, early-​picked strawberries with some strawberry glaze, salt and pepper. Very, very good but rich.
Cocktail wise I had a standard Manhattan with basil hayden’s and for «dessert» an Athens based creature comforts Athena Berliner weisse beer with blood orange + ginger bitters. Tasty.

Hidden gem in Edgewood. The decoration is unique, so are the dishes — not only fresh but also creative.
Had lunch there. Ordered the fried chicken (the spicy one), lamb sausage with duck egg, and spaghetti with crab lump. The food came bigger than I thought. The meat was very high quality and tender. The food was so tasty.
Will definitely come back for dinner.

I brought friends here because I heard great things about this place and the wait staff was SO VERY RUDE. I have never had eyes rolled in my face when I asked a question about the menu. Forgot half my order on my salad, when bought to their attention, they rudely slammed the missing «element» on the table. We had a COMPLETELY rude and asinine waitress. Such a shame because the area is one of my favorite in Atlanta, but I
WILL NEVER come back. In addition, I will never recommend this restaurant.

The meal was not just delicious, but unique and exciting. Start off with one of the whiskies or scotch. The selection is quite good. Everything was cooked and seasoned perfectly
The menu changes ever couple of days. My hubby and I shared the pancetta salad. He had chicken and I had baked cod. We were both very happy with our meals
The only negatives are noise and timeliness of service. Noise level is awful. You can’t talk to someone across the table. Service is a bit slow but friendly.

I hate writing bad reviews, and very rarely have to, but felt compelled after a really awful experience here. I was actually excited for brunch at One Eared Stag. I had eaten dinner there a few years ago and remembered liking the food. However, on this particular Sunday, everything went wrong.
Seeing nothing meatless on the menu, I inquired about meatless options. I was told that a dish I was interested in absolutely could not be modified but the chef could do a veggie plate… for $ 22. Far more than any of the other brunch entrees. But I always love a good veg plate and it was off the menu so I ordered it, my friend ordered a duck thing, and we ordered a salad as an appetizer. Ok, nothing super out of the ordinary so far.
45 minutes later… no food and our mimosas were long since depleted. Just as we were attempting to ask about the hold up, our entrees showed up — but no appetizer. Our server is notified of the problem and also finally realizes our lack of drinks. So we eat our food but mimosas never show up. My friend had an appointment and needed to leave so we were attempting to cancel our drink order and get the check… just as the mimosas arrive.
Ok, so it wasn’t the best experience, but we’ve eaten and had 2 drinks so I’m over it. Until, 2 hours later, watching a movie with my husband, I start to feel extremely nauseated. Over the course of the evening, this turns into full blown food poisoning — the worst I have EVER had. Vomiting, fever, chills, weakness, the works. Brunch here was the only thing I had eaten that day.
Needless to say, I wouldn’t recommend this restaurant to anyone and, in fact, would probably advise to avoid.

I wanted *so* badly to like this place… but they made it really, really hard.
For starters, the server, while nice enough, was inattentive and had very little knowledge of the menu. Also, the staff overall just appeared sloppy– dirty shoes, stained shirts… I’m all about casual, but at least be presentable. Especially when you’re serving $ 20+ plates of eggs & bacon.
Which brings us to the food itself… I had the Meat Stick– which was the highlight of the meal. The burger is unique and very tasty. The pickles compliment the meat perfectly & the bacon ground into the meat gives the meal an interesting twist. It’s a shame the fries accompanying the entrée weren’t nearly as good. They were soggy & stone cold. The Bloody Mary was decent, but nothing to write home about.
Finally, we specifically selected this restaurant to take a friend out for a birthday meal. We shared this when we made the reservation and reminded both the hostess & waitress. However, to our dismay, the waitress didn’t even say «happy birthday» let alone offer a dessert or anything to acknowledge our special event.
All-​in-​all, it’s a real shame the food & service didn’t live up to the hype because the building is beautiful, well-​appointed & the bar has an incredible whisky selection. I may come back & sample a unique bourbon (& *maybe* for the meat stack) but probably not for a full meal with friends… and definitely not to celebrate a special occasion.

I love farm to table restaurants and One Eared Stag would’ve gotten a higher rating had they not run out of so many things we wanted to order, which was surprising as we ate here at 7:30pm on a weeknight. It was even apparent in some of the dishes, as I did not see or taste some of the ingredients stated on the menu. Our server was very apologetic and gave us substitute options that were good, but it was a bummer to miss some of what we hoped to eat.
The menu changes daily but I think there are repeats if you’re going in the same season (as I see most of what we saw on tonight’s menu, on a menu from January that is posted on Unilocal as a sample). Tonight we ordered:
–clams with bacon cream, potato, fennel, fried bread — would’ve preferred the bread not fried– was too hard to chew even after dipped in the cream
–rutabaga, sweet pecans, rutabaga purée, meyer lemon parsley, brown butter vinaigrette — rutabag was finely chopped and cooked with the pecans in a rich buttery sauce
–hot chicken, pickle, toast – chicken was very tender and not too spicy
–duck breast, sorghum, charred rapini, sour clementine, potato sauce, almond picada — duck was cooked medium rare, perfectly seasoned, and skin was crispy. Rapini reminded me of kale.
–for dessert, cheesecake truffles with graham cracker, apple butter, and fruit curd — fruit curd was more of a jam, and truffles tasted like white chocolate

Eh, maybe I went on an off night but I wasn’t blown away by this place.
The food on the menu wasn’t anything inventive and their service was a little off. I ordered a hot chicken, mussles and crusty bread, and porkchops with collards. They didn’t taste bad, but not great either. They said they just switched their point of sale system so… We did come with a large group but still. Restaurants can’t handle large groups? eek.
It’s in a cool area, I’d be willing to try it again but I’d have a hard time recommending it others.

One Eared Stag is tucked behind proof coffee and bake shop in Inman Park. If you want to impress foodie friends and dates, the crew at One Eared Stag won’t disappoint. The menu is packed with seasonal farm fresh options that everyone can find something they will enjoy. I am gonna talk about that off menu item that’s a go to if you’re in the mood. It’s called the Meatstick and its one of the best burgers in Atlanta! The bacon ground into the burger patty is what makes it artistic and absolutely awesome! The cheese, bun, and placement on top of a mountain of pretty awesome fries is great the icing on the cake! Also, it’s huge, easily shareable! When it came to our table, there were many jealous eyes coming from our neighbors who must have not known about the burger. The beer selection is also good, and the cocktails well made!
Atmosphere is trendy and somewhat upscale but not pompous. Some tables are community style seating, and the restaurant is cozy and warm feeling. There is an actual mounted one ear stag… that was very satisfying to see. The staff is awesome and highly recommend it! Four stars only because I feel like it’s small size makes it a little loud sometimes otherwise top notch!

Had a pretty terrible experience here this past Saturday night. Unfortunately, I can’t comment on the food because it didn’t get that far. I had a 7:15 reservation via Open Table with the note that it was my husband’s birthday.
There’s no valet, which is kind of a pain in that neighborhood, and after circling the block twice, we found a spot that some chick was standing in to hold for someone and she wouldn’t move. So this started us off on the wrong foot.
Once inside, the hostess promptly seated us in the shittiest table available in the relatively empty restaurant. It was a TINY table in the prime location directly between the kitchen and the restrooms. Before we even sat down, I quickly turned to the hostess and said, «hey, this table’s not so great and it’s his birthday, can we sit there… or there… or anywhere over there…» (pointing to the 5 – 6 open tables) to which she replied «No. We have too many 4 tops coming in.»
So, we sat down and discovered not only was the location of our table not great, it literally smelled like a port-a-potty…Happy Birthday, Honey!
Our server took quite a while to come over and when he did there wasn’t much of a greeting just more like, «What do you want to drink?». Meanwhile, 3 tables were seated in the empty tables I’d suggested we move to, and guess what: they were ALL 2 tops, so her original story was BS.
It was at this point that we decided to bolt. We tried to find the server and/​or the hostess to let them know, but no one was around.
Oh well, see ya never.

One Eared Stag was recently named Best Restaurant to Bring the Kids by Creative Loafing critic. This baffled me since I’ve never seen a child at this place, but then again, I tend to come later in the evening. So if you have little ones, take note.
My main motivation for coming here was to try the famed meatstick burger ($ 14). The bun is very shiny/​oily/​buttery which is slightly off-​putting but not so much that you want to hurl the bun on the floor in disgust. The fries sitting under the burger can get a little soggy. The first time I had this burger, it was slightly too bacon-​y if that is even fathomable, but the second time, it was firing on all cylinders. The kitchen allows you to sub a simple salad with a lemon dressing for the fries in case you don’t feel like getting potato products, at no upcharge! Back to the burger, no lettuce or tomato on this bad boy like some other notable ATL burgers. I’d prefer dill over bread & butter pickles, but what can you do. Definitely get the meatstick.
The appetizers I’ve had were worth mentioning: some roasted leeks and roasted marrow bones. Both were excellent. You’d think leeks wouldn’t be that exciting, but you’d be pleasantly surprised. Hot and cold appetizers range from about $ 7 to $ 15.
The black bottom tart ($ 8) was excellent. Imagine a cheesecake married to a chocolate cake. Yasssss.
It is loud in the main dining room; that’s my main negative. And one time the hostess had zero personality and wasn’t especially warm or welcoming. Oh well.
Taylor was our server for our two visits. She got everything right in the server book: professional, polite, attentive but not annoyingly so, knowledgeable.
The décor of the place is ultra cute too, with jars of pickled veggies, bowls of heirloom cherry tomatoes, and the one eared stag. I’m way eager to come back sometime for brunch and the Monday night fried chicken!

Like with any fine establishment on this part of town, the food will be hit or miss depending on your taste. Overall I loved most of the items and would love to come back for the food I’m craving. The dinners (suppers as they are called) are good but we opted for the tappas and small plates.
We got the Dandelion Salad with arugula and cherries ($ 11) It was ok. Not our favorite salad, just felt like it was missing something and it was very sour.
We got Oysters $ 2.75 ea
These were nice and fresh, the sauce they give you is great too
Pork belly was served on toast and served open face with curd and peas ($ 14) This was my favorite dish of the night. All of the perfect blend of salty and savory flavors on top of toast.
Chorizo with a srambled egg ($ 15) This was very good too. Most people loved this or the pork belly as the winning dish of the night.
Fried quail ($ 13) This tasted like quail with wing sauce. I’ll skip it next time.
Bone marrow with toast, roe, goat cheese and radishes ($ 15) This was better than I thought it would be. The marrow is very buttery, delicate, and melted on my toast. The radishes cooked with the marrow tasted like the marrow which was the best part.
Fried eggplant ($ 9) This had bursts of brown sugar in it. It wasn’t very good. No one would finish eating it
We did try a supper:
Tuna collar ($ 33) This is a massive amount of fish. You will feel like you are eating a giant carcass but it’s delicious. Like no other fish we’ve had before. Some areas are light and flaky, others are dark flavorful. A must try for sure.
Meat stick burger– a giant burger with fries that was also great.
Griddle cake ($ 8)
This was so good. Think mom’s griddle pancakes with peach jam.
Lavender Pot de crème ($ 8) Never had this before. It was nice and creamy, like a custard.