Food History of Chattanooga

Key eras

1917-1932, the snack-food boom

Chattanooga Bakery introduced the MoonPie on April 29, 1917, a graham-and-marshmallow round built to a coal miner's request. Fifteen years later, in October 1932, Rody Davenport Jr. and J. Glenn Sherrill opened the first Krystal downtown, betting Depression-era diners would pay for a clean room and a small, square, onion-steamed slider. Both are still made or run today, and both started here.

1930s-1960s, counters and the Big Nine

Ninth Street, the Big Nine, was one of the South's great Black main streets, its clubs and cafes feeding a blues corridor that raised Bessie Smith. The same decades built the city's counter culture: Wally's opened as a drive-in on McCallie Avenue in 1937, and family rooms like Bea's on Dodds Avenue set lazy susans spinning with fried chicken and vegetables.

1960, Little Debbie next door

McKee Foods, founded by O.D. and Ruth McKee in 1934, named a snack line after their four-year-old granddaughter Debbie in 1960. The family bakery in Collegedale, on Chattanooga's eastern edge, still produces every Little Debbie and remains privately held, giving the metro area a second claim on the American snack aisle alongside the MoonPie.

2011-2026, distilleries and the Southside revival

Chattanooga Whiskey, founded in 2011, brought distilling back to the city for the first time in over a century and helped will the Southside's warehouse blocks back to life. Butchers, bakeries and breweries followed down Main Street, and by 2025 the inaugural Michelin Guide American South listed four Chattanooga rooms, with James Beard semifinal nods following in 2026.

Immigrant influences

• Lebanese: Lebanese families ran Southside lunch counters for a century; Zarzour's Cafe, opened by Charlie Zarzour in 1918, fed the city until its 2025 sale.
• Levantine and Middle Eastern: Chef Khaled Albanna's Calliope reframes Levantine cooking with Southern produce on MLK Boulevard, a 2026 James Beard semifinalist.
• Mexican: Taquerias along Rossville Avenue like Taqueria Jalisco Ania and food trucks in St. Elmo anchor the city's everyday taco culture.
• Korean: Han Mi grew from the Korean Underground supper club into a Broad Street storefront cooking grandmother-recipe dak-galbi and cutlets.
• German: A free two-day Oktoberfest at the First Horizon Pavilion, now in its 25th year, keeps Bavarian food and biergarten culture on the calendar.

Signature innovations

• The MoonPie: graham, marshmallow and chocolate, made by Chattanooga Bakery since 1917
• The Krystal slider: the South's square steamed burger, founded downtown in 1932
• Little Debbie snack cakes, named for a McKee grandchild in 1960 and baked in Collegedale
• Tennessee High Malt whiskey, pioneered at Chattanooga Whiskey's Experimental Distillery
• The lazy susan restaurant table, kept spinning at Bea's since 1950