In July 2019, I took Zach to The Optimist for his birthday. It was our first time there, and I’m just going to say it up front: it’s the best seafood we’ve had anywhere.
Better than St. Simons. Better than the coast. Better than a lot of places we’ve eaten on our travels.
The Optimist is a Ford Fry restaurant on Howell Mill Road, tucked in behind Georgia Tech. Laid back, open, a little industrial. It’s a former meatpacking warehouse, used back in the 1940s to smoke and age ham. Now it’s the kind of place where you can dress up or dress down and feel comfortable either way.
How We Decided to Go
I’ve been familiar with Ford Fry’s restaurants for years – we’d eaten at The El Felix and King & Duke and enjoyed both. But I was skeptical about The Optimist because seafood is a whole different ball game from San Antonio-style Tex-Mex or farm-to-table fare. I was afraid the restaurant was an attempt to fill a niche in Fry’s portfolio rather than being based on a true love and understanding of all things seafood.
Then we saw Ford Fry on The Chef Show on Netflix, and he talked about why he opened The Optimist. About his love of seafood. About what he wanted to create.
That’s when I decided to book a reservation for Zach’s birthday.
We Ubered so we could have a few drinks and not worry about driving back home. Our reservation was at 8 PM, but not knowing how traffic might be, we started out early and arrived a little after 7. So we took a seat at the oyster bar to wait.
The Oyster Bar
We’d missed the $1 oyster happy hour, but there were still plenty of oysters to be had at regular price.
We ordered a dozen oysters, selecting 4 different regions: New Brunswick, Virginia, Florida, and Washington. They were beautifully shucked – slipped right off the shell.
The oysters came with homemade “saltine” crackers, a mignonette, house-made hot sauce, house-mixed cocktail sauce, and fresh grated horseradish. Not the kind from a jar – actual fresh grated horseradish that Zach didn’t recognize at first because he thought it was some kind of shredded cabbage.
The crackers were lovely and crisp and just salty enough. I’d have eaten a pile of them on their own. The cocktail sauce was just the right balance. I usually like being given the ingredients to blend my own at the table, but I was perfectly happy with what they served. And the house-made hot sauce started off delicate and built to a slow burn on your lips and the tip of your tongue.
We spent that hour watching the activity around the wood-fired stove and the staff behind the counter. Everything from the various crudos and ceviches to the lobster roll to the famous shrimp a la plancha was made right in front of us. We got to chat with the folks making the food and with the expediter as he lined up plates to go.
It was a fun part of the experience. The next time we go back, we might just do the happy hour and oyster bar part.
The Meal
Once we were seated, we ordered:
Shrimp a la Plancha: Y’all. This was the favorite dish of the night. Maybe the favorite seafood dish I’ve ever had anywhere. Five head-on shrimp atop a thick piece of toasted bread, drenched in a spicy, creamy butter sauce. (I looked it up online later – the recipe is 3/4 of a stick of butter and a cup of cream). The shrimp are perfectly cooked. The sauce is the right combination of rich and spicy. The bits of roasted pepper in the sauce almost have the texture and consistency of pancetta and are delicious.
Don’t try to be neat with this dish. Just get your fingers in there and peel and sop and soak and be messy. It’s worth it. They’ll bring you lemon towels for cleaning up.
The Refugee Platter: This cost around $80 and came with another dozen oysters with all the accessories, 12 steamed shrimp in a spicy boil, half a lobster, and 3 small ramekins – shrimp and scallop ceviche with melon, lump crab meat salad, and salmon poke.
The ceviche was wonderful – the melon was an unexpected sweet “pop” of flavor that worked beautifully. But the best thing on the platter? The salmon poke. Salmon that melted in your mouth with a buttery finish, coated in just the right balance of salty and tangy (soy, mirin, something else?), and crunchy bits of black garlic and toasted sesame to give it texture. If I go back, I could order a bowl of that salmon poke and be perfectly happy.
Corn Milk Hushpuppies: Perfect. Pure corn flavor with a dusting of powdered sugar and honey butter that accented the sweetness of the corn. Crunchy outside, tender inside.
Dessert: Blueberry Bread Pudding and Scotch: We ordered the blueberry bread pudding with toffee sauce and paired it with a Macallan 12 year scotch. This pairing was Zach’s idea, and he was absolutely right. The combination was perfect. The pudding was not too sweet or rich, and the blueberries popped. The scotch set off the toffee sauce to perfection.
The Overall Experience
We were there for about 2 hours total. The service was superlative – attentive without being hovering, knowledgeable, friendly.
After dinner, we Ubered back to our hotel and then walked around Centennial Olympic Park to walk off some of the heavy meal and drinks. We figured we needed it. All in all, it was a fabulous meal and I don’t regret a minute of it.
Zach is always taking me out to dinner, indulging my seafood cravings, listening and following through on what I want. This was an opportunity to return the love. To plan something special for his birthday. To splurge on dinner and drinks and make him feel celebrated.
It’s nice to be able to do that for someone who does so much for you.
Would We Go Back?
We’ve been back twice since then, even though it’s about an hour away from our house. That should tell you something.
The Optimist is the best seafood restaurant in Atlanta. Maybe the best seafood we’ve had anywhere. And we’ve had a lot of seafood in a lot of places.
If you like seafood and you’re in Atlanta, go to The Optimist. Sit at the oyster bar. Order the shrimp a la plancha. Get messy. Enjoy yourself.
It’s worth every penny.
What’s the best seafood restaurant you’ve been to? What’s your favorite seafood dish? Let me know in the comments.
P.S. The shrimp a la plancha is not a neat dish. Don’t try to make it one. Just lean into the mess and enjoy it.
P.P.S. If you’re not into oysters, don’t worry. There’s plenty else on the menu. But if you are into oysters, the oyster bar during happy hour is the way to go.
P.P.P.S. That Macallan 12 and blueberry bread pudding pairing? Trust Zach on this one. It works.