An open-faced sandwich of turkey breast, bacon and tomato on toast, blanketed in a creamy Mornay sauce and broiled until golden. Louisville's signature plate.
Chef Fred K. Schmidt invented the Hot Brown at the Brown Hotel in 1926 to feed the late-night dancers at the hotel's 1,200-guest dinner balls. Schmidt riffed on traditional Welsh rarebit, replacing the bread foundation with toast and turkey and finishing with bacon and tomato. The sandwich quickly became the choice of 95 percent of the hotel's restaurant customers and has anchored Louisville hotel menus and lunch counters ever since. Recipes have been published widely, but the Brown Hotel's J. Graham's Cafe still serves the original.
3 editor picks for Hot Brown in Louisville, ranked by editorial score. All Louisville signature dishes · Hot Brown across every city.
J. Graham's Cafe ★ 4.6
downtown · 335 West Broadway, Louisville, KY 40202
J. Graham's Cafe in the Brown Hotel serves Louisville's original Hot Brown, the open-faced turkey-and-Mornay sandwich invented here in 1926.
Lobby Bar at the Brown Hotel ★ 4.4
335 West Broadway, Louisville, KY 40202
Lobby Bar at the Brown Hotel in Louisville pours mint juleps and bourbon flights inside the lobby where the Hot Brown sandwich was invented in 1926, the city's hotel-bar classic.
Wagner's Pharmacy ★ 4.2
south-louisville · 3113 South 4th Street, Louisville, KY 40214
Wagner's Pharmacy on South 4th in Louisville has cooked breakfast since 1922, the Derby-week diner across from Churchill Downs that locals call the city's true racetrack canteen.