The Best Places in Germantown Nashville, TN & around

Vivek Surti grew up eating Southern food and Gujarati home cooking, and this tasting menu restaurant in Germantown is where those two things finally sit down together. The open kitchen and plush, jewel-toned room feel more like a dinner party than a restaurant, helped along by the kitchen sending courses to every table at once. The Michelin Guide has it selected, and a James Beard Semifinalist nod for hospitality tracks with the room's warmth.

1. Bon Appétit #7 · America's Best New Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. The Infatuation #10 · The Best Restaurants In Nashville

Babychan is a Japanese bakery on the ground floor of a Germantown condo building, done up in walnut and Japanese art, which is more design effort than most places put into the thing you eat standing up. The case runs to sesame swiss rolls, salmon onigiri, and milk bread stuffed with cream cheese. It was a James Beard semifinalist for Outstanding Restaurateur, and the pastries sell out early, so arrive at opening.

1. Nashville Scene 2025 · Best New Cafe and Bakery · Best of Nashville
2. The Infatuation #24 · The Best Restaurants In Nashville
3. The Infatuation The 15 Best Bakeries In Nashville

The raw bar anchors the room at this polished seafood restaurant, oysters from both coasts and the Gulf stacked up in a city that has no business pulling this off. Julia Sullivan, who came up at Per Se and Blue Hill at Stone Barns, keeps the menu rooted in Southern instincts while the flavors drift pleasantly coastal. The onion dip topped with Tennessee paddlefish caviar is the kind of dish that makes you feel silly for ever ordering anything else.

1. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Nashville Right Now
2. James Beard Awards 2025 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Restaurateur · Benjamin Goldberg, Max Goldberg, and Josh Habiger - Strategic Hospitality

A pasta program that changes with the season keeps regulars at this Germantown neighborhood restaurant coming back to see what Philip Krajeck is running on the menu. The cooking is unfussy and ingredient-driven, the kind of sharing-plates dinner where everything on the table looks better than what you ordered. The Michelin Guide has it selected, and a James Beard nomination for Best Chef Southeast followed.

1. James Beard Awards 2022 · Nominee · Best Chef: Southeast · Philip Krajeck
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: Southeast · Philip Krajeck

Germantown was still dozing when this Italian-Southern trattoria and pizza spot opened, and it has been packing the room ever since. The kitchen treats Southern ingredients as native Italian speakers, so cavatelli gets field peas, cornmeal-crusted trout gets salsa verde, and summer pies get loaded with Tennessee tomatoes or ripe peaches. Leave room for dessert; the pastry chef has a following of her own.

1. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Nashville Right Now
2. Eater 38 Essential Restaurants in Nashville

The Band Box is the food hall tucked behind the right-field fence at First Horizon Park, where you eat a hot dog and keep one eye on the Nashville Sounds. Thursday home games bring guest chefs doing their own takes on concession-stand grub, which beats the usual nachos under a heat lamp. Casual and ballpark-priced, with the crowd in team jerseys and a little more sauce on them than they planned.

1. James Beard Awards 2025 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Restaurateur · Benjamin Goldberg, Max Goldberg, and Josh Habiger - Strategic Hospitality
2. Nashville Scene 2025 · Best Ballpark Food · Best of Nashville

1. Nashville Scene 2024 · Best Coffee-on-the-Go · Best of Nashville
2. Eater The Best Coffee Shops in Nashville

Warm broth arrives first at this seven-table multicourse speakeasy on the Cumberland River, and whatever's in it will probably confuse you before it convinces you. Scallops, paprika, and strawberries, say, or horseradish oil wrapped around aged tuna belly with local melon. The chef's palate is the whole point: combinations that read like a dare on paper land as inevitable on the plate. The New York Times named it to their 2026 Restaurant List.

1. The New York Times 2026 · The Restaurant List

1. Eater 38 Essential Restaurants in Nashville

Close Company is a cocktail bar in the Neuhoff District, a Nashville outpost of New York's Death & Co., set in a big, open, colorful adaptive-reuse space. The menu favors familiar drinks with a twist, like a Bitter Melon Negroni, and the Wray & Ting pairs Jamaican rum with grapefruit soda. Food comes out of a cubby counter you retrieve it from yourself. Ordering a vodka tonic here is a bold way to announce yourself. Nashville Scene named it Best New Bar in 2025.

1. Nashville Scene 2025 · Best New Bar · Best of Nashville

1. Nashville Scene 2025 · Best Addition to Germantown · Best of Nashville

The Optimist is a polished seafood restaurant on Nashville's Adams Street, the kind of place where the wood-roasted oysters arrive before you've decided how much of the bill you're willing to think about. The room leans nautical in a restrained, postmodern way, and the menu rotates often enough that regulars can't coast on habit. Outside, a seasonal bar called Jacqueline serves cocktails when the weather cooperates. Nashville Scene named it Best High-End Seafood in 2025.

1. Nashville Scene 2025 · Best High-End Seafood · Best of Nashville

1. Nashville Scene 2023 · Best Restauranteur in the Face of Adversity · Best of Nashville · Austin Ray
2. Nashville Scene 2023 · Best Place to Go With a Big Party · Best of Nashville

1. Nashville Scene 2024 · Best Weekend Meal to Emulate a Texas Roadhouse Steak Night Experience · Best of Nashville

Spread is a small specialty market in Germantown, built for the moment you open the fridge and find only mustard and regret. The shelves hold tinned fish, odd spices, and condiments you'll swear you'll use, plus a short wine list and sourdough loaves baked in-house. The refrigerated case does the rest with charcuterie, cheeses, and marinated olives, and the staff will talk you into a whole dinner without anyone turning on a stove.

1. Nashville Scene 2023 · Best Way to Avoid Messing Up Your Kitchen for Dinner · Best of Nashville