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Feature article
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Hamburgers the hallmark of Litton’s
By Fred Sauceman
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Amid all the “Best of” citations from the Knoxville News-Sentinel and Metro Pulse newspapers, the framed magazine mentions and a plaque commemorating a segment on the Food Network, a child’s letter, written in aquamarine crayon, says it shortest and best:
“Litton’s is the best restaurant that you could go to. It is like Paradise.”
Claire Turner’s succinct missive is framed right under the cash register at Litton’s Market and Restaurant in Fountain City, near Knoxville.
Litton’s is a fourth-generation business. Its origins as a community grocery store that opened in 1946 are still evident today in the shoe-darkened, well-worn wooden floor, a meat counter packed with Porterhouse and ribeye steaks for take-home cooking and cardboard boxes bulging with sweet potatoes and Irish potatoes.
It’s the hamburger that has become the hallmark of Litton’s menu, although daily blue plate specials feature pork and dressing, meatloaf, fried chicken, fried schrod and salmon patties.
Litton’s grinds and grills its own hamburger meat, all Western top round. In 1985, the restaurant started baking its own hamburger buns.
“We are self-sufficient,” says owner Barry Litton, a native of Inskip. “That’s how we grew up.”
Far exceeding USDA specifications, Litton’s employs its own microbiological lab to check the safety of its products.
A six-sided chalkboard, with numbered panels, is the restaurant’s seating system. You grab a piece of yellow chalk and write your name on the board, then take a seat in one of the old wooden church pews. Or wander around the building reading the accolades.
Choices range from basic — the Litton Burger, labeled as “Barry’s Saturday nite favorite” — to Baroque — the Thunder Road, dressed with pimento cheese, sautéed onions and jalapeńo peppers.
“The day we lunched there we followed the Governor of Tennessee’s entourage, yet still we were treated like old friends,” says my friend Al “The Mayor” Bowen of Lane, Indiana. “Litton’s is a great place to enjoy a real American burger in a comfortable and clean environment.”
In all my visits to Litton’s, I’ve never strayed from the hamburger, but my wife Jill ventured into chili dog territory recently. The hot dog and bun came completely submerged in beany chili.
Litton’s is just about as well known for its desserts as its hamburgers. Red velvet and Italian cream cakes are perennial best sellers. Barry says cupcakes, in chocolate and strawberry, have caught on quickly because diners want smaller portions after the massive hamburgers.
Heading out Broadway (Highway 441 North), look for what is popularly known as the Duck Pond on the left, then make a right on Essary and into Litton’s lot.
The official name of the Duck Pond is the Fountain City Lake, created in 1890 and now maintained by the Fountain City Lions Club.
For one of Tennessee’s most heralded hamburgers, in the atmosphere of a mid-20th-century market, Litton’s is a top choice.
As diner Dan MacDonald of Knoxville says, “Litton’s passes my most crucial test for independent restaurants, diners and cafés: It projects a personality. The mood here is community and family and quality.
“There is an atmosphere more like some places you’d find along a seashore than you’d expect in landlocked Tennessee. It’s like you’re on vacation there even when you have to work the next day. When you walk into Litton’s I guarantee you everyone at every table is talking. All at the same time. It’s a happy, energetic buzz. I don’t just go to Litton’s to eat, I go to defuse and let it all go.”
Litton’s Market and Restaurant
LOCATION: 2803 Essary Road, Fountain City, Tennessee
PHONE: 865-688-0429
HOURS: Open Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 8 p.m.;
Friday and Saturday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.
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Food writer Fred Sauceman, author of the book “The Place Setting: Timeless Tastes of the Mountain South — from Bright Hope to Frog Level,” is senior writer and executive assistant to the president for public affairs at East Tennessee State University. E-mail him at sauceman@etsu.edu.
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