Tallahassee Magazine January-February 2023

Michelle Mecca will not stop for cancer

Skate parks, rinks are back on a roll

Rowing is exercise in synchronization

Care Givers

Drs. Jana and Michael Forsthoefel’s careers have spanned generations

We hear thousands of heartbeats every day, and they all tell us one thing: Keep going.

Keep caring. Keep growing. Keep learning. Keep building. Keep dreaming. Keep saving lives. Never quit.

We do it all for

Our community deserves the best healthcare, right here at home. For your children. And our children. For all of us. Over the last 75 years, TMH has grown with our region. From the barracks at Dale Mabry Field to a sprawling campus in the center of town, and now into Panama City Beach and beyond, we’re building a regional healthcare system for the future. And we’ll keep going. For you.

THE TALLAHASSEE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA IS PROUD TO PRESENT A NEW WORK:

Composed by Joel Thompson (Seven Last Words of the Unarmed) Featuring the FAMU Concert Choir

↘ 92 MERRILY, MERRILY

For Michael Moxom, a head coach at Capital City Rowing, the skies always seem to clear up whenever his kids hit the water at Alfred B. Maclay Gardens State Park. Tallahassee is scarcely a hub for rowing, but CCR consistently punches above its weight, regularly sending crews to state and national finals.

by EMMA WITMER

323

23 RECREATION There’s something about going round and round a roller rink on tiny wheels that triggers nostalgia for youth and a desire to show off your stuff.

32 PERSONALITY Felicia Dilbert has been through some tunnels in life, including battles with depression and anxiety, but she has emerged as an optimist with a powerful zest for life.

PANACHE

39 CITIZEN OF STYLE As the founder of a marketing and media business, Andrew Goldstein is all about making lasting impressions for his clients. In that regard, he doesn’t neglect himself, either.

44 FASHION Uncovering your perfect color palette involves science, psychology and play. Increased confidence and compliments from passersby will let you know when you’ve found it.

48 WHAT’S IN STORE

Boutiques Hearth & Soul and Shoppe NEAT specialize in clothing and lifestyle items that are indulgent — but hey, you’re worth them.

GASTRO & GUSTO

56 DINING OUT Moving into a building once occupied by the Cypress Restaurant, the owners of The Huntsman felt an obligation to maintain the location’s reputation for fine dining. They’ve succeeded.

60 LIBATIONS The very word, moonshine, connotes a guilty pleasure. Today’s makers of commercial

moonshine are OK with that but have arrived at flavors that bootleggers never thought about.

EXPRESSION

67 FILM Veteran character actor Bill Kelly has a history of playing roles as authority figures. He drew upon that experience in portraying the sheriff in Where the Crawdads Sing

72 BOOKS Former Tallahassee Mayor Dorothy InmanJohnson has compiled a book of profiles written about Black residents of the city who set precedents, established milestones and made history.

51

ABODES

101 INTERIORS Statement walls use elements including paint, wallpaper, laminate, paneling, tile, wood, art or photographs to draw the eye and add personality to a room.

106 EXTERIORS When shopping for any household security system, a smart consumer will want to consider price, reliability, ease of use and compatibility with other smart devices in the home.

DESTINATIONS

119 GETAWAYS In Coastal Alabama, an evening meal of redfish on the half shell was still on a kayaker’s belly as he headed out with a couple of locals for a morning of backcountry fishing. A big flounder cooperated.

IN EVERY ISSUE

16 PUBLISHER’S LETTER

18 EDITOR’S COLUMN

138 SOCIAL STUDIES

143 DINING GUIDE

146 POSTSCRIPT

Care Givers

ON THE COVER:

Michael Forsthoefel was an undergraduate at the University of Louisville when he met his future wife Jana. He intended to become a research scientist, but Jana was dead set on medicine at a time when women had scarcely been encouraged or even allowed to go to medical school. Both went on to graduate from the Emory School of Medicine in Atlanta. The couple moved to Tallahassee in 1983 when their Killearn neighborhood “wasn’t much more than a road in the middle of nowhere.” Over the years since, they have maintained a trifold commitment to family, their community and their patients.

AND

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64 CHEERS FOR CHARITIES Sample more than 600 wines while supporting children’s charities at the South Walton Beaches Wine & Food Festival at Grand Boulevard Town Center.

76

↑ HISTORY & HERITAGE

Throughout February, in observance of Black History Month, Opening Nights will feature a roster of performers whose artistic talents promote their heritage and culture through song, dance and the written word.

134

↑ BEST OF TALLAHASSEE RECAP Over 200 local businesses were celebrated and congratulated at the 24th annual Best of Tallahassee event. Business owners, their supporters and event sponsors danced, imbibed, snacked and chatted the ceremonial night away.

114 DEAL ESTATE A scenic and stunning home on Ochlockonee Bay sold recently. Nestled under Tallahassee’s signature live oaks, a family home in Luna Manor is seeking a new owner.

78

↑ MUSICAL MOMENTS Sinfonia

Gulf Coast’s music and artistic director, Demetrius Fuller, provides insights on what to expect from the symphony’s 17th season, including celebrity appearances, innovative performances and classical concerts.

124 CALENDAR   Start 2023 off right with plenty of music and artistic events, conducted at local theaters and concert halls and featuring community performances and international big names.

PRESIDENT/PUBLISHER

BRIAN E. ROWLAND

ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER

MCKENZIE BURLEIGH

EDITORIAL

EXECUTIVE EDITOR Steve Bornhoft

MANAGING EDITOR Emilee Mae Struss

SENIOR STAFF WRITER Emma Witmer

EDITORIAL COORDINATOR Raemi Creteur

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Marina Brown, Sandra Halvorson, Ph.D., Les Harrison, Al Krulick, Rochelle Koff, Thomas J. Monigan, Huw O’Callaghan, Rebecca Padgett Frett, Rvgeniya Stetsenko, Ethan Tetreault

CREATIVE

VICE PRESIDENT / PRODUCTION AND TECHNOLOGY Daniel Vitter

CREATIVE DIRECTOR Jennifer Ekrut

SENIOR PUBLICATION DESIGNERS Sarah Burger, Saige Roberts, Scott Schiller, Shruti Shah

GRAPHIC DESIGNER Sierra Thomas

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS Aerial Tallahassee, Dave Barfield, Michael Booini, Sharen Bradford, Matt Burke, Chris Granger, Haley Jacobs, Kacey Lanier, Sekou Luke, Saige Roberts, Floyd Self, Charlene Trickey Durham, The Workmans

SALES, MARKETING AND EVENTS

SALES MANAGER, WESTERN DIVISION Rhonda Lynn Murray

SALES MANAGER, EASTERN DIVISION Lori Magee Yeaton

DIRECTOR OF NEW BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT, EASTERN DIVISION Daniel Parisi

DIRECTOR OF NEW BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT, WESTERN DIVISION Dan Parker

ADVERTISING SERVICES SPECIALIST Tracy Mulligan

SENIOR ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE Julie Dorr

ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES Michelle Daugherty, Darla Harrison

MARKETING MANAGER Javis Ogden

SALES AND MARKETING WRITER Rebecca Padgett Frett

ADMINISTRATIVE & CUSTOMER SERVICE SPECIALIST Renee Johnson

OPERATIONS

CUSTOM PUBLISHING MANAGER Sara Goldfarb

CUSTOMER SERVICE REPRESENTATIVE/AD SERVICE COORDINATOR Sarah Coven

PRODUCTION EDITOR Paige Aigret

PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION SPECIALIST Melinda Lanigan

STAFF BOOKKEEPER Amber Dennard

DIGITAL SERVICES

DIGITAL EDITOR Alix Black

TALLAHASSEE MAGAZINE tallahasseemagazine.com facebook.com/tallahasseemag twitter.com/tallahasseemag instagram.com/tallahasseemag pinterest.com/tallahasseemag youtube.com/user/tallahasseemag

ROWLAND PUBLISHING rowlandpublishing.com

unsolicited manuscripts, photography or artwork. Editorial contributions are welcomed and encouraged but will not be returned. Tallahassee Magazine reserves the right to publish any letters to the editor.

Copyright January 2023 Tallahassee Magazine, Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part without written permission is prohibited. Partners of Visit Tallahassee and Member, Greater Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce.

It’s time to take the pain out

health care.

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PRICELESS ADVICE FROM PEERS

Business community owes Jim Moran a debt of gratitude

In the 1930s, a great entrepreneur was taking his first steps in a remarkable journey to success. He sold sodas at baseball games and eventually saved enough money to buy a Sinclair gas station — for $360.

Jim Moran was in the right place at the right time. The auto industry was taking off, and Moran worked hard in making his business the highest-volume seller of gasoline in Chicago.

Moran, meanwhile, had a lot of gas in his tank. He went on to establish the world’s largest Hudson Ford dealership. His success in the car business led Toyota to approach him in 1968, and Moran brought about Southeast Toyota.

Today, Moran’s highly successful JM Family Enterprises employs more than 5,000 people and is one of the largest and most diversified companies in the auto industry. Its principal operations are vehicle distribution and processing, finance and insurance, and retail vehicle sales. Its interests also include home improvement specialty franchises.

The Chicago-born Moran has been a great friend to Tallahassee. He and his wife Jan donated $100 million, the largest gift in Florida State University’s history, to establish the Jim Moran College of Entrepreneurship. Flourishing in a

building in downtown Tallahassee, the institute furnishes today’s budding entrepreneurs with valuable lessons as they start their own journeys to success.

I have had the privilege of being a founding member of the Tallahassee CEO Peer2Peer Group, which is an extension of the Jim Moran Institute. An initial group of 10 entrepreneurs was assembled based on characteristics of their businesses, such as annual sales and number of employees.

Now, admission to the groups — several now exist in Tallahassee — is by invitation. Confidentiality agreements are signed, and regular attendance is expected. The group gets together monthly for a 90-minute lunch meeting guided by a facilitator from the Jim Moran Institute.

The members, representing businesses of a similar size, relate well to one another’s challenges. At each meeting, a couple of members raise a hand and describe a difficulty or concern they are experiencing. Other members then speak to how they handled a similar situation at their business. The hand-raisers can then apply those experiences as they see fit to their own circumstances.

I am in my third decade as a member of the CEO Peer2Peer

Group. It is one of the best investments of time I have ever made. The lessons I have learned from others have been invaluable.

Thanks to Jan and Jim Moran, I am a better entrepreneur, leader and publisher. They have made a great difference in my life and that of FSU, Tallahassee and the state of Florida.

Be well,

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INVALUABLE CONNECTIONS

Fitness flows from engagement

Before she developed breast cancer that later metastasized to her brain, Michelle Mecca of Tallahassee constantly pushed herself — to close the next loan, knock out one more set at the gym, win a fitness competition, be a great mother to her two sons and an outstanding friend to her friends.

Those strivings have served her as practice for dealing with difficulties arising from a rare and aggressive malignancy. To spend time with her today, as she struggles to suppress the ravages of chemotherapy, is to be reminded that you are operating at far, far less than capacity. The vast majority of us are merely cruising.

A conversation with Michelle comes as a kick in the ass.

I thought about her this morning as I rolled out, checked the AccuWeather and found that, yes, there was a weather window that would allow me to get a 5K in before my first remote meeting. I laced up my On Clouds.

I have been running since the time when Phil Knight produced his first pairs of waffle trainers. Several times a week, I complete a 3.1-mile course through my neighborhood, mindful of advice given me by a cardiologist, Dr. Greg Hartlage. Owing to a history of heart attacks and strokes on my mother’s side, my primary care physician referred me to Hartlage for tests and told me to suspend running.

Hartlage countermanded that order after I aced a stress test.

“I want you to run as far as you can as fast as you can as often as you can,” he told me, and I have tried to fill that prescription. Now, if I tried to quit, my visit to Mecca would prevent me from doing so.

Fitness is synonymous with engagement. Engage your body and mind in challenging ways, and reap the benefits.

It is popular at present to talk about “working from the inside out,” to begin by discovering one’s essence and assessing beliefs that may block you from realizing personal ideals. Don’t merely fix the toaster; understand what it is that led you to buy a cheap toaster in the first place. Or something like that.

But it’s equally important to let the outside in. For eight years, I taught as an adjunct professor of communication, first at FSU Panama City and then at Flagler College’s satellite operation in Tallahassee. In getting to know my students, I asked them where they got their news. “Facebook,” many said. “Twitter.”

I encouraged them to swing open their door to the outside world more widely, in the manner of Karen Moore, the founder and CEO of a Tallahasseebased marketing and communication agency. She begins her days at 4 a.m. by reading her Bible and listening to a TED talk.

I’m up at that hour, too, reading or writing. My teacher Prudence Bruns would (gently) chastise me for not meditating during my quiet time before, say, reading a New Yorker interview with Neil Young, as I did last night.

In November, Young released his 42nd album, World Record, a collection of songs mostly about fighting climate change. He told writer Amanda Petrusich that while walking snowy trails in the Rockies, he was caused somehow to whistle unfamiliar melodies, which he recorded on his phone. The melodies kept coming for weeks, and it seemed to Young that each arrived from a different spirit. They came from the outside in, and now they are the basis for his new album.

Young, 77, when asked if he ever contemplates retirement, said only that it

“doesn’t seem out of the realm of possibility.” He’s engaged, and the world speaks to him.

Good things come from unions — people with people, people with teachings, people with art, literature and poetry, people with their pasts and their futures, people with the planet.

I met Doug Hertkorn, 80, of Vernon, Florida, in a Publix parking lot. He was seated in a gnarly old pickup. Suspended above the truck bed from rigging fashioned with PVC pipe and spring clamps and rubber bungee cords were birdhouses made of cypress wood — two-holers and one-holers.

“They make great gifts,” he said. “And they’ll last a lot longer than I will. The holes are one and five-eighths, perfect for bluebirds.”

The wood had spoken to Doug, and his handiwork spoke to me. We shook hands, and I made off with what, for some lucky birds, will become Mount Vernon.

STEVE BORNHOFT, EXECUTIVE EDITOR sbornhoft@rowlandpublishing.com

TALLAHASSEEMAGAZINE.COM

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JOURNEY DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE AS MOMIX PRESENTS ALICE

In its original depiction, Alice navigates the mystery and magic of Wonderland with a sense of fascination unique to childhood. She greets the weird and the whimsical with equal curiosity. This sense of wonder is the guiding force behind Moses Pendleton’s latest MOMIX show Alice, to be staged at Ruby Diamond Auditorium Concert Hall on Feb. 14, as part of Opening Nights.

Tally Top Pet

The Tally Top Pet competition intensifies in January and February with two rounds of voting. Your vote may move a prized pet into the final furry showdown. Visit TallahasseeMagazine.com/tallytop-pet to participate in these pivotal portions of the Tally Top Pet contest.

FREEBIE!

Did you know you can sign up for our exclusive e-newsletter for free? Get the latest news, information, giveaways and more about all the happenings in Tallahassee. Go to TallahasseeMagazine.com/connect-with-us

Read more and purchase tickets by visiting TallahasseeMagazine.com/ momix-presents-alice. TALLAHASSEE

BEST OF TALLAHASSEE 2022

The Top Shelf Band kept people hopping as hundreds of standout Tallahassee business owners and members of the community flooded into the Dunlap Champions Club for this year’s Best of Tallahassee awards event. Watch the highlight video, view photos and relive the night at TallahasseeMagazine.com/best-of-tallahassee-2022

SKATING REGAINS SPEED

A rink operator bets on the future

by MARINA BROWN ↓

JAN/FEB 2023

THE PURSUITS, PASSIONS AND PERSONALITIES AMONG US

PROFILING

← Brandon Simmons performs a smooth move at Skate World in Tallahassee. Roller skating enjoyed a recent resurgence, particularly during the pandemic when outdoor skate meetups caught on.

PERSONALITY Life Coach Felicia Dilbert

Rink operators influence the movement of skaters by varying lighting schemes and playing a variety of musical selections. Some 11.3 million people in the U.S. participated in roller skating in 2021, according to Statista research.

What is it about going round and round a roller rink on tiny wheels that triggers nostalgia for youth, a little bit of danger and showing off your stuff to whoever has also managed to stay upright?

Today, Skate World on Capital Circle is the sole roller rink in Tallahassee. Although Benny Chastain missed the so-called golden age of skating in the 1930s to 1950s, the original developer of what is now an 11,340-square-foot rink recalls that he wasn’t even a skater when he’d bought an earlier rink, Skate-In West. He added Skate-In East, now Skate World, in 1973. Chastain’s entrepreneurial spirit would take his interests elsewhere, but devoted manager Ron Hildebrand would, for the next 20 years, oversee

Skate World’s evolution in skates, music, games and parties as driving components of the sport’s popularity.

“We were open seven days a week,” Hildebrand said. “Over the years, we held not just open skate nights and school skating parties but added speedskating teams and roller hockey.” Hildebrand recalls Friday nights when, in a “safer” time, parents would “drop off their kids — 300 to 400 of them — and pick them up after the grown-ups had gone out for a nice dinner.”

But trends expand and recede. While the disco beats of the 1970s may have driven “groovin’” roller enthusiasts to Skate World, by the late 1980s, the crowds that had earlier flocked in, now left Skate World open only on weekends. Inline skates may

↓ SKATE WORLD

The facility offers events for children, adults, families, businesses and other groups. It offers lessons for beginners and is home to a speedskating club.

↙ MOOD LIGHTING

have seduced blade enthusiasts to outdoor venues and sidewalks, but by 1998, the rink was sold to a California real estate investor, Donald Hengstebeck and his wife, Barbara. His daughter, Nicole Bisping, who now, with her husband, runs the operation, said, “I think my father’s timing was really great. It gave us an opportunity to make a lot of changes and turn Skate World into a real destination. For the last 20 years, it’s become a family entertainment center!”

The rink floor, made of particle board and plywood with a smooth plastic coating, is slightly smaller than the original oval but is now surrounded by no fewer than 10 arcade games’ blinking lights and ringing bells and their redemption center. An indoor playground of multicolored PVCs, bouncy platforms, swings and slides; an expansive dining area with 20 tables; and three private party rooms — and all of it wrapped in the fragrance of popcorn — give Skate World the sensation of being inside a bustling circus. But there’s a lot of physicality involved, too. Bisping counts 428 pairs of rentable roller skates and 200 pairs of the inline variety available. There are even little plastic skates that fit over tiny shoes.

And what about the skaters? Passing two “first date” teenagers holding hands as they glide across the ice, Susan Polangin, an elegant woman in her 60s, floats artistically across the rink on one leg, arms in an arabesque. Behind her, small pyramids of downed skaters giggle as they haul themselves up for another try.

Seventy-five-year-old Dale Elrod comes “three or four times a week.” “It’s low impact — if you don’t fall,” he joked, adding, “You can’t keep me away.” An emerging star is 11-year-old Gavin Sparkman who says he’ll be rinkside from “11 a.m. until 6 p.m.” on Saturdays. He’s on the speed skating team and hopes to one day be a coach. Meanwhile, dozens of neophytes haltingly make their way across the oval behind what look like roller walkers made of PVC. A good way to get the feel of a floor that isn’t where you’ve left it.

Whether “jamming” in a kind of line dance to a hip hop beat, skating to a stopwatch, or simply propelling yourself magically round and round a crystal-smooth floor, Skate World is betting its next 50 years will be its best.

← Jamie Wagner appears entranced by the ease of movement that roller skating affords participants in the activity. In recent years, 2 x 2 wheeled skates have surpassed inline skates in popularity. The rink floor at Skate World is topped with a smooth plastic coating.

An artful skate park

The 1840s-era inventors of roller skates likely never envisioned the acrobatic skill and daring that now take place at popular outdoor skate parks. And Tallahassee, through its Blueprint 2020 initiative, has recently created one of the finest. Along the perimeter of the Railroad Square Arts District, the $2.8 million FAMU Way Skateable Art Park provides a 200-meter “snake run” of polished concrete that finishes with a rearing Rattler head jutting above the rails and ledges upon which skateboarders careen.

Brothers Jon and Nick Virga, both in their 20s, swirl in and out of the “awesome flowing bowls.”

↑ Rollerblader Matt Burke performs a stunt on his way to getting airborne at the $2.8 million FAMU Way Skatable Art Park. The runs at the park were designed by Team Pain Skate Park Design & Construction of Winter Springs, Florida.

↗ Matt Adams, wearing inline skates, rides a rim at the FAMU Way Skatable Art Park. The goal of most skaters is to complete sessions without requiring a Band-Aid. Others may feel that if you don’t fall

down, you’re not trying hard enough.

photography by MATT BURKE

“It’s like surfing,” Nick said. Another skater, Crosse Bearden, has come from Valdosta, Georgia, just to try the subtleties and challenges of a course designed by premier park designers, Team Pain Skate Parks. “I like the ‘rhythm section’ of the snake run,” he said, pushing off.

And then the lanky young man seems to turn concrete into air or water, flying off metal, swirling into pits and remerging

with blonde hair flying behind him, the constraints of gravity seemingly loosened and thrown away.

Of course, as with all sports involving revolving wheels, gravity likes to wait its chance. But for board enthusiasts from grade school to college kids to those with sit-down jobs, a silky-smooth run on FAMU Way’s undulating cement may be well worth a big box of Band-Aids. TM

SKATEABLE ART PARK

Adjacent to Cascades Trail, the new skate park is located on the northeast corner of FAMU Way. It includes the longest skate run in Florida, according to city officials. The Skateable Art Park is the second skate facility in Tallahassee, joining Mike Blankenship Skate Park on Jackson Bluff at Appleyard Drive.

↘

The fierce-looking snake feature at the FAMU Way Skatable Art Park is a Pete Koenig design that honors FAMU’s rattler mascot.

OPENING THE DOORS TO YOUR HEART: Minimally Invasive Treatments for Heart Valve Disease

by Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare

More than five million people are diagnosed with valvular heart disease each year, with more than 13 percent of adults over the age of 75 suffering from some form of the disease. When confronted with a diagnosis of valvular heart disease, patients often ask: What caused this?

Valvular heart disease is a progressive condition in which any one of the valves in the heart is damaged or diseased. There are multiple forms of the disease, as well as a number of factors that can cause it.

As we age, calcium deposits form on the leaflets of our heart, causing them to thicken. Think of these leaflets as the doors that allow oxygen-rich blood to flow to your entire body. As calcium builds, it becomes harder for the “doors” to open and deliver blood flow to the body. This extra labor can lead to weakening of the heart muscle. For the patient, this can cause shortness of breath, increased fatigue, chest pressure, feeling dizzy or passing out. Oftentimes patients associate these symptoms with simply getting older when, in fact, they could be indicative of a problem with the heart valves.

Other causes can include congenital heart defects present at birth or rheumatic fever, an infection that can damage the heart valves.

An innovative, multidisciplinary approach to care

The Structural Heart Program at Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare (TMH) brings to the Big Bend region innovative techniques for treating life-threatening heart disorders –specifically those impacting the heart’s valves – available only at select hospitals across the country. It’s the only program of its kind in the area. Through a multidisciplinary approach in a clinic setting, the team is able to review patients’ cases and identify the best individual care plans for treating their valvular heart disease.

This collaborative approach to treatment offers patients more efficient care, with expert insight and guidance from cardiologists, interventional cardiologists, heart surgeons, anesthesiologists and other allied health professionals, including nurse practitioners, nurses, physician assistants, imaging specialists and anesthesia providers. Leading this team are Structural Heart Program Co-Chairs and interventional cardiologists, Thomas E. Noel, MD, FACC and Pablo A. Rengifo-Moreno, MD; cardiothoracic surgeons, Edward R. Ferguson, MD, Juan J. Gallegos, MD, C. Patrick Murrah, MD, FACS and David L. Saint, MD, FACS; and Structural Heart Program Manager, Marie Strickland.

Healthy versus calcified heart valve

TMH’s multidisciplinary Structural Heart Team

Structural heart treatment options

Once a patient wraps their head around a diagnosis, the next question is usually: What happens now?

When you are diagnosed with heart valve disease, a series of diagnostic tests can help determine the severity of your disease, which will in turn guide the most appropriate treatment course.

One of the most common and serious valve diseases is aortic stenosis, which involves the narrowing of the heart’s aortic valve opening connecting the left ventricle and aorta. For eligible patients who present with severe and symptomatic aortic stenosis but are deemed intermediate or high risk for open chest surgery, the structural heart team at TMH offers a minimally invasive treatment with a quick recovery –transcatheter aortic valve replacement, or TAVR.

valve leaflets do not close tightly, causing blood to flow backward from the heart’s left ventricle into the left atrium. This makes the heart work harder to push blood through the body. Patients with MR caused by a structural defect in the heart, who are experiencing symptoms and are deemed too high risk for surgery, may be candidates for the minimally invasive implantation of a device called MitraClip.

As with TAVR, this procedure is performed by Structural Heart Program leaders, Dr. Noel and Dr. Rengifo-Moreno, in the Cardiac Cath Lab via a catheter-guided delivery system. The MitraClip procedure involves placing a small clip-like device that brings the separated valve leaflets together, reducing the backflow of blood, or regurgitation, into the left atrium. Patients often feel relief of symptoms, specifically shortness of breath, immediately following the procedure.

The future of heart valve treatment

Our heart physicians at TMH perform more clinical research and advanced procedures than any other program in the North Florida and South Georgia region, meaning TMH frequently has the opportunity to participate in and offer eligible patients access to cardiac research trials. In fact, TMH is one of only a handful of institutions chosen to participate in select valvular heart disease studies.

The next frontier of valvular medicine lies in treating tricuspid valve regurgitation – a condition in which the tricuspid valve, located between the heart’s right ventricle and right atrium, allows blood to leak into the right ventricle. Our physicians are currently involved in clinical trials to advance treatment options for patients with tricuspid valve regurgitation. If you think you may be a fit for these trials, please call Structural Heart Program Manager, Marie Strickland, at 850-431-7397.

By delivering a small, stent-like valve to the heart through a catheter inserted via a small incision in the patient’s groin, this procedure allows our team to open the individual’s narrowed valve without ever having to open the chest. This procedure takes place in one of TMH’s four state-of-the-art Cardiac Cath Labs. Patients typically feel immediate relief of To learn more about advanced heart treatments offered at TMH, please visit TMH.ORG/Heart.

symptoms, require just one overnight stay in the hospital and are only minimally limited for the first two weeks of recovery.

The Structural Heart Program also offers a minimallyinvasive treatment option for patients suffering from mitral regurgitation (MR) – a condition in which the heart’s mitral

Transcatheter aortic valve replacement opens your heart’s aortic valve

MitraClip is used to treat mitral regurgitation

Minimally invasive heart procedures are performed in our Cardiac Cath Lab

Healed

Healing AND

Life coach Felicia Dilbert sows confidence

by SANDRA HALVORSON, PH.D.

Something — she’s not sure what — compelled Felicia Dilbert to answer a call from an unfamiliar number.

“You are on my mind, and I want to pray with you,” said a woman with whom Dilbert had worked years earlier.

Dilbert, newly diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes, was hospitalized. She had lost her mother and chief support to lung cancer a few days earlier. Dilbert’s health had been in decline since her mother received her diagnosis, and her will to go forward was waning.

In response to the phone call, however, Dilbert reversed course. Tears streamed down her face, and her breathing eased.

“I saw life in a new way, and I began to heal,” Dilbert said. She

counts the phone call as a miracle, one among several she says she has experienced in her life.

Dilbert, for most of her life, has battled anxiety and depression. Her difficulties went untreated for many years.

She is better now. A therapist has been helpful to her. She made peace with her father. She believes that healing occurs over life, not overnight.

“In 2020, my father called me and asked me if I would talk to my husband and prayerfully consider moving in with him to be his caregivers in what I refer to as the dream house,” Dilbert said. “When I was a little girl, I prayed that there would be room for me in the dream house, the house he promised my mama he would build for her.”

That house for a time became a home to Dilbert and her husband, Louis.

“I prayed for the strength to honor him unconditionally in actions and words,” Dilbert said. “Four months before he died, he thanked me for everything that I had been doing. We became the best of friends that day.”

For a woman on the mend, it was a beautiful healing.

Dilbert has gotten around to accomplishing something most people only think about doing. She has published a book, Beautiful Healing: Seven Love Letters for the Truth Seeker’s Soul. It’s a book, she said, about not giving up.

In the love letters entitled Unraveling, Releasing, Love, Truth, Peace, Worth, and Embrace Your Path, Dilbert candidly discusses the trials that made her who she is today — a self-assured, compassionate, caring woman bent on helping others. Her open, authentic writing style is like sitting with your best friend and talking about life’s challenges over a cup of coffee.

Dilbert radiates genuine Southern charm. Her first 15 years were spent in Pelham, Georgia. She moved to Thomasville and then Tallahassee, where she currently resides. Dilbert was a spiritual person growing up and learned how to pray from her grandmother. Every morning, she would pass by her grandmother’s bedroom and hear her talking to someone.

Her father was a hard-working entrepreneur who expected his children to earn college degrees. She graduated from Valdosta State University

← Motivational speaker, life coach and author Felicia Dilbert encourages people to cultivate a sense of their inner beauty and to enjoy the confidence that it can inspire. Healing, Dilbert says, occurs over life, not overnight.

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with a degree in communication and later earned a master’s degree in education from the University of Phoenix.

Dilbert cites in her book a letter of recommendation written for her by one of her college professors.

“She always tells me that I am her role model, but what she doesn’t know is that she inspires me to be the best me that I can be,” the professor wrote. “I have never met anyone like Felicia, and I have the feeling I never will.”

When Dilbert had an opportunity to accept a job as a life coach, her mother insisted that she take it. She knew it was her daughter’s calling. Too, it was consistent with a kind of ministry that Dilbert had been envisioning for years.

Today, Dilbert, as a presenter, author and coach, emphasizes inner beauty and the confidence it can inspire. But as a young girl, she was captivated by the beauty of women in magazines, including Ebony and Essence. The one-time homecoming queen learned all she could about cosmetics and later worked as a makeup artist.

LOVE LETTERS

Felicia Dilbert’s book, Beautiful Healing: Love Letters for the Truth Seeker’s Soul, includes sections devoted to truth, peace, worth and other essential topics.

Dilbert knows the pain and suffering people feel when losing a loved one, experiencing a bad relationship, dealing with a troubling health diagnosis, being bullied or striving to be perfect in a world that bombards people with unrealistic ideals. She helps women replace feelings of inadequacy and unworthiness with confidence and positivity.

Dilbert holds certifications in life coaching from the Professional Counseling and Coaching Academy and Florida State University and in diversity and leadership from Valdosta State University. She worked as a life coach at FSU.

Dilbert said about her husband, who heads up the Department of Military and Veteran Affairs at FAMU, that he is almost perfect. Asked to name the last time he messed up, Dilbert said he went to vacuum her car and neglected to gas it up when doing so.

Both Felicia and Louis have dreamt about having boy-and-girl twins. They are so confident that the twins are in their future that they have already named them — Oliver and Olivia.

One can reasonably expect that the children will be positive from day one. TM

Steve Bornhoft contributed to this story.

PHOTO BY THE WORKMANS

Care and Compassion

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TALLYING TIP-TOP STYLE

by REBECCA PADGETT FRETT

↖ Andrew Goldstein, the founder of a multimedia marketing company, Tally Entertainment Group, is seen stylin’ at the Charlie Park rooftop bar on the eighth floor of the AC Hotel by Marriott in Downtown Tallahassee.

Andrew Goldstein is an observer. From a young age, he observed that people reacted to his grandfather with reverence. Many knew Goldstein’s grandfather as a businessman, yet even those who didn’t know him looked on admiringly.

Watching and learning from his grandfather, Goldstein set out to become a successful business owner with particular attention to style.

It’s all about the details.

A designer watch glints in the sun as he extends a handshake; a perfectly tailored suit is noted during his meetings with clients; a boldly hued printed tie leaves an impression. In other words, he’ll have new clients calling up “the guy with the fun tie.”

As the founder of Tally Entertainment Group, a full-service multimedia company encompassing videography, photography, social media, web design and photo booth rentals, observational skills align with the job description.

Goldstein and his team stay abreast of trends to remain cutting edge in their service offerings. He operates in an industry that anticipates not only what the consumer wants today but also what they could need tomorrow.

“Tally Entertainment stems from a marketing and general interest standpoint in order to make an impression on our clients, who in turn make a lasting impact on their audience,” said Goldstein. “We are in the business of making and preserving memories.”

Much of Goldstein’s time is spent getting to know his clients to best portray their desired message. He observes how they operate, what they do, what their culture is and how they represent themselves internally and externally. To Goldstein, much of who a company or individual is can be defined by how they display themselves in the world.

“The way we dress and carry ourselves is our own personal brand,” said Goldstein. “Style is about expressing yourself as an individual and telling the story of who you are.”

Goldstein’s happens to be one influenced by the clean-cut, well-tailored prep school stylings of his home state of Connecticut. A navy-blue sport suit over a pastel plaid button-down topped with a coral paisley bow tie wouldn’t be an uncommon outfit for Goldstein.

Professional Style

➺ “I love bright, bold colors and eyecatching patterns, anything that stands out. I dress professionally but with an edge, blurring the lines a bit.”

Casual Look

➺ Goldstein is a longtime Polo brand wearer. Most recently, however, he’s filled his closet with Australian brand Hotel Franks by Camilla, a globally inspired collection exotically embellished with animal prints, florals, palms, paisley and brocade.

photography by THE WORKMANS

← Manhattan in hand, Andrew Goldstein, a native of the Northeast, sports an outfit that includes a shirt from Purple Label by Ralph Lauren; trousers from Sandro; a watch from the Movado Bold collection; and shoes by Christian Louboutin. Glasses on table are from Polo by Ralph Lauren. Stunning jacket is by Turnbury.

“Anywhere I go, I want to make a lasting impression. I hope people see me and remember me. I’m constantly marketing myself within the marketing world.”

— Andrew Goldstein

As a proud University of Hartford graduate and always a Northeasterner at heart, Goldstein moved to Tallahassee in 2020; a difficult time to move anywhere, but he decided to find the bright side, quite literally, through his clothing.

“I love bright, bold colors and eye-catching patterns, anything that stands out,” said Goldstein. “I dress professionally but with an edge, blurring the lines a bit.”

Goldstein is a longtime Polo brand wearer. Most recently, however, he’s filled his closet with Australian brand Hotel Franks by Camilla, a globally inspired collection exotically embellished with animal prints, florals, palms, paisley and brocade.

On the weekends, you won’t find Goldstein on the couch in sweats. Instead, he can be found out and about,

socializing in a vibrant silk Camilla shirt, a tailored pair of trousers and always well accessorized with a classic timepiece and statement-making designer sunglasses.

To Goldstein, every day provides a networking opportunity, whether serving on the Tallahassee Young Professionals board, working out at F45 Training Tallahassee Midtown or frequenting the city’s latest hot spots.

Goldstein is a people person. It’s apparent in the industry he chose and his need to connect with others and advocate for their stories through his company’s services.

“I take pride in providing quality service and the best products, but more than those things, I just genuinely enjoy helping people, especially entrepreneurs.”

The nature of a professional is reflected in his clothing, and for Goldstein,

it’s joyful, radiant and vivid. Just as he takes note of others, Goldstein is likely to be noticed.

“Anywhere I go, I want to make a lasting impression,” said Goldstein. “I hope people see me and remember me. I’m constantly marketing myself within the marketing world.” TM

→ Bathed in a warming sun, Andrew Goldstein looks chill in sunglasses by Gucci; a shirt from Haupt; shorts from Hotel Franks by Camilla; and a watch from Hublot.

↑ A timeless timepiece like this one from Hublot makes a powerful statement. And that, really, is what Andrew Goldstein is all about — making lasting impressions, personally and on behalf of his clients.

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FOR YOU hue THE

The science and whimsy of finding “your color”

by REBECCA PADGETT FRETT

Pale skin and jet-black hair against a cherry red dress. A man’s auburn beard peeking over the collar of a forest green coat. Black skin in a burnt orange top. A blonde, tanned by summer rays, in a pastel pink dress. Visualizing these complementary images is easy, and there’s a reason for that.

How we process color is more than meets the eye.

As the retina intakes color, our brain internalizes what we associate with the color. Since the existence of humankind, red has caught the eye. It requests that our brain pay attention and be alert. Blue often lulls us into a state of comfort and trust — access to water and clear blue skies.

The earliest color wheel was developed by Sir Isaac Newton in the 17th century. Experimenting with sunlight and prisms, he noted that white light was comprised of seven colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet (ROY-G-BIV). This finding opened the floodgates for the studies of optics and perception, which would eventually influence marketing, interior design, visual art and fashion.

Swiss artist and color theorist Johannes Itten not only advanced upon

Newton’s color wheel but also created the Four-Season Color Theory. When painting, Itten desired background colors that best matched the skin tone of his portraits.

Itten noted that skin tones fall into two categories: yellow undertones, which equated to warm, and blue undertones, which he called cool. Warm and cool were then divided into light or dark, often aligning with eye and hair color. Spring is warm and light, autumn warm and dark, summer cool and light, and winter cool and dark.

Spring colors include sunshine yellow, pale green, lilac and blush pink. Autumn would look best in olive green, crimson, burnt orange and gold. Summer identifiers shine in blue hues, gray and pale pink. Winter contrasts with bold hues of maroon, deep purple and cobalt blue.

Itten’s theory was highly popular in the ’60s and ’70s. Where Itten’s theory failed, however, was in fully recognizing the vastness and variation of skin in people of color.

Morgan Anthony, the lead apparel stylist at Hearth & Soul, thinks there is validity to the Four-Season Color Theory. He also recognizes it can

➺ YOU HAVE A “COOL” UNDERTONE IF: The veins on your wrist are blue or purple. Silvery jewelry flatters your skin tone more than gold. You look best in jewel-tones such as blues, purples and emerald greens.

Source: Medium.com

COOL SKIN TONE

➺ YOU HAVE A “WARM” UNDERTONE

IF: The veins on your wrist are slightly green or olive. Gold jewelry flatters your skin more than silver. When you look at your skin in the sun, it appears yellowish. You look best in earth-tones like reds, oranges, yellows, and olivegreens

PHOTOS BY ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS: SHURKIN_SON (BLUE SHIRT) RIDOFRANZ (ORANGE)

Source: Medium.com

WARM SKIN TONE

panache

become a bit confusing and limiting, especially regarding the combination of a person’s skin, hair and eyes.

“The key to finding your color is paying attention,” Anthony said. “Take notice of what color you’re wearing when someone compliments your eyes or tells you that you look great that day. Pay attention to what colors you are wearing when you feel most confident.”

Hearth & Soul encourages customers to come into the stores and work alongside their stylists, who will pull from various colors. This process allows the customer to see how they feel in colors they may have been hesitant to try beforehand.

“When a customer exits the fitting room door, and their facial expression is bright and excited, you know they love the color on them,” said Sarah Villella, manager and buyer of Narcissus Tallahassee. “Once we find that color, we pull colors from similar families, identifying if they look best in jewel tones, earth tones or a neutral palette.”

Finding your hue can help you build a complete wardrobe by identifying analogous colors, which is where the color wheel comes into play.

Analogous colors are next to each other on the color wheel, such as blue sandwiched by teal and violet. As a result, these colors stemming from the same family line create comfort and uniformity in your closet.

When looking at a color wheel, complementary colors are across from one another — red and green; yellow and purple; orange and blue. Colors that seem to juxtapose but instead work in unison. Fashion often coincides with beauty, where color theory can also be utilized.

“Wearing the correct makeup colors makes you look younger, the whites of your eyes look brighter, your teeth look whiter and brings harmony to your overall look,” said Lisa Davis, owner of Image by Lisa. “Wearing the wrong makeup does the opposite, aging you, and can tone down the brightness of eyes and teeth.”

Uncovering your perfect palette is a merging of science, psychology and play — your discovery results in increased confidence and perhaps even passerby compliments. TM

➺ YOU HAVE A “NEUTRAL” UNDERTONE IF: The veins on your wrist are blue-green. Both gold and silver jewelry flatter your skin. You look best in neutral colors such as light peach, dusty pinks, soft rose, placid blue and jade green.

NEUTRAL SKIN TONE

What’s In Store?

by REBECCA PADGETT FRETT

Hearth & Soul

➸ Stride back into the office in style wearing a bowtie that won’t go unnoticed. BRACKISH BOWTIES are inspired by the vibrant beauty found in nature. Each bowtie is handmade, crafted from genuine feathers with a grosgrain-wrapped center.

➸ During the winter months, cozy pajamas are considered a wardrobe staple. On average, we spend eight hours sleeping and additional weekend hours lounging, so quality pajamas are worth the investment. The GISELE PAJAMA SET BY EBERJEY, made from luxuriously soft, temperature-regulating fabric, envelops the body in total comfort.

➸ The CAMPO ESSENTIAL OIL DIFFUSER creates a sensory experience merging scent and sight. Designed like a piece of art, this diffuser can be placed anywhere in the home as an interior design statement. All the while, it emits an essential oil blend selected by you.

From work to play, the ARDEN TOTE BY SHIRALEAH is 2023’s bag to have. This vegan leather shoulder bag is chic with a pebble-grain texture on the outside and is roomy inside, making for an attractive combination of style and efficiency.

Shoppe NEAT

Shoppe NEAT is a complete lifestyle store designed to display experiences you will want to relive at home. The store offers clothing, home accessories, furniture, gifts and much more.   Consider refreshing your home decor in 2023 with their popular CUSTOM TEA TOWELS or TURKISH MINI RUGS. Among customer favorites are CORK KEEPERS. Treasure the memory of a bottle popped or glasses poured by keeping the cork safe in the glass box along with a sweet note.  Each week, the store is stocked with clothing that’s versatile and comfortable whether your destination is the office, the school pickup line, drinks with friends or date night.

MIDTOWN READER

Start the new year off with new reads purchased from locally loved bookstore Midtown Reader. Here are four recommendations from the store’s staff.

➸ With health being at the forefront of many resolutions, BRAIDING SWEETGRASS: INDIGENOUS WISDOM, SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, AND THE TEACHINGS OF PLANTS by Robin Wall Kimmerer, focuses on using Indigenous knowledge and teachings as an alternative or complementary approach to Western medicine.

➸ New York Times bestselling author Grady Hendrix presents a new thriller, HOW TO SELL A HAUNTED HOUSE, which explores how family secrets and repressed memories can haunt us more than anything. The protagonist, Louise, is tasked with selling a house that figures to be on the market for a while.

➸ James Patterson and Mike Lupica merge their talents in their latest release, THE HOUSE OF WOLVES, which revolves around the powerful Wolf family who control the San Francisco Tribune, the local football team and a holding company. The family’s matriarch, Jenny Wolf, is handed these responsibilities after her father is murdered.

➸ Adam Rubin, a popular middle-grade writer, has published a new collection of six different short stories, THE HUMAN KABOOM. Equal parts comedy, mystery and mayhem, these stories are illustrated by six different artists.

SHOPPE NEAT

Thank You For Voting Us Best Medical Spa

We are honored to once again receive this recognition and value the continued trust you place in us. Our team is dedicated to helping keep you and your skin looking its best at every age. To schedule an appointment, please call 850-254-0244.

I. Wayne Freilich, MD Board-Certified Dermatologist

Katie Bridges Certified Physician Assistant

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Donate your gently used furniture to The Fix Thrift Shop.

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HEALTHY

EATING

Dehydrated, toasted and freeze-dried fruits, seeds, beans and veggies

Healthy snacks are an important part of a balanced diet. They can help you feel fuller longer, especially if you have to take extended breaks between meals, and they can also be a great way to get some extra nutrients in your diet. However, unhealthy, processed “junk foods” can be hard to avoid. Finding snacks that are portable, tasty and nutritious may require a little extra effort, but it’s worth it. Healthy snacking is a great way to boost your energy, stay focused and avoid overeating at meals. It’s also a good way to get extra protein, fiber, vitamins and minerals throughout the day.

PROTEINS

Lots of snacks contain healthy amounts of protein. Whether you choose animal proteins (hardboiled eggs, turkey, cheese, jerky, cottage cheese) or other sources of protein (chickpeas, hummus, lentils, edamame, popcorn), various options can help tide you over until dinner time. They are filling and loaded with vitamins. Healthy snacks for the whole family are reasonably accessible. If you know your family members are free of nut allergies, nuts and seeds are a great option. They contain minerals, vitamins, healthy fats, proteins and fiber. Plus, they can help you keep your cholesterol levels within normal ranges.

FRUITS AND VEGETABLES

Maybe the best types of healthy snacks include fruits and vegetables. They can be consumed fresh, dried or preserved another way, such as pickling. They are high in vitamins and minerals, but low in calories, making them ideal for people who want to watch their weight. Consider your preferences and allergy limitations, and be creative. Preservation processes cause fruit to become dehydrated, but it retains its flavor and has a light crispy texture. You’ll be surprised at the cravings that apples, pineapples, apricots, grapes, strawberries, blueberries and dragon fruit can suppress.

Veggie sticks and hummus dip

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FOOD & WINE FESTIVAL

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GRANOLA

Combine granola with yogurt, fruits and nuts for a breakfast that is like a parfait minus all that sugar. Granola can be enjoyed, too, as a midday snack.

MAKE YOUR OWN SNACKS AT HOME

Packaged foods often contain high amounts of sugar, sodium and fat — all ingredients that can harm your health over time. Make sure to read labels to discover the amounts of sugar, sodium and other ingredients that your snack contains. Educate yourself on your body’s dietary requirements. Instead of relying on packaged snacks full of preservatives and additives, try making your own snacks as a healthy, educational and money-saving activity.

There are also lots of other types of healthy snacks available on the market today that don’t contain just fruits or vegetables. They include energy bars and protein shakes, which can give you an extra boost when you need it. Instead of grabbing an afternoon cup of coffee with cookies, opt for a relatively healthy energy bar as a way to combat afternoon drowsiness. Eat a variety of foods. Snacks should be more than just chips or candy bars. Try different things, and discover what excites your taste buds. TM

Greek yogurt, granola and fresh fruit

Mason jars — solid, traditional, attractive and transparent — are an excellent “storage medium” for snacks.

THEY’VE GOT GAME

The Huntsman gathers a crowd

by ROCHELLE KOFF

Before The Huntsman launched in July, the culinary buzz was a mix of excitement and skepticism. Could a fine dining restaurant specializing in game be successful in Tallahassee?

The answer appears to be a resounding “yes.” The Huntsman has been a hot reservation since opening day. Customers have been flocking to the sleek space, which offers one of the most unique menus in the city.

“It’s rewarding to see that people can come here and get what they’re looking for,” said Daniel Renninger, co-owner of The Huntsman with Ben Williamson and executive chef Skylar Stafford, all experienced in their craft. “I was optimistic, but it’s been better received than I thought it would be.”

There are many reasons why. The food is exemplary. The space is contemporary and inviting. Service is attentive. Most of all, diners have options. How often can you order these dishes at the same table: grilled

beastloaf, moulard duck cassoulet with wild boar bacon lardons and a vegan winter vegetable terrine?

While you might expect a restaurant called The Huntsman to be meat intensive, diners are exploring a menu that offers Scottish salmon as well as black buck antelope leg filet, Romesco grilled cauliflower steak and grilled axis deer sauerbraten, vegetable mei fun along with bone-in pork chops.

“Everything is brand new, so people are willing to try a bunch of stuff,” Renninger said.

The restaurant also showcases chefguided, five-course tastings for hunters (seasonal fare), gatherers (plant-based dishes) and primalists (a wood-fired carnivorous experience). You can feast on appetizers, a la carte items and sides.

Game surprisingly represents a small portion of The Huntsman menu, about

photography by DAVE BARFIELD

↖

The co-owners of The Huntsman, from left: Ben Williamson; executive chef Skylar Stafford; and Daniel Renninger. Paintings by Paul Tamanian add bold touches to the restaurant.

10%, but it’s a draw. The Huntsman owners state their emphasis is on ethically sourced game animals. A lot of their meats come from the Broken Arrow Ranch in Texas, which touts “high quality, free-range venison, antelope and wild boar meat from truly wild animals.”

“We found that game animals have lower cholesterol, lower fat and higher protein than chicken,” Renninger said. “You can eat quality, clean meat that you don’t have to feel bad about eating. It’s better for the environment and better for humans.”

The Huntsman is working with local sources for some items, such as Tallahassee’s Legacy Greens, which specializes in microgreens, Tallahassee fish and seafood purveyors and Goats & Hoes, which supplies fresh flowers.

The restaurant has had big shoes to fill. It’s located in the former home of Cypress Restaurant on Tennessee Street. The place has been renovated, but there is still a separate bar area. The gleaming dining room is dominated by wood and deep blue-green tiles that evoke both the forest and the sea.

Seating is mostly booths with some tables, and there’s a 12-seat private room. Bold paintings by Tallahassee-based artist Paul Tamanian add a dramatic flair to the soothing hues.

We haven’t yet tried the tasting menu, but the regular selection has so many tempting choices it’s tough to decide. Keep in mind that the list is seasonal and evolving.

Among the highlights to consider: the beastloaf, The Huntsman version of meatloaf made from a mix of antelope, elk, bison and beef with a rich mushroom gravy; venison backstrap (if available), considered the

←↑

Grilled Axis Deer Sauerbraten with potato gnocchi, butter braised cabbage, asparagus and rotkohl kraut; Grilled Wild Game Meat Loaf wiith garlic mashed potatoes, horseradish gremolata, sauteed green beans, Huntsman sauce; Romesco Grilled Cauliflower Steak with smoked mushroom risotto, caramelized butternut squash, bitter green salad, pistachio salsa verde.

best and most tender cut of deer; and the Southern fry, which brings not only calamari but also pieces of fried catfish, shrimp, banana peppers, okra and eggplant with a delectable tomato gravy and roasted garlic mayonnaise.

Another favorite was our dish of spring rolls, which you can roll in lettuce. They were a vegan, Vietnamese-style roll made with shiitake and cremini mushrooms, ginger and scallions, rice noodles and kimchi in a light, crisp shell with a nuoc cham dipping sauce.

Dessert ends on a sweet note, whether you get a chocolate peanut butter tart or flourless cheesecake. Especially rave

Clockwise from left:

worthy: the bread pudding s’mores smothered in dark chocolate. It’s like a campfire treat, but you don’t have to toast your own marshmallows.

Pair your dessert with an afterdinner drink such as a sauterne from Bordeaux, ice wine from Ontario or a 30-year-old tawny port from Portugal. If you want a truly lavish splurge, you can find the exquisite Dal Forno Romano Vigna Seré Passito Rosa for $375.

The wine selection is impressive and trots the globe, bringing selections from England, Tasmania, Portugal, South Africa, Austria, Lebanon, India, German, Italy, France and Spain.

“If you’re in the mood for something fun on the wine list from an obscure part of the world, we probably have something for you,” Renninger said.

If you want to sample the menu, consider stopping by for happy hour or the late-night menu for small bites and reduced drink prices. We were here early on one visit and were able to order a $6 gin-based Negroni cocktail and an $8 glass of sauvignon blanc. During regular hours, cocktails are $14 to $20 and wine by the glass ranges from $10 to $15.

Half bottles of wine are also available along with draft beer, primarily local choices of Deep, Proof and Lake Tribe.

The Huntsman takes a different approach to its primarily full-time staff.

Diners are informed that The Huntsman charges an 18% gratuity to provide a stable base income with benefits to its employees. Tips are pooled, but you can add to the 18% and that amount goes directly to your server.

Customers have been embracing The Huntsman’s concepts.

“It’s new to us and Tallahassee,” Renninger said.

One thing that’s clear: If you’re game for a different fine dining experience, your hunt is over. TM

photography by DAVE BARFIELD

↑ From top: Carmelized Banana Peanut Butter Tart; Campfire S’Mores Bread Pudding; The Huntsman, a cocktail made with bacon fat-washed Blue Note Huntsman Barrel Bourbon and aromatic and black walnut bitters, under construction; and four Huntsman signature cocktails: The Huntsman, Vanillionaire, Dad Joke and Porch Swing.

MOONSHINE GOES LEGIT

Flavored varieties prove to be hot sellers

by THOMAS J. MONIGAN

Americans living in remote places making their own alcoholic beverages have long figured in history and folklore.

From the Prohibition era forward, they have been known as moonshiners, that is, people engaged in producing homebrews variously called mountain dew, choop, hooch, mulekick, shine, white lightning, white-corn liquor, white-corn whiskey, pass around, firewater or bootleg. The illegality of such intoxicants added a certain romance about them.

Less dodgy but far more available are legal variations of moonshine — produced by Ole Smoky and Murder Creek — that are now commonly found in liquor stores.

Ole Smoky was founded in 2010, according to Sydney Holsclaw, its senior public relations manager.

“Ole Smoky is the first federally licensed distillery in the history of East Tennessee,” Holsclaw said. “Due to the overwhelming success of our original moonshine flavors, we began crafting new flavors within the first few years of our company’s founding.”

Ole Smoky’s whiskey line first appeared in 2016, coinciding with the

creation of The Barrelhouse distillery in Gatlinburg. There are 16 different Ole Smoky whiskeys today.

Ole Smoky introduced canned moonshine cocktails in 2020 and began marketing James Ownby Reserve Bourbon Whiskey in 2021.

There are three other Ole Smoky distilleries in Tennessee: The Holler in Gatlinburg, The Barn in Pigeon Forge and 6th & Peabody in Nashville.

“Ole Smoky is the leading distiller of premium moonshine in the world and the leading craft distiller in the U.S.,” Holsclaw said.

Shaun Brown, director of sales for Wine World with locations throughout Northwest Florida, commented about legal moonshine’s popularity.

“I think because it is associated with bootlegging, it is an alluring option

for people. It sounds exciting,” Brown said. “Moonshine has traditionally been viewed as high octane and tough to drink, but now the flavored stuff that is so popular is often lower proof than most whiskeys.”

Alcohol content in Ole Smoky products ranges from 35 to 100 proof.

“We sell Ole Smoky moonshine in many different flavors, including regular, apple pie, banana cream pie, mango, cherry and pickle,” said Mike Raynor Jr., the owner of Mike’s Liquor & Beer Barn in Tallahassee. “They are very popular, and I believe it is due to the fact that they have fruit soaking in the alcohol that makes for a strong but flavorful snack and also allows the customers to feel as if they are drinking traditional moonshine.”

Stephen Matthews of Navarre is Murder Creek’s founder and distiller.

➸ Original Moonshine

Some Beach

Strawberry ➸ Butter Pecan ➸ Strawberry Mango Margarita

➸ Mountain Java

Margarita ➸ Shine Nog

➸ Pumpkin Pie

➸ Blackberry

➸ Apple Pie

➸ Hunch Punch Lightnin’

➸ Moonshine Peaches

➸ Blue Flame

➸ White Lightnin’

➸ Moonshine Cherries

➸ Moonshine Pickles ➸ White Chocolate

Strawberry Cream

➸ Banana

Pudding Cream ➸ Sour Lime

➸ Hot & Spicy

Moonshine Pickles

➸ Moonshine

Pineapples with Pina Colada

➸ Key Lime

↑ Products marketed by Ole Smoky, the operator of four distilleries in Tennessee, include moonshine pineapples, cherries, pickles and peaches.

Catering also available. From weddings to at-home gatherings to office lunches and events.

Catering@AndrewsDowntown.com 228 S. Adams St. | (850) 815-9184 (850) 815-9124 | AndrewsDowntown.com

“Stephen started making his own moonshine, just playing with it in 2017,” said Charity Blazek, the company’s production manager. “In 2018, they applied for a license and they started in Riverview, just outside Brewton, Alabama, in 2019.”

There is also a large Murder Creek Distillery in the OWA theme park, located in Foley, Alabama.

“We started with very basic flavors,” Blazek said. “Then as we started branching out, we made some based on old family recipes. Blueberry is from his great grandmother’s ice cream sauce recipe.”

There are 14 flavors available now, sold throughout the Emerald Coast and all over Alabama. Murder Creek’s products range between 40 and 50 proof.

“Our moonshine is distilled to a high purity with no flavors of the mash coming through,” Matthews said. “We don’t use corn, so we don’t have that corn aftertaste. We also hand make every batch, hand bottle and hand label each product.”

➸ Peach Cobbler

➸ Orange Dreamcicle

➸ Strawberry Cream

➸ Hot Shot

➸ Pecan Praline

➸ Alabama Apple Pie

➸ Southern Cherry Bombs

➸ Watermelon

➸ Blueberry

➸ Banana Pudding

➸ Dixie Dizzy Pickle

➸ Dixie Honey

➸ Dixie Chocolate

➸ Dixie Chocolate Mint

According to Matthews, “Banana tastes like banana taffy, chocolate tastes like Tootsie Rolls, blueberry mixes well with lemonade, and pickle and Hot Shot make a good bloody mary.”

Tours are conducted at both the Brewton and Foley distilleries, and Foley features a large bar and tasting room with events most weekends.

“We’re looking to open a third distillery; we’ve tossed around the idea of another location in Alabama,” Blazek said. TM

↑ The Murder Creek Distillery, founded by Stephen Matthews of Navarre, was established in a small town in Alabama. It started with basic flavors and traditional recipes but has since expanded its offerings.

A fresh take on Pan-Asian cuisine and sushi. Join us for lunch & dinner. Extensive selection of wine, beer & sake

Masa 1650 N. Monroe St. (850) 727-4183

Little Masa 619 S. Woodward Ave., #105 (850) 727-8909

MasaTallahassee.com

South Walton Beaches Wine & Food Festival

Wine has a way of brightening even the sunniest of days. Each year, the South Walton Beaches Wine & Food Festival raises a glass to that sentiment.

The festival, which brings together winemakers, chefs, distillers and brewers for a weekend of wine tastings, education and entertainment, will be held for the 11th time next April 27–30 at the Grand Boulevard Town Center.

More than 600 wines will be poured, giving attendees the opportunity to taste, learn about and purchase regional, national and international vintages.

To complement the wines, the Savor South Walton Culinary Village will offer samples from the best restaurants in South Walton. Items are prepared to pair well with the wines that are poured. Additional food offerings are located throughout the festival.

A unique aspect of the festival is its Tasting Seminar Tent. Seminars presented by winemakers, distillers, chefs and well-

known personalities are both educational and enjoyable and provide insights into processes, flavor profiles and more.

The festival begins on Thursday with a Winemakers & Shakers event held at Wine World in Destin. Friday’s activities include a VIP Wine Tasting followed by the Craft Beer & Spirits Jam. The main events occur on Saturday and Sunday at the Grand Tasting.

Stacey Brady, executive director of South Walton Beaches Wine & Food Festival, advises festival-goers to look at the event program ahead of time and plot out the tents they most want to visit.

“Our wines are poured from around the world — beautiful pinots from Oregon, specialty cabernets and chardonnays from California, delicious Italian reds, subtle French wines that everyone loves and bold wines from South Africa and South America,” Brady said.

Find a new wine that you like, and you can purchase a bottle at the retail tent.

“Our goal is to present a world-class wine and food event that you might not be able to experience elsewhere in terms of the volume and types we pour,” Brady said.

The Minuty Rose tent, evoking the glamour and French Riviera lifestyle of St. Tropez, will be back in 2023.

The festival is a fundraiser for the Destin Charity Wine Auction Foundation, which benefits over a dozen children’s charities in Northwest Florida. The 2022 event raised $40,000, a record amount.

“Since the start, we have made it our mission to be charitable, and it’s been incredibly rewarding to see how much we’ve raised, all while allowing attendees to enjoy the good life, discovering great wines and delicious local food,” Brady said.

Role Player

Bill

by EMILEE MAE STRUSS ↓

photography by DAVE BARFIELD

The fictional town of Barkley Cove in North Carolina’s marsh country is far too small to conceal a murder as far as Sheriff Ed Jackson is concerned.

The sheriff is among the characters central to Delia Owens’ bestselling novel, Where the Crawdads Sing, now a major motion picture in which Tallahassee resident Bill Kelly plays the role of Jackson.

Jackson leads an investigation into the death of Chase Andrews, who had befriended Owens’ protagonist, Kya, a young woman left to fend for herself after her parents abandon her. The sheriff develops the “Marsh Girl” as a suspect despite finding little evidence of a crime at the fire tower where Andrews’ body was found.

Kelly was in the midst of reading Owens’ novel when he learned that he would be fitted for a sheriff’s uniform. He had landed a trophy of a part.

“I get a lot of authority figure roles,” he said. “There’s law enforcement in my family, and I’m a father. I suppose those parts come more naturally to me because I have some real-life experience.”

Kelly has been in broadcasting and acting for decades. Some 40 years ago, he got his start at a small AM radio station, KEKY, in his home state of Kentucky. As an actor, he has appeared in the movie, Hillbilly Elegy, and the True Detective and Bloodline TV series. Roles have included a military general, a banker and a devoted father.

“When it comes to working in radio broadcasting or acting, we’re all trying to move up the ranks,” Kelly said. “Getting the part of Sheriff Jackson was really an honor to me, and the experience was spectacular.”

Kelly spent seven weeks onsite with the production team. Director Olivia Newman — best known for First Match, a wrestling movie — and producers Reese Witherspoon and Lauren Neustadter undertook the job of bringing Owens’ novel to life. Filming took place not in North Carolina, but at Fontainebleau State Park in Mandeville, Louisiana.

“You’d never know it watching the film, but people are camping and cooking hotdogs just a few feet away during some scenes,” Kelly said. “Most of what you see in the movie was built or staged just for the film.”

“It’s an honor to be around such prestigious individuals, and it’s also nice to see that they are people, too, working on their craft.” — Bill Kelly

↑ Veteran character actor Bill Kelly of Tallahassee played the role of Sheriff Ed Jackson in the film adaptation of Delia Owens’ bestselling novel, Where the Crawdads Sing. The state brings a weak murder case to trial, resulting in a difficult turn for the sheriff on the witness stand.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF BILL KELLY

→ Wearing a look of consternation, Bill Kelly, in the role of Sheriff Ed Jackson, surveys a murder scene. Kelly is accustomed to playing parts as authority figures on TV and the big screen.

With marshes, of course, come bugs.

“There’s one shot where my deputy (played by Jayson Warner Smith) and I are walking toward Kya’s house, and I had to swat this huge mosquito,” Kelly said. “We called it for the night after that because the bugs were so bad. I joke that they had landing lights with numbers on them because they were massive.”

Filming scenes that involved searching Kya’s shack or testifying in court, Kelly was excited to be performing alongside many talented actors, including Daisy Edgar-Jones as Kya.

“It’s an honor to be around such prestigious individuals,” he said, “and it’s also nice to see that they are people, too, working on their craft.”

Many have helped Kelly in the course of his career, and he is quick to acknowledge the importance to him of the Florida State University College of Motion Picture Arts.

“That’s where I cut my teeth,” Kelly said. “The FSU film school is truly a hotbed of filmmaking.”

Kelly is a proud Tallahassean.

“When I’m traveling to be on set for these shows and films, people assume I’m from Los Angeles or Atlanta,” he said. “I happily correct them and share that I live in Tallahassee.”

Kelly has called Northwest Florida home since 1986. He and his wife Nancy worked together when their careers were just beginning; both were married to others at the time.

“We lost connection over the years,” he said, “and then we both got divorced. It’s a funny story of how we reconnected. She was watching Bloodline and noticed that I was in it. She found me on Facebook and told me, ‘I was watching this great show, and then there you were!’”

Nancy moved to Tallahassee after suddenly finding herself unemployed and receiving an unsolicited offer on her home.

“There’s nothing better than having your spouse support your dreams,” Kelly said.

Nancy helps Kelly prepare for his auditions and can be a tough critic.

“She’ll tell me I need to do something again or that I can do it better,” Kelly said. “I want to say that’s good enough and take a break, but she keeps pushing me to do it better, and that’s really helpful for me.”

Kelly was proud to bring his wife to the premiere showing of Where the Crawdads Sing in New York. Together,

they walked a green carpet — a nod to the lush setting for the film, which has been nominated for a People’s Choice “Drama Film of the Year” Award.

Kelly said he has learned to set aside personal concerns when he is behind a microphone or a camera.

“When you walk into that studio, you have to hang your emotions and problems on the door,” he said. “Your job is to help others enjoy their day a little bit more and maybe set aside their problems for a moment.” TM

Bill Kelly has appeared in over 50 film and television projects. Among his most famous appearances are: Where the Crawdads Sing (2022), Hillbilly Elegy (2020), The Last Thing He Wanted (2020), Pain & Gain (2013) and Catching Hearts (2012).

← Actor Bill Kelly at the Student Life Cinema on the Florida State University campus. Kelly attributes his success as an actor to training he received at the FSU College of Motion Picture Arts.

PROFILES IN PROGRESS

Book documents milestones achieved by Black residents of Tallahassee

by EMILEE MAE STRUSS

Dorothy Inman-Johnson is a preservationist, not of the world as it is, but of the world as it has been.

Encouraged by Dr. Clinita Ford, a one-time teacher of the year at Florida A&M University and a member of the National Black College Hall of Fame, InmanJohnson undertook the writing of Tallahassee’s Black History Firsts, Post-Reconstruction Era, her fourth book. In it, she documents the contributions made by 60 pioneering Black residents of Florida’s capital city.

Ford kept after Inman-Johnson about writing the book after attending a Tallahassee’s Black History Firsts dinner. The event, hosted by the Loved by Jesus Family Church, benefits a nonprofit created to assist low-income children living in the Orange Avenue area.

Inman-Johnson and her husband, Rev. Lee Johnson, established the event and founded the church and nonprofit.

For Inman-Johnson, it is important to document the milestones for posterity, including recent ones achieved by Blacks in the cultural arenas and fields of arts and media, business, civil rights, religion, education, government, law, medicine and sports.

“I feel we’re at a point in this country and state where we’re simply afraid to talk about the lives of Black people and their history,” Inman-Johnson said. “And that’s a problem.”

Her subjects include headline makers and people far less familiar.

So it is that the profiles include longtime elected official Al Lawson, Tallahassee’s first Black legislator and congressman, and

→ Dorothy Inman-Johnson’s fourth book contains dozens of profiles of Black difference-makers who established precedents and milestones in Tallahassee. She hopes her book fosters appreciation in young people for the struggles of earlier generations.

Benjamin Crump, whom InmanJohnson credits with being the first nationally and internationally known Black lawyer from Tallahassee. But they also include Yvonne and Curtis Tucker, the creators of Afro-Raku ceramic techniques; James Nelson Tookes, the first Black owner of a Tallahassee real estate agency; and Jack Gant, the first Black dean at Florida State University’s College of Education.

“Young people today don’t understand how things have changed over decades,” Inman-Johnson said. “They don’t know what it took for Black people to get to where they are today — it’s these individuals whose shoulders young people are standing on today,

and I think newer generations should know who’s holding them up.”

Inman-Johnson has set important precedents of her own as the first Black woman elected to the City Commission and Tallahassee’s first Black female mayor. She moved to Tallahassee in December 1971.

“Some of these people I’ve known for decades,” she said. “But then I started digging into their lives and discovered I really didn’t know all they had accomplished — I was blown away by what these individuals have done.”

Most were born in the 1930s and ’40s, making them witnesses to the events of the civil rights era, and grew up in segregated rural areas.

Beneby Perfume

The profiles are written in the manner of encyclopedia entries, beginning with birthdates and family histories, followed by a recitation of career steps and highlights. To appreciate how far the subjects have come, one must know, of course, from whence they came. The distances traveled are remarkable and represent hard-earned triumphs over high hurdles.

“What these individuals went through so that future Black generations could live with fewer obstacles are valuable lessons that should be taught in schools,” InmanJohnson said.

The reader learns, for example, about Gayle Andrews, the first Black television news anchor in Tallahassee, that she was born to a Black father and a Native American mother and attended an Indian college in Muskogee, Oklahoma, before moving on to FAMU.

“She became the first FAMU news reporter with major market TV stations at the Capitol, launching her career as an anchor and political reporter in Tampa, Orlando and Tallahassee CBS NewsNet,” Inman-Johnson writes. “She became an anchor at Tallahassee’s WCTV, the local CBS affiliate, in 1978. She was a member of the prestigious Capitol Press Corps for 14 years, and for 11 of those years, she was the only person of color covering state politics.”

When she completed a profile, Inman-Johnson sent a draft to the subject or a family member to review. Impressively, she completed her book in less than two years.

“Working on a project like this is one instance where COVID helped,” she said with a laugh. “Being isolated gave me the time to focus on gathering information and putting the book together.” TM

↑ Tommy Mitchell is among the sports world figures profiled in Dorothy Inman-Johnson’s latest book. Mitchell was the first Tallahassean to play for the touring Harlem Globetrotters basketball team.

Opening Nights Celebrates Black History Month

Black History Month will be fully embraced and celebrated through three Opening Nights performances spanning the month of February. Step Afrika!, Colson Whitehead and Meklit will promote their heritages via their individual talents.

“Multicultural representation is essential to our mission, and it gives us great joy to celebrate Black History Month by presenting African American artists from different parts of the world. These artists represent the very best in the performing and literary arts,” said Opening Nights director Jennifer Wright-Allen.

The month will open on Feb. 7, 2023, at 7:30 p.m. with a choreographed dance party performed by Step Afrika! Founded in 1994 by C. Brian Williams as the first professional company dedicated to the tradition of stepping, Step Afrika! rose from the historically acknowledged dance styles of African American fraternities and sororities. Under Williams’ direction, the performances also unify traditional African dances and contemporary dance forms.

The audience experiences a percussive beat that urges them to get to their feet. The dancing and song combine to tell stories that encourage audience participation and promote learning about history and culture. Each year, the company visits colleges and theaters in 50 cities to promote stepping and educate audiences about its beauty and purpose within African American culture.

To read a Colson Whitehead novel is to immerse yourself in the world of his words. On Feb. 9, 2023, at 7:30 p.m. Whitehead will talk writing with his audiences, relating his fictional works to reality. Whitehead, a No. 1 New York Times bestselling author, is highly respected and celebrated within the literary world.

His novel The Underground Railroad was the winner of the 2016 National Book Award and the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. His novel The Nickel Boys, inspired by the Arthur G. Dozier School in Marianna, Florida, won the 2019 Kirkus Prize for Fiction, the 2020 Orwell Prize for Political Fiction and the 2020 Pulitzer Prize, making him the fourth writer in history to win two Pulitzers in the fiction

category. Whitehead writes about social, political and historical themes revolving around race.

Meklit Hadero brings her cultural activism to audiences through song. As an Ethiopian-American vocalist, songwriter and composer, Meklit specializes in EthioJazz songs that are both deeply personal and culturally relevant. Alongside her touring jazz band, Meklit will perform on Feb. 28, 2023, at 7:30 p.m.

With soul and sway, Meklit sings lyrics in both English and Amharic, merging cultures while connecting audiences. Her music inspires audiences to engage with the music through dance and encourages them to reflect upon our shared humanity.

The Opening Nights celebration of Black History Month comes months after Florida State University’s Integration Celebration. On Nov. 17, 2022, Florida State University marked a milestone — it had been 60 years since the first African American student, Maxwell Courtney, enrolled at the university. This set into motion additional diversity and inclusion events and observances.

Jazz singer Meklit

A Conversation with the Conductor

Demetrius Fuller Gives His Take on Sinfonia Gulf Coast’s 17th Season

Curating a season that “sings” is an art form, and Sinfonia Music and Artistic Director Demetrius Fuller is pitch perfect for the 17th year. With celebrity appearances, classical connections and innovative debuts, this year’s lineup redefines the symphony experience and offers something for everyone. We sat down with maestro Fuller to get his take on Season 17’s winter performances.

Garland Show with tons of outtakes with Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr. and Frank Sinatra that make an entertaining trip down memory lane. It will be a fun concert to experience because we are creating a clubby, dinner theater atmosphere with café tables. You can do that or opt for regular seating.

February 24 and 26 you celebrate the Season of Love with Crescendo! 2023. What can we expect for this year’s event extravaganza?

DF: This is our biggest “fun-raiser” of the year and has become known as the mustnot-miss event of the social season. We kick off the event with a seated lunch at Bijoux Restaurant + Spirits January 26. The two-day celebration begins on Friday with a series of intimate Vintner Dinners showcasing celebrity winemakers and chefs in stunning homes, resorts and restaurants along the coast. On Sunday, the Hilton Sandestin Beach Golf Resort & Spa will transform into a chic, black-and-white-themed fête we’re likening to a classic, chic Ebony & Ivory Ball. The Main Event on Sunday afternoon is a festive affair that features world-class vintners and spirit purveyors, delicious bites, a seated lunch, an amazing silent and live auction, party games, and, of course, live entertainment!

At the heart of Sinfonia’s mission is music education. Tell us more.

January 21 audiences can enjoy a Southeast U.S. premier with Get Happy: A Judy Garland Centennial Celebration.

DF: Who doesn’t love the legend, Judy Garland? This is a great production because it showcases the string section of the orchestra and basically a jazz band along

with classically trained vocalist, Broadway veteran and recording artist Morgan James. If you’ve heard her sing, you know she has amazing pipes and is just a powerhouse. You will feel as though you are seeing Judy Garland singing live with the orchestra. There’s a multimedia component that showcases vintage footage of The Judy

DF: Our mission states succinctly that we “entertain, educate, inspire the community” and we aim to do that with everything we do. Education is the centerpiece of Sinfonia. It was founded not only for its entertainment value, but for the fact that Northwest Florida needed an organization that could be the proponent for arts education in schools, specifically music education. In many cases our programs are sometimes the only arts education these students receive.

An experience as great as your smile.

We are proud to be considered one of Tallahassee’s most respected practices of its kind. Our goal is to provide the kind of professional, personalized periodontal and dental implant care you need to ensure beautiful, healthy smiles for a lifetime.

WILLIAM T. BALDOCK, JR., DMD, MS

Big-Hearted Passion A FOR PEOPLE

STORY BY ETHAN TETREAULT // PHOTO BY THE WORKMANS

Drs. Michael and Jana Forsthoefel have been serving the Tallahassee community for almost 40 years, each earning a stellar reputation over that time.

He works in internal medicine and she in gynecology and obstetrics, both striving tirelessly to keep people healthy and happy. They teach at Florida State, helping to usher in the next generation of doctors. They have raised eight children, several of whom have obtained medical degrees. Their philanthropic efforts in support of military veterans are remarkable. Together, the Forsthoefels make Tallahassee a better place to live.

In and out of white coats, Michael and Jana Forsthoefel treat Tallahasseeans with respect

Michael was so inspired by Jana’s determination that he decided to join her in applying to medical schools. Both were accepted at their top choice, the Emory School of Medicine in Atlanta.

The couple moved to Tallahassee in 1983 and built a new home in Myer’s Park where they would reside for 20 years.

“When we moved here, Killearn wasn’t much more than a road in the middle of nowhere,” Jana said.

Since arriving in Tallahassee, the Forsthoefels have scarcely thought about leaving for anywhere else. “It felt like home very quickly,” Jana said. “Neither of us ever wanted to leave.”

Jana was the first woman ever to have a private OB-GYN practice in Tallahassee.

“There’s nothing more rewarding than delivering a healthy baby early in your career, then 25 years later delivering the baby of that baby!” she said.

Both Michael and Jana teach at the Florida State University College of Medicine. One of Michael’s former students joined his practice recently.

Michael was an undergraduate at the University of Louisville when he met his future wife. Both majored in biology. He intended to become a research scientist, but Jana was dead set on medicine at a time when women had scarcely been encouraged or even allowed to go to medical school.

↑ As medical students, Jana and Michael Forsthoefel spent time in the Charles and Peggy Evans Anatomy Building at the Emory School of Medicine in Atlanta. → The Forsthoefels have raised eight children, several of whom have obtained medical degrees and started growing families of their own.

As veteran doctors, the Forsthoefels have witnessed the arrival of technological advancements they never could have imagined early in their careers.

Jana started performing surgeries using robots about 12 years ago, right when they first became available. At the time, she was the first female doctor certified to use them.

About telemedicine, the Forsthoefels have mixed feelings.

“More people can get seen by their doctors more often,” Michael said. “Now, none of my patients will have to put off an appointment if they can’t find someone to drive them.” On the flip side, Jana emphasizes the importance of in-person interaction versus video chats.

“You aren’t just a collection of data points, you’re a person,” she said. “And we treat people.”

SERVICE TO VETERANS

About 10 years ago, Michael and his longtime friend Mac Kemp got together to find ways to give back to veterans.

Honor Flight Tallahassee was founded to celebrate contributions made by veterans and provide them with an unforgettable experience. Divisions of Honor Flight exist across the country; all fly veterans to Washington, D.C, where they visit memorials. The trip lasts only one day, and the charity covers all costs.

Every veteran on the trip can bring another person, called a guardian, on the trip. Michael encourages especially children and grandchildren of veterans to go with them.

“Honor Flight can become one of the best teaching tools for these kids,” Forsthoefel said. “They

PHOTOS BY THE WORKMANS (DRS. MICHAEL AND JANA FORSTHOEFEL) AND COURTESY OF THE FORSTHOEFELS (FAMILY) AND WIKIMEDIA COMMONS / DANIEL MAYER(UNIVERSITY)

Honor Flight Tallahassee

ROUND TRIP TO WASHINGTON CONFERS DESERVED RESPECT

BY EMILEE MAE STRUSS

eated at a cafe beside his wife Sonya, retired U.S. Marine Johnny Linton scrolled to a folder of photos on his phone.

Titled “Vietnam,” it contains more than 39,000 photos, including sepiatoned portraits of Linton as a thin, young man at war, bloodied helicopters and fellow soldiers.

“Most people don’t know what that experience was like,” he said of his two tours in Vietnam. “But I’d go back to that war multiple times before ever returning to boot camp.”

He paused on photographs of four drill sergeants.

“These men were the worst,” he said. “I was all bruised, cut and beat up. I had a size 12 boot print in purple right on my chest from being kicked. We had to survive all that just to go to the war.”

Linton, in a button-up flannel shirt and neatly combed-over hair, recalled that many of the men he served with did not return from the war. His

closest friend was scheduled to leave Vietnam the same day as Linton but died in combat eight days before their discharge date.

Left with severe post-traumatic stress disorder due to his Vietnam experiences, Linton was placed on full disability and deals with physical and mental consequences from the war to this day.

The Honor Flight Network, a nonprofit founded in 2005, is dedicated to honoring veterans like Linton. Since its inception, it has taken more than 200,000 veterans on all-expense-paid trips to Washington, D.C., where they spend a day with other veterans and tour war memorials.

Honor Flight Tallahassee first took off on May 11, 2013, when it escorted its first planeload of mainly World War II veterans to experience a day they’ll never forget.

Aboard that first flight was WWII veteran Bryce Thornton, who served in the 104th Infantry Division. He spent

11 months overseas during the war, and even at 98 years old, he can still rattle off his dates of service: June 14, 1943, to December 12, 1945.

“Going on the Honor Flight was one of the finest experiences,” said Thornton, who recalled the reception he enjoyed upon coming home from the war. “I remember seeing the Statue of Liberty in the distance and all these people on tugboats with giant water cannons spraying in a salute. They followed us all the way in.”

For soldiers returning from Vietnam, there was no hero’s welcome.

“They threw rocks in my face and called me all sorts of names,” Linton recalled.

Participating in Honor Flight Tallahassee in April 2022, Linton was finally able to release the disgust about that experience that he had harbored for 50 years.

Upon arriving at the Baltimore airport en route to Washington, D.C., Linton was greeted by more than 800 people clapping and extending him a warm welcome.

“At that moment, I let go of that demon of hatred for how they mistreated me,” Linton said. “Everyone was there, even my grandchildren, welcoming me.”

Honor Flight participants are assigned a “guardian” who helps guide them during the actionpacked day. The tour begins at a memorial honoring the 16 million troops who served in World War II, including the more than 400,000 who died in combat. The tour then leads to the Korean War, Vietnam War and Lincoln memorials.

And that’s just the first half of the day.

The tour continues to the Changing of the Guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery. The tomb represents soldiers who died in battle and whose remains were never found or identified. After that, the Honor Flight participants visit the Marine Corps “Iwo Jima” War Memorial, the Air Force Memorial and the Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) Memorial.

Concluding the emotional day is the flight home, which provides veterans with an opportunity to share memories and compare notes on a day designed to make them feel the appreciation of a nation.

The next Honor Flight Tallahassee is scheduled for Saturday, April 29, 2023. To learn more, visit HonorFlightTallahassee.org.

learn about the armed forces in a hands-on way, and they gain a brand-new respect for the veterans in their lives.”

On Honor Flight days, it’s wheels up at 5 a.m. When they land in Washington, veterans are immediately off on a busy schedule. They begin their tour at a memorial to the soldiers of World War II, then continue on to the Lincoln Memorial. They view the Marine Corps Iwo Jima statue, the Air Force memorial, and memorials to the veterans of Vietnam and Korean wars. They travel on chartered buses with a police escort throughout the entire day, ultimately visiting every major veteran’s memorial in the city. The trip culminates in a visit to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Following this final paying of respects, the group

heads to the airport and arrives back in Tallahassee by 10 p.m.

Michael has been the flight physician for every Honor Flight originating in Tallahassee. He has had the privilege of seeing the positive impact that the flights have on veterans and their guardians.

“We are changing lives every trip,” he said.

Vietnam veterans in particular get a lot out of the trip.

“When those boys got back to the States, a lot of them weren’t treated the best,” Michael said. “They didn’t get the same respect that some of the older vets got, even though a lot of them were drafted. We’re working to change that.”

Michael continues to practice with the Southern Medical Group. Jana is with Gynecology & Obstetrics Associates of Tallahassee. TM

↑ Michael Forsthoefel, at right, has been the flight physician for every Honor Flight to Washington, D.C., originating in Tallahassee. He is pictured with Tom Napier, left, and Curtis Richardson.

ST SHE WILL NOT

RELENTLESS MICHELLE MECCA EMBODIES TRUE GRIT

STORY BY STEVE BORNHOFT

PHOTOGRAPHY BY DAVE BARFIELD

FOR CANCER OP

It may beat me, but it’s not going to conquer me. I have thrown up at the side of the road, but I keep driving. I have thrown up at the gym, but I resume my workout.”

The cure, Michelle Mecca said, can be worse than the disease, and barring the emergence of protocols not part of the science of medicine today, her course of treatment will be lifelong.

Still, Mecca looks good. She appears fit, extraordinarily so. Her movements are confident. And her eyes — oh, those eyes — reflect intensity, determination, interest.

“It may beat me, but it’s not going to conquer me,” Mecca said of the breast cancer that metastasized to her brain. “I have thrown up at the side of the road, but I keep driving. I have thrown up at the gym, but I resume my workout.”

She has been told by doctors to expect a slow decline in her health, but the tumor in her head is stable for now.

The product of a childhood that she describes as difficult, Mecca has about her a toughness that she has productively channeled in multiple ways.

She was a successful bank loan officer accustomed to knocking down six figures. She began training for fitness competitions in 2014 and would place in five shows over a three-year period. In preparation, she hit the gym twice daily, with one session devoted to cardio and the other to weight training.

By the time she competed in her last show, she was undergoing chemo.

NO REASON

As of 2017, Mecca was an established and elite fitness competitor — she participated in bikini competitions — and had begun to assemble a portfolio of photos with an eye toward getting a start in commercial modeling. She was a picture of health.

So it was that everyone in her circle was incredulous when Mecca received a breast cancer diagnosis.

“I was shocked,” Mecca said. “I had stayed on top of my mammograms. I did everything right. There wasn’t any reason for it. No family history. Working out the way I did, I was the last person you would think would get cancer.”

About Mecca, her friends assumed the best.

“They thought, ‘OK, it’s no big deal. They’ll get it out,’” Mecca said. “But come to find out, it was a rare, very aggressive cancer (called HER2-positive). By the time they got to it, it had turned into stage 2. I had a double mastectomy. I had lymph nodes removed. I had a port put in.”

Too, a scan revealed a spot on her skull. A biopsy came back negative, but Mecca was left for a time with staples in her head. Nonetheless, she clung to her active lifestyle.

“I went to the gym with the staples, and people freaked out,” Mecca said. “They were thinking,

The cure bends her fingers and her toes. It discolors her skin and has erased her fingerprints. She experiences lapses in memory and often loses track of time. She develops lesions on her feet and wraps them so that they do not become raw and blistered. She has problems with her mouth and stomach. Her appetite vanishes. She frequently becomes nauseous and is easily fatigued.

↑ Michelle Mecca was an accomplished fitness competitor when she was diagnosed with breast cancer that would later metastasize to her brain. The discipline and training required of participants in that sport helped prepare her to fight for her life.

‘Oh my god, she’s going to fall down dead.’ I told them to relax, that it was my skull, not my brain.”

Mecca underwent targeted chemotherapy for a year and a half. She lost her hair. Now, the motivation for her workouts was different. Cardio helped her withstand chemo. Weight training guarded against atrophy.

In the midst of it all, Mecca, the mother of two boys, came through a divorce. Eventually, she entered remission.

Via mutual friends, Michelle, in 2019, met Dan Mecca, the general sales manager at WCTV, the CBS affiliate station in Tallahassee. Dan was “smitten, very smitten,” and the couple began dating. Michelle got him started with a personal trainer at her gym, Momentum Fitness in Tallahassee — “I wasn’t physically fit until I met her; I owe her a lot,” Dan said. In November 2020, they got engaged.

“I thought cancer was over, and the world would be great,” Michelle said. “My oncologist told me not to worry about it anymore.”

But Michelle would become symptomatic in new ways.

She cried a lot without apparent cause. She began to have difficulty computing percentages and doing basic math.

“Hysterical crying, hysterical screaming, dropping the f-bomb, I was out of control,” Michelle recalled. “Then I started to have these weird symptoms where my right arm would start shaking, and I would have a sensation that felt like my head was rocking.”

The episodes would last 30 seconds or a minute. Michelle couldn’t account for them apart from thinking that they might be resulting from low blood sugar or stress.

Dan, as it happened, would witness one such episode and insist that Michelle immediately call a doctor. That doctor gave Michelle three hours in which to make an appointment at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville. She was experiencing seizures.

At Mayo, Michelle underwent an MRI in the morning. She was to have an in-person meeting with an oncologist later that day but opted instead to receive a phone call during her ride back to Tallahassee.

CARRYING THE FIGHT TO CANCER

EXERCISE. Even when I have bad days and struggle with side effects, I go to the gym and do what I can. If you can’t run, then walk. If you can’t walk, then crawl. Fight for your life through exercise and moving.

NUTRITION. I eat anti-inflammatory foods mostly and take many supplements to help offset the damage chemo can do to healthy cells.

MENTALLY. Do what you need to try and be happy. Even when you don’t feel well, get up, put on some nice clothes and whatever you feel makes you look good. When you look good, you feel good.

SOCIALLY. Join support groups. Go to church, and get together with friends and neighbors. Ask your friends to spend time with you, or ask them to go to lunch, or ask them to invite you to events. Don’t be embarrassed to ask.

GRIT. Fight for your life in every way possible. Your life is important.

— Michelle Mecca

Dan and Michelle had passed by Downtown Jacksonville and were about to merge onto I-10. The phone rang, Dan said, at 3:21 p.m. on May 28, 2021.

“I think the oncologist didn’t want to just blurt it out,” Michelle said. “So she asked me to tell her my symptoms again, and I did, and then she said, ‘You have a brain tumor.’ I was thinking, ‘Is she talking to me?’”

The oncologist had been down the hall to speak to world-renowned neurosurgeon Dr. Alfred Quinones-Hinojosa, an immigrant from Mexico who once figured in a Netflix series, The Surgeon’s Cut. Quinones-Hinojosa called just a couple of minutes after Michelle hung up with the oncologist. He explained that the tumor was in a precarious spot, but he was prepared to do surgery within a few days.

Dan and Michelle packed for a weeklong return trip to Jacksonville. A pre-op discussion, testing and mapping were scheduled for Monday. The operation would take place as soon as an operating room became available later in the week. And, the couple had made

arrangements to be married at the Duval County Courthouse on Tuesday.

The medical plan changed when Dan showed Quinones-Hinojosa a photo of Michelle at a fitness competition, and the neurosurgeon learned in the pre-op meeting that she was a young, fit woman with two teenage sons. The doctor explained that the surgery would, best case, limit Michelle’s control of her right arm and, worst case, would leave her paralyzed on her right side.

Doctor and patient opted for radiation instead.

AN OUTLIER

Gamma radiation sessions were brutal but successful.

“They bolt your head down to a table,” Michelle explained. “The only thing that is open are two holes for your nose, and you have to sit there for about 45 minutes. You take a lot of Xanax because it is terrifying. You can’t open your eyes if you try.”

Dan explained that the 700 beams of radiation that would (continued on page 130)

↑ Michelle Mecca was working as a loan officer when she and Dan Mecca were introduced to one another by mutual friends. Dan recalls permitting himself to cry upon returning to Tallahassee from the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville where Michelle had been diagnosed with a brain tumor. Seeing Dan break down, she firmly assured him, “There are no effing victims in this house.”

Rowing

story by EMMA WITMER photography by THE WORKMANS AND AERIAL TALLAHASSEE

Tallahassee is set to become Florida’s next crew hub

is Growing

FOUR-MAN CREW Members of the Capital City Rowing club practice at Maclay Gardens State Park in Tallahassee. While Tallahassee is not the rowing center that some large cities in South Florida are, CCR teams consistently place well in state and national competitions.

he folks at Capital City Rowing are convinced that Michael Moxom holds command over the wind and rain.

The men’s head coach for Tallahassee’s decorated youth rowing club, Moxom may not possess such mythological power, but the skies always seem to clear up when it’s time for his kids to hit the water at Alfred B. Maclay Gardens State Park.

Unlike communities around Tampa or Miami where the sport is both well-known and well-funded, Tallahassee is no hub for rowing. In fact, CCR is the city’s only youth rowing program, but that has not kept its crews from gaining recognition across the country.

CCR participates in regattas from Florida to Tennessee and regularly sends crews to the state and national finals. According to Moxom, not a year has gone by that the program has not sent rowers on to the college level.

Michael Moxom

Capital City Rowing, or CCR, is open to girls and boys in grades 6-12 from any Leon County school, private school or home school. Teams often depart Tallahassee and their relatively short training course for competitions at world-class rowing venues in locations including Sarasota, Tennessee, New Jersey and California. CCR team members frequently qualify for scholarships at prestigious schools across the country.

“We consistently punch above our weight,” said Huw O’Callaghan, a CCR parent and board member. “A lot of it is down to the fact that we have very, very dedicated coaches who have personal backgrounds in the sport. They put the hours in. They make sure the kids are engaged and excited about the sport, and they get the work done.”

CCR is open to middle- and high school-age boys and girls with no direct affiliations with any one school. Practices are held between five and six days every week, either on the water at Maclay Gardens or on land at CCR’s training center on Meridian Road where the crews work on strength training, yoga and cardio. Those interested in signing up can join a week’s worth of practices for free without any commitment.

AND BOARD MEMBER

Out on the water, there’s no tackling, tagging or blocking, just boat after boat barreling forward at blistering speeds. In some ways, Moxom said, rowing is much like running or cycling. It takes an immense amount of focus and discipline to remain in the moment when your muscles are burning. These characteristics, not always associated with middle and high school students, must be fostered through consistency and encouragement.

“Some people are more naturally gifted at it, as with any sport, but I think rowing tones that down, particularly at the high school level,” Moxom said. “If you have someone who is willing to put in the work more consistently than the other guy, they will be successful. We want the kids to have a very visceral understanding that, if they put in the work, it’s going to happen.”

Rowing differs from running and cycling by one distinct principle — teamwork. Rowing is, perhaps, the most cooperative sport out there. Each movement must be coordinated down to the most minute detail to keep the boat balanced, in line and up to speed.

“There is a rhythm to the stroke, and you’re trying to get eight people in time,” Moxom said. “Breathing is a very good metronome to help with that.”

“We consistently punch above our weight. A lot of it is down to the fact that we have very, very dedicated coaches who have personal backgrounds in the sport. They put the hours in. They make sure the kids are engaged and excited about the sport, and they get the work done.”

— HUW O’CALLAGHAN, A CCR PARENT

“It’s one of those things where, if you are in a boat and one person looks out to the side, the balance will be off,” O’Callaghan said. “You have to do everything together, so it doesn’t surprise me that Michael is coaching breathing that way. It all goes together.”

In rowing, there are various classes of boats with different numbers of people, but a cox-eight is the most common. A cox-eight holds eight rowers and a coxswain. Something like a team captain or quarterback, the coxswain is responsible for steering the boat, a particularly critical position in head races where the crew must navigate down winding rivers without colliding with another boat or going off course. Seated at the back of the vessel, the coxswain faces toward the path ahead and directs their teammates through a microphone. The coxswain is typically the smallest in stature but must be confident and savvy.

“It’s a very unique position,” Moxom said. “You’re often looking at a 100-pound girl barking orders at 200-pound, 6-foot-5 guys, and they are heeling very well. It’s a really fun thing to watch when you have a good coxswain.”

Aside from the coxswain, Moxom said there is a stereotypical order of how to seat your rowers but no hard and fast rules. The rower seated closest to the coxswain, called the stroke seat, sets the pace for the rest of the crew, and the following seat backs them up. Those seated in the central four seats serve as the engine room — strong crew members who bring the power. The two rowers at the front of the craft add finesse and technicality.

“But that’s just your starting point,” Moxom said. “There aren’t many hard and fast rules that make a boat go fast. A lot of times, it’s just the coaches’ discretion about what they see when they are making a lineup and moving guys around. Sometimes things click and make a boat work, and the coach doesn’t really know why. There is a little magic voodoo to it.”

Rowing boats may be powered by humans, but they are still delicate pieces of machinery. High intensity races put a strain on the nuts and bolts that hold the boat together. The length and orientation of adjustable oars can be the difference between a gold medal and an honorable mention. Whether it’s a race day or just practice, each member of the crew is responsible for checking the boat and equipment.

From preparation to performance, rowing is a labor of love that has myriad benefits, both physical and mental. Rowing is widely considered to be one of the best full-body workouts, O’Callaghan said, and Moxom always encourages his crew to “sharpen the ax” by eating right and staying hydrated.

Focus, responsibility, self-discipline and teamwork are just a few of the qualities that rowing is teaching the CCR crews.

Moxom stresses the importance of pre-race equipment checks, citing them as one of his kids’ most important responsibilities. Months of training and preparation for a race may be wasted if equipment is faulty.

“After all,” Moxom said, “you only have one shot at it.” TM

In the considered opinions of many, rowing may be the most physically demanding sport of them all. Its rewards, according to Huw O’Callaghan, a member of the board of directors at Capital City Rowing, include life lessons that relate to character, commitment and cooperation.

TALLAHASSEE’S BEST CHOICE IN ACTIVE SENIOR LIVING

TALLAHASSEE’S BEST CHOICE IN ACTIVE SENIOR LIVING

Enjoy an active lifestyle emphasizing wellness and lifelong learning opportunities at our Life Plan Community on 140 acres of rolling hills in Tallahassee. At Westminster Oaks, every residence is maintenance-free, so you can take a wellness class in the fitness center, savor a chef-prepared meal, or enjoy the many walking and biking paths nearby instead of keeping up with your home. You’ll love the wide variety of spacious residences available, all with great services and amenities to enhance your lifestyle, like housekeeping, scheduled transportation and 24-hour security. Best of all, you’ll find safety and security for the future with our full continuum of healthcare services, including Assisted Living, Nursing Care, Memory Care and more, should your needs change.

Enjoy an active lifestyle emphasizing wellness and lifelong learning opportunities at our Life Plan Community on 140 acres of rolling hills in Tallahassee. At Westminster Oaks, every residence is maintenance-free, so you can take a wellness class in the fitness center, savor a chef-prepared meal, or enjoy the many walking and biking paths nearby instead of keeping up with your home. You’ll love the wide variety of spacious residences available, all with great services and amenities to enhance your lifestyle, like housekeeping, scheduled transportation and 24-hour security. Best of all, you’ll find safety and security for the future with our full continuum of healthcare services, including Assisted Living, Nursing Care, Memory Care and more, should your needs change.

Call (850) 813-0978 today to learn more.

abodes

Everyone has one. That big, blank, boring wall may be in your bedroom, living room, kitchen or even hallway. You could throw up some family photos or a piece of art, but the whole effort feels daunting, and up until now, you’ve left well enough alone. No more. A delightful trend has emerged, proving that with a bit of creativity and elbow grease, even these windowless, doorless stretches of paint and plaster can become the focal point of a room.

The popularity of statement or accent walls saw a meteoric rise about 10 years ago, thanks to websites like Pinterest. Put simply, an accent wall uses elements like paint, wallpaper, laminate, paneling, tile, wood, art or photographs to draw the eye and add personality to a room. Consider bringing in a pop of color, covering an entire wall with reclaimed barn wood or creating a modern textural pattern with carefully placed paneling. The options for creating an accent wall are as varied as your imagination. Still, there are a few things to consider before you reach for your paintbrush or load up the nail gun.

Anna Osborne and Ashley Farrell of Studio A Interiors frequently create accent walls through their interior design services. For Osborne, who focuses on the commercial side of the business, designing an accent wall relies on three basic questions.

“There are lots of ways to approach it, so it really comes down to budget, your style and whether or not you can do it yourself,” Osborne said.

Budget, as you might expect, is directly tied to what you can do yourself. DIY projects can be both fun and economical, but it can be easy to get in over your head.

Elements like tile backsplashes or large paneled designs are beautiful, but they require special equipment and a deft hand. Tile, in particular, is expensive and tricky to install without expert help. The last thing you want

is for the whole thing to come crashing down in the middle of the night. There is less margin of error when installing paneling on your own, but the right tools are necessary. Osborne recommends keeping a miter saw, nail gun and goodquality glue on hand.

Paint is arguably the most popular approach in accent walls for a number of reasons. It’s simple, inexpensive and easily covered if you decide to refresh the room down the line. In the 2010s, the trend of painting one wall a different

shade or color took off, but in some cases, the theory behind this design was lost in the excitement.

“I am delicate with accent walls, especially when it comes to paint,” Osborne said. “You are either going to make or break a space depending on how you incorporate color. It should tie in with other parts of the room, like lamps, throw pillows or curtains. There is also something called chair railing where you can do one color on the bottom and a complementary contrasting color on top.”

↘ Paint is frequently a factor in accent walls. It’s easily applied, inexpensive and readily changed if at some point down the line you grow tired of the Pantone color of 2022.

PHOTO BY KATERYNA OMELIANCHENKO ISTOCK/GETTY IMAGES PLUS

When tying in pops of color throughout the room, Osborne says to avoid permanent features like tile or countertops. Stick with things that can be changed or rotated out if you decide to repaint. This principle applies to other accent wall mediums, as well. Wallpaper has had a major resurgence in recent years, particularly once peel-and-stick products hit the market, cutting down on the hassle of application and removal.

“If you go with a textured surface like a wallpaper, you can create warmth,” Farrell said. “Some wallpapers have almost a fabric quality and really add to that warm, homey feeling. Using a laminate approach gives you a more commercial or contemporary look. I have even seen people incorporate plants into their accent walls, so you have the feeling of the outdoors indoors.”

Creating a statement does not have to require power tools or hours of dry time. Arranging gallery walls with family photos, landscapes and unique artwork is a great way to display your creativity and cherished memories.

Gallery walls have become especially popular in recent years. This style of hanging photos foregoes the older linear display. This approach creates movement, fluidity and texture when done correctly. Before you start, consider choosing between a color or black-andwhite motif, then lay the whole arrangement out on the floor to get an idea of how the finished product will look.

Whether you opt for firing up the miter saw or painting that once overlooked wall Pantone’s color for 2023 (Viva Magenta), your accent wall is sure to make a standout statement. TM

↑ Some people — they may be fans of the ivy-covered walls of Wrigley Field — incorporate plants into their accent walls and enjoy the feeling of bringing the outdoors indoors.

Pantone’s COLOR OF 2023

↑ BIRD FOOD | FEEDERS | GARDEN ACCENTS | UNIQUE GIFTS

EXTERIORS

OUTFOXING INTRUDERS

Home security systems grow in sophistication

by AL KRULICK

In 1604, English judge and jurist Sir Edward Coke declared, “The house of everyone is to him as his castle and fortress as well for defense against injury and violence.”

Over time, Coke’s phrase became simplified to “a man’s (or woman’s) home is his (or her) castle.” Now, if one’s home were, indeed, an actual castle, history informs us that its protection would be supplied by such things as high walls, ramparts, moats, drawbridges, flanking towers, battlements, machicolations (stone boxes that projected from the walls of castles and had holes in the floors for dropping stones or boiling oil on attackers), as well as the portcullis, the spiked wooden or metal barrier that helped protect castle doors from fire and battering.

While today’s modern homes may be relatively safe from marauding hoards or medieval monarchs, they are still the targets of burglaries, break-ins and forceful entries. In fact, in the United States, a home burglary occurs every 15 seconds, and the FBI estimates that one in every 36 homes in America will experience a break-in at some time — and not by swords, arrows or catapults, but rather by common household tools: pliers, screwdrivers and hammers.

While virtually every American home has doors that lock, and many have dogs that bark, only about 30 percent of U.S. households have installed modern security systems, the first of which was invented by Marie Van Brittan Brown, an African American nurse from Queens, New York. She and her husband Albert, an electronics technician, received a patent for their unique contraption in 1969.

↑ The ADT Camera-and-Command system delivers high-definition video to a smartphone, tablet or ADT portal, enabling homeowners to see who is at their door. The ADT Command smart home security touchpad provides protection for property and provides for smart, simple integration and control of smart security and home automation devices.

abodes

Its features included a closed-circuit television, multiple peepholes, a sliding camera, two-way microphones and emergency buttons.

Mass manufacture of the Browns’ system was too complicated in that era, but home security technology has more than caught up since then. Modern systems can contain any or all of the following components: a control panel that oversees the entire system and may or may not be connected to a home security company or police and/or fire department; door and window sensors; presence simulation, which may include light and shadow effects at night or sound simulation in the daytime; surveillance cameras, which can stream to users’ phones or computers; motion sensors; glass break detectors; and high-decibel alarms.

Doorbell cameras allow users to talk with visitors while they’re at home or even when they’re away. And some systems have smoke alarms, carbon monoxide detectors and flood sensors, as well.

Today’s home security systems are also highly customizable and available as DIY kits or as more complex setups that include professional installation and monitoring. Thus, pricing is highly dependent on what features one chooses. Equipment costs average about $300, with installation costs running up to almost $200. Average monthly monitoring costs range from zero to a few dollars for self-monitored systems and $25 to $50 for professionally monitored systems.

When shopping for any system, a smart consumer will want to consider price,

reliability, ease of use and compatibility with any other smart devices in the home. Homeowners should also consider which companies are highly rated by industry insiders and respected periodicals. Companies that often appear in Top 10 lists include: ADT, Vivint, SimpliSafe, Frontpoint, Abode, Cove, Ring Alarm, Wyze, Brinks, Link Interactive, Deep Sentinel and Comcast Xfinity.

Today, the home security industry is growing rapidly. Revenue for U.S. companies should reach $5.43 billion by the end of 2022. With a projected annual growth rate of 11.55%, the projected market volume should approach $8.41 billion by 2026, with the number of active households expected to amount to 57.6 million users.

TYPES OF HOME SECURITY SYSTEMS

MONITORED

Professionally monitored systems are continuously overseen by dedicated teams. Self-monitoring systems give authorized users access to live camera feeds and other details that could indicate issues.

UNMONITORED

A fully unmonitored system may capture camera footage or include door and window sensors. However, notifying the authorities or getting alerted to a potential issue does not happen unless someone hears the alarm and acts accordingly.

WIRED

These systems use hardwired connections to get power and send signals to a central hub. Wires connect every sensor and entry point in the home. Professionals must install them, but that process is easy in homes pre-wired for such setups.

WIRELESS

These options use radio waves to send data and notifications of possible problems. Renters and people who move often appreciate their portability.

Electromagnetic interference from other devices in the vicinity could trigger a false alarm.

APP-BASED

Most modern security systems come with apps, letting users check statuses, watch live camera feeds and receive real-time notifications. Less common are security apps not associated with a particular brand. They aim to protect a person rather than property.

Source: MUO

↑ Ring’s popular video doorbell enables users to see, hear and speak to visitors from anywhere. It supplies a clear picture with high-definition video and a night vision feature.

↑ The base station is the brain of SimpliSafe systems. It communicates with all of a user’s SimpliSafe devices and relays alarm signals to a 24/7 monitoring center.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF SIMPLISAFE.COM ↓ COMPANIES THAT OFTEN APPEAR IN TOP 10 LISTS ADT Vivint SimpliSafe Frontpoint Abode Cove Ring Alarm Wyze Brinks Link Interactive Deep Sentinel Comcast Xfinity Here to Floor You. CARPET • HARDWOOD • LAMINATE CERAMIC TILES • WINDOW BLINDS • AREA RUGS LUXURY VINYL TILE & PLANK VISIT OUR WEBSITE FOR CURRENT SPECIALS 3333 Capital Circle NE | (850) 386-7139 | CarpetOneTallahassee.com

Going forward, more and more home security systems are going to be linked with other “smart home” components. Keypads that control door locks and alarms also can allow users to turn lights on and off, control thermostats, open and close garage doors, and even manage and monitor other home appliances and electronics. Alternatively, voice control apps, such as Alexa and Google Assistant, are increasingly able to augment, or even replace, keypads so that all one need do is give commands via a smartphone, tablet or smartwatch. Safety has never been more user-friendly.

So, to protect your castle, your family and your possessions, you don’t need to arm the ramparts, ready the crossbows or load the machicolation with boiling oil anymore. By installing a modern home security system that suits both your needs and your budget, you can keep the barbarians outside the gates. TM

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we celebrate our 23rd year in business, we thank all of our customers for their continued support. (850)

abodes

CAMELLIAS BIG AND SMALL

Ornamental thrives in cool temperatures

by LES HARRISON, UF/IFAS EXTENSION AGENT EMERITUS

It is time to brighten the home landscape during the winter with colorful blooms. Camellias will add natural color that will return each year for decades when the days are short and the weather cools.

January and February are an ideal time to install new camellias in the landscape. This allows ample time to get this flowering ornamental established before the rigors of hot weather arrive.

Japonicas are a larger variety of camellias, which can grow and be shaped into a small flowering tree. Sasanqua varieties are smaller and often used as foundation plants and blooming hedges in the home landscape.

Both take readily to proper pruning and shaping soon after their flowering is finished in the spring.

Camellias grow well in moderately acidic soils with a pH between 5.0 and 6.5. This may require soil amendments when planting as sand or alkaline readings will greatly limit the potential for success.

Peat moss is ideal for mixing with substandard soil, usually on a 50/50 basis. The peat moss adds organic matter and helps to acidify the soil.

Leave the root ball 1–2 inches above the soil’s surface when installing. Never plant below the soil line as there is always some settling over time.

To help maintain the soil’s acidity, mulch with oak leaves and/or pine straw. Oak leaves also add some nutrients and organic matter to the camellia’s root zone.

This ornamental is not salt tolerant. Its growing zone must also be well drained and not retain excess water.

Transplanting

Winter is a good time to transplant shrubs and small trees in the home landscape. With a little planning and a deft touch, the plant will successfully initiate growth in its new location as spring returns.

There are three important factors to consider when moving a plant or tree to a new site. The success of the relocation depends on these variables.

First, there must be enough space for the plant to reach its full growth potential. Any adjacent structures, trees and other objects must be considered.

Second, the light needs of the plant must be recognized and met. Whether full sun, filtered light or heavy shade, the plant will not flourish if too much or too little light occurs in the new location. The soil type and condition must be correct. Plants that grow in well-drained soils rarely perform well in typically saturated environments. The pH or acidity/ alkalinity needs of the plant must be addressed.

Raking leaves and pine straw is an inevitable part of winter in North Florida. In most cases, homeowners use the debris as mulch for flower beds and around trees. This is a great use of organic material that would otherwise go into the county’s waste stream. In cooler months, it acts as insulation against frigid events. Mulching also adds nutrients to the soil, improves water-holding capacity and improves the plants’ performance, if done correctly. A big mistake when mulching is known as volcano mulching. This is when leaf litter is piled up around the trunk of the tree or woody ornamental in a cone or volcano shape. The dead leaf material will hold moisture against the plant’s bark. It becomes an ideal environment for disease and/or insect damage, which occurs when the dampness remains in long-term contact. Leave about 6 inches of space between the mulch and the plant’s trunk.

Les Harrison is a retired University of Florida/Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences Wakulla County extension director.

GREEN SCENE

VOLCANO MULCHING

Beautiful Bayfront Home Sold!

Located on Ochlockonee Bay, this neverrented, four-bedroom, four-bathroom home measuring 2,200 square feet was beautifully maintained, is move-in ready and only minutes from the Gulf. Angelo’s seafood restaurant, with some of the best freshly caught seafood in the area, is right around the corner. Located near Mashes Sand, Alligator Point and St. Teresa beaches, this bay home is perfect for family vacations, gatherings, a second homestead or a primary residence! Nothing beats the sunset views seen from this home! They are absolutely stunning and always make for that picture-perfect moment! This home is only a short drive to Apalachicola and St. George Island and makes for a great central location between some of North Florida’s most-visited and family-oriented beaches.

SOLD PRICE: $950,000

ADDRESS: 293 Mashes Sand Road, Panacea

SQUARE FOOTAGE: 2.284

BEDROOMS: 4

BATHROOMS: 4

YEAR BUILT: 2002

FEATURES: This four-bedroom, four-bath home features a large open concept with vaulted ceilings, updated windows, real hardwood floors, granite countertops, stainless steel appliances and tile backsplash in the kitchen. All bathrooms and all lighting have been updated, metal roof, 14,000-pound lift, inground pool with new liner, two-car carport and separate one-car garage for storage.

APPEAL: Just minutes from the Gulf and picturesque North Florida beaches. The sunsets are stunning.

CONTACT INFORMATION:

Lisa Montgomery-Calvert (850) 556-1226, LisaMCalvert@outlook.com Coldwell Banker, Hartung

JUST SOLD

Incredible Pool Home in Luna Manor!

This Florida-style home is nestled among canopy oaks and blends all the favorite aspects of pools, homes and an idyllic setting.

SOLD PRICE: $725,000

ADDRESS:

10089 Neamathla Trail

SQUARE FOOTAGE: 3,284

BEDROOMS: 4

BATHROOMS: 3

YEAR BUILT: 2005

FEATURES: Tall ceilings with extensive moldings, trey ceiling accents, large picture windows, fantastic master suite with private den/office, spacious onestory floor plan, eat-in kitchen, formal and informal living and dining spaces, oversized laundry room, outdoor kitchen space and screened-in pool.

APPEAL: Sprawling across 2.48 acres with four bedrooms, three full bathrooms, a home gym plus a den/office, this home has it all in a Northeast Tallahassee location with one of the best school zones.

CONTACT INFORMATION:

Omar Hajjar, Realtor® (850) 339-9830

The Naumann Group, Inc.

REST ASSURED

Coastal Alabama offers good times not to be forgotten ↓

by STEVE BORNHOFT

→

A bicyclist pauses with her balloon-tire beach cruiser at a dune walkover along Alabama’s Gulf Coast. Among Gulffront structures, two piers in the area — the Gulf State Park Pier and the Fort Morgan Pier — accommodate anglers.

About five pounds of Mardi Gras beads hang from the rearview mirror in Easton Colvin’s four-wheel-drive F-150 pickup truck. There’s a foam rubber ball wedged into a space beneath the glove compartment that Colvin surely tosses to his German shorthair pointer, a dog he acquired during his Colorado years spent working for the Professional Bull Riders organization. There’s a cowbell on the dash — Colvin, an Arkansas native, went to Mississippi State. A crack runs the length of the truck’s windshield, and there’s a cattle catcher out front. It’s not the kind of vehicle you would expect a hospitality industry public relations official to drive, but Colvin far from conforms to a PR stereotype.

For starters, he’s a dude, one who looks like a cross between Tiny Tim and Waylon Jennings, with a build much slighter than either one of theirs. He stands 6 feet, 3 inches and might touch 175 pounds if you filled his pockets with sand. From his truck’s sound system emerge David Allan Coe songs including The Ride, about a guitartoting vagabond and a driver “dressed like 1950,” who share the front seat of a vintage Cadillac. The land yacht owner turns to his rider and wants to know…

Drifter, can ya make folks cry when you play and sing?

Have you paid your dues, can you moan the blues?

Can you bend them guitar strings?

He said, “Boy, can you make folks feel what you feel inside?

’Cause if you’re big star bound, let me warn ya, it’s a long, hard ride.”

Colvin, a hard-drivin’ man, picked me up at 6 a.m. at my hotel, The Tides, in Orange Beach — the breakfast there is way above average — and we coursed west through the dark on highways 182 and 180 toward an unimproved landing. There, we were to meet up with a fishing guide, Scott Kennedy of Whistlin’ Waters, billed as the Alabama Gulf Coast’s premier kayak charter company.

Along the way, Colvin, a PR coordinator with Gulf Shores & Orange Beach Tourism,

→ Orange Beach and Gulf Shores, Alabama, have a long history as a destination for tourists. The Orange Beach Hotel opened in 1923 and withstood a 1926 hurricane that did in other Gulf-front properties. The Gulf Shores Hotel opened in 1927.

↗ The par-4 No. 6 hole at Kiva Dune Resort and Golf plays at 345 yards from the white tees. At Kiva, the sea breezes, dunes and vegetation all present obstacles to low scores.

described the golf courses that coastal Alabama has to offer and conceded about his own game that he may shoot 89 one day and 112 the next. I can relate to that, partly. Layouts include Kiva Dunes, the No. 1 public course in the state, said to be challenging enough for pros and forgiving enough not to thoroughly discourage hackers.

Spotting Kennedy’s truck, we left the pavement near Fort Morgan. Colvin permitted his tires to spin for two seconds before engaging four-wheel-drive, and we plowed our way close to where Kennedy was offloading three pedaldriven Hobie kayaks.

The night before our fishing excursion, I had met up with Colvin at the Playa at Sportsman Marina, a casual-fine-dining, waterfront restaurant dwarfed by nearby boat storage buildings. There was no missing him in his cream-colored cowboy hat, boots and a belt buckle the size of a sandwich. We ordered a round of drinks and, at Colvin’s suggestion, started with Playa Shrimp Ceviche — a halfdozen crustaceans, salsa, cucumber, avocado, Valentino and lime served with tortilla chips. A great beginning.

As we were about to order salads and entrees, formally attired young people arrived at the restaurant, and I muttered to myself, “They didn’t build homecoming dresses like that when I was a kid,” before redirecting my attention to the menu. I opted for a specialty of the house, Redfish on the Half Shell, that is, redfish with its tough hide left on. Chef Bill Briand lets the fish do most of the work unaided — topping the dish simply with roasted tomatoes. I like that. Colvin went with Pepper-Seared Tuna, served with cucumber salad, coconut scallion rice, sushi barbecue and spicy aioli. He would carry fully half of his fish home in a box.

Kennedy introduced me to a Hobie after I told him that heretofore I had been a paddle purist. Securing the pedal drive in the kayak was a snap, and there was nothing to mastering the back-and-forth motion used to propel it forward. All good, except that I didn’t know how to steer the thing until Kennedy introduced me to the rudder control at my left hand.

One of his eyes had been injured, and he didn’t wait for me to ask about it.

“Blood vessel burst,” he volunteered. “I know, I need to come up with a better story.”

← Guacamole made to taste is among the temptations at Playa at Sportsman Marina in Orange Beach. Seafood entrees include Redfish on the Half Shell and Fried Coconut Grouper.

MOBILE BAY

Estuaries represent some of the most sensitive and ecologically important habitats on the planet. Mobile Bay and its estuary are national and state treasures that are frequently compared to South America’s Amazon region. Their richly diverse waters are home to more than 1,000 species of animals. The health of the bay and estuary are strongly connected to human activity, including shoreline development and fishing pressure.

Once underway, I found that the kayak easily handled the chop on Mobile Bay — the wind was out of the east at 12 knots. I outpaced Kennedy and Colvin in that I had the kayak with the longest fins. There was a trade-off, however. Those fins demand more oomph from the pedaler, a factor that would have a cumulative effect over the course of the morning.

Kennedy is likable, patient, relaxed, knowledgeable and a good conversationalist with an inexhaustible love for kayak fishing. It’s what he does on vacation. He’s equipped with stories of BTB (beyond the breakers) trips to artificial reefs off Navarre that, with just a little bit of embellishment, would have worked in the old Argosy magazine.

We headed toward cuts in a dorsal fin-shaped part of what might well be called Alabama’s Big Island. Given a choice by Kennedy, I opted to work the leeward side of the cuts. Even at that, landing lures near the water’s edge but out of the reeds wasn’t easy. The guide suggested that sidearm casts, like a knockdown shot in golf, might help

↑ Scott Kennedy of the Whistlin’ Waters guide service led editor Steve Bornhoft of Rowland Publishing to a fine flounder, which pounced on a paddle-tail jig. Bornhoft, while tempted to take the fish to a hook-and-cook restaurant, released the fish to the tidal cut where he found it.

↙ Fort Morgan, which fronts both the Gulf of Mexico and Mobile Bay, is located west of Gulf Shores on Mobile Point and offers lots of options for golfers, foodies and anglers.

and encouraged Colvin and me to work over any indentation in the shoreline.

I pitched a copper-penny-colored swimbait on an unpainted jig head into one such pocket and was rewarded with a solid strike. Moments later, a large undulating flounder, stout enough to pull line from my spinning reel, came into view. Because flounder are notorious for slipping hooks, I was greatly relieved when I managed to get a landing net under the 18-incher — not a doormat, granted, but darn near a toilet-seat cover.

Colvin petitioned for keeping my catch and taking it to a restaurant offering a hook-and-cook option. Several in the area do, including Tacky Jacks Orange Beach, the Villagio Grille at the Wharf and Voyagers at Perdido Beach Resort, an Alabama Restaurant & Hospitality Association “Restaurant of the Year.”

It was clear, however, that Kennedy’s sentiment leaned toward releasing the flounder, and that I did.

Coming off the water hungry after seven miles of pedaling, Colvin carried us to Desoto’s Seafood Kitchen in Gulf Shores, a long-established family restaurant where owner Rosemary Steele likes to circulate among her customers, most of whom she counts as friends.

I had the Flounder Po’ Boy, don’t you know, with coleslaw. Massive and massively good.

I was free to set my agenda for the afternoon. Colvin had suggested as possibilities fishing the pier at Gulf State Park or visiting the Orange Beach Coastal Arts Center, but I had not come this far not to visit, just over the line, the widely renowned honky-tonk, the Flora-Bama Lounge & Oyster Bar, where Colvin has been seen to join in its Mullet Toss competition.

I lucked out. The Perdido Brothers — bongos, guitar and bass — with frontman Rick Whaley were playing at the upstairs stage. I entered upon the space unabashedly wearing a New York Yankees ball cap, which would attract some attention.

Whaley is a tall drink with hair that is long and tired, a Fu Manchu mustache, bird legs, lively eyes, a captivating smile and a voice as raspy as a raven’s. He’s good, now; he channels Neil Diamond so closely, it’s eerie. People frequently request his cover of Dan Fogelberg’s There’s a Place in the World for a Gambler for good reason.

On this occasion, when he slips into a performance of the Elvis Trilogy, there are some in the audience who get to their feet, remove their caps and place hands over their hearts as Whaley sings …

I wish I was in the land of cotton, Old times, they are not forgotten, Look away. Look away. Look away. Dixie Land.

So it is that I was surprised when, at a break, Whaley’s wife, seeing my hat, approaches me and says, “You know, Rick is actually from New Jersey. At one time, he knew a bunch of the Yankees. You should talk to him.”

That I do. Turns out, Whaley, in 1979, played with a jazz band in Paramus, New Jersey, at what was the Yankees’ team hotel. The club featured the likes of Bucky Dent, Ron Guidry and Reggie Jackson, and Billy Martin was in his second of five tours as Yankees manager.

Martin and Whaley were neighbors for a time and became drinking buddies. Whaley told me a crazy story about Martin and a stick of Land O’ Lakes butter but made me promise not to retell it in print. Oh, but I wish I could.

Whaley left me wishing for more — more music, more tales. And, indeed, my welcome respite in Orange Beach, Gulf Shores, Fort Morgan and Perdido Key had been much too brief. I’ll be back for seconds.

There was a headline on the cover of the 2022 Gulf Shores & Orange Beach Vacation Guide: REST ASSURED. Kudos to whoever it is who wrote that. I am not sure anyone could better capture the Alabama Big Island vibe in a couple of words.

There is a place in the world for a gambler, all right, the kind of guy who will try to fill a straight, but there are times when it’s hard to beat a sure thing. TM

↑ It is possible that a bad mood never survived a trip to the Flora-Bama honky-tonk. The good-time business was built twice by a family from Pensacola before it opened in 1964. Arson claimed the original structure, and people suspected that the owners of a nearby floating bar and strip joint were responsible for the blaze. Undeterred, the Tampary family built it back.

PHOTOS BY ISTOCK/GETTY IMAGES PLUS: GEORGE DODD (BEACH) AND COURTESY OF STEVE BORNHOFT (FISHING), GULF SHORES AND ORANGE BEACH TOURISM (BAR)

JAN. 20–29

→ When Oscar the slob and fastidious Felix decide to room together, hilarity ensues as the two have a showdown of epic proportions. A classic that never goes out of style, The Odd Couple is nonstop comedy you don’t want to miss!

JAN/FEB 2023

↓

Founded in 1994 by C. Brian Williams, Step Afrika! is the first professional company dedicated to the tradition of stepping. Their electrifying production arrives Feb. 7 at Ruby Diamond Concert Hall as part of the Opening Nights series at Florida State University. Under Williams’ leadership, stepping has evolved into one of America’s cultural exports. The company now ranks as one of the top 10 African American dance companies in the United States and tours internationally.

Powerful Voices

→ The Tallahassee Symphony Orchestra presents Walk in Dignity, A Commemoration of the Tallahassee Bus Boycott, composed by Joel Thompson (Seven Last Words of the Unarmed) and featuring the FAMU Concert Choir. Tickets are available at TallahasseeSymphony.org.

PHOTOS BY SEKOU LUKE COURTESY OF OPENING NIGHTS, EMERALD COAST THEATRE COMPANY AND TALLAHASSEE SYMPHONY

Send

Building Hope

A BENEFIT FOR REFUGE HOUSE

FEBRUARY 16, 2023 6:00-8:30 P.M.

THE CARRIAGE HOUSE AT GOODWOOD

Heavy Hors d’Oeurvres, Silent Auction and Bar

Join us for a birthday bash featuring Tallahassee Favorite band: Revival

For more information visit refugehouse.com or contact Michelle Frier (850) 922-6062 ext. 1011

KICK OFF LUNCH

Thursday, Jan. 26 | Bijoux Restaurant + Spirits

VINTNER DINNERS

Friday, Feb. 25

CRESCENDO! MAIN EVENT

Sunday, Feb. 26

Hilton Sandestin Beach Golf Resort & Spa

BOX OFFICE: SinfoniaGulfCoast.org

850.460.8800

CRESCENDO! 2023 IS PRESENTED BY:

POWER OF THE PURSE

→ Join Women United this spring to celebrate the power of women at Power of the Purse. Grab your favorite girlfriends, and enjoy a night out for a cause!

Visit UWBB.org for more information as details become available.

TEF PRESENTS AN EVENING WITH KELLI O’HARA

JAN. 10

One of Broadway’s busiest leading ladies, Kelli O’Hara, brings her intimate cabaret to the Thomasville Center for the Arts as Thomasville Entertainment Foundation’s 85th performance season continues.

visittallahassee.com/events/tef-presents-anevening-with-kelli-ohara

THE MANHATTAN TRANSFER WITH SPECIAL GUEST DIVA

JAN. 12

The Manhattan Transfer has achieved an incomparable career of pop and jazz hits, a legacy that defines the group as it celebrates its 50th anniversary. Their dynamic performances and sense of style have led them to become one of the most iconic music groups in the world.

openingnights.fsu.edu/events/manhattantransfer-diva

INTERNATIONAL GUITAR NIGHT

JAN. 19

International Guitar Night (IGN), the longest-running guitar show in America, is now in its 23rd year. Each year, IGN brings together a new group of renowned guitarists from around the world to tour the United States. The 2023 troupe includes Canadian jazz guitarist, vocalist and recipient of the 2021 Juno (Canadian Grammy) for Jazz Album of the Year, Jocelyn Gould; riveting Gypsy-Jazz guitarist Olli Soikkeli from Finland; classical guitar soloist and chamber

musician Stephanie Jones from Australia; and flamenco master Jesus Guerrero from Spain. openingnights.fsu.edu/events/internationalguitar-night

THE TEMPEST

JAN. 19–FEB. 5

Theatre Tallahassee brings one of Shakespeare’s most-known works to the stage. Prospero, a magician, controls the elements and in turn, his enemies whose ship he wrecks. Conflict and magic ensue. theatretallahassee.org

VOCTAVE

JAN. 24

A cappella sensation Voctave has performed around the world and climbed the Billboard charts. Formed in 2015 by producer and arranger Jamey Ray, the voices that bring their arrangements to life represent a wealth of diverse backgrounds and musical experiences. openingnights.fsu.edu/events/voctave

ARTS-IN-THE-HEART CONCERT SERIES

FEB. 3

Javacya Arts Conservatory continues its Arts-in-the-Heart Concert Series 2023 with the Derek Menchan Trio. Alongside cellist Menchan will be violinist Kinga Augustyn and pianist Joanna Sobkowska. The trio will be accompanied by the Javacya Elite Chamber Orchestra as they perform the iconic Triple Concerto by Beethoven. javacyaarts.com

THE OTHER MOZART BY SYLVIA MILO

FEB. 4

The Other Mozart is an awardwinning solo play telling the forgotten story of Nannerl Mozart, the sister of Amadeus — a prodigy, keyboard virtuoso and composer, who performed throughout Europe with her brother to equal acclaim, but her work and her story faded away, lost to history. openingnights.fsu.edu/events/ the-other-mozart

TALLAHASSEE MARATHON

FEB. 5

The Tallahassee Marathon has grown to a first-class event, showcasing Florida’s capital city like no other race. The Tallahassee Marathon is an allvolunteer event organized by the Gulf Winds Track Club, a local nonprofit dedicated to advancing the sport of running, whether for competition, physical fitness or pleasure. tallahasseemagazine.com/local-events/?_ evDiscoveryPath=/event/79380r-tallahasseemarathon-half-marathon-and-relay

KATHARINE MCPHEE

FEB. 6

Singer, actress, Broadway performer and philanthropist, Katharine McPhee will stun from the stage in her many multifaceted roles. openingnights.fsu.edu/events/katharine-mcphee

COLSON WHITEHEAD

FEB. 9

Colson Whitehead is a No. 1 New York Times bestselling author and Pulitzer Prize winner in 2020 for his novel Nickel Boys. Whitehead will talk about his latest novel Harlem Shuffle, his previous bestsellers, the writing process and more. openingnights.fsu.edu/events/ colson-whitehead

QUEENS OF SOUL WITH TALLAHASSEE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

FEB. 11

Experience the best of Motown, R&B and soul with vocalists Morgan James and Erica Gabriel, featuring works by Annie Lennox, Adele, Marvin Gaye, Whitney Houston and more, all backed by the Tallahassee Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of Darko Butorac. openingnights.fsu.edu/events/queens-of-soul

MOMIX PRESENTS ALICE

FEB. 14

Travel down the rabbit hole

MOMIX-style with Moses

Pendleton’s newest creation, ALICE, inspired by Alice in Wonderland. Audiences will be taken on Alice’s journey through music, dance, projected imagery and costuming. openingnights.fsu.edu/events/ momix-presents-alice

REFUGE HOUSE BIRTHDAY BASH

FEB. 16

The band Revival will supply entertainment at Building Hope, a fundraising birthday celebration benefiting Refuge House. The Building Hope event will take place at the Carriage House at Goodwood from 6 p.m. until 8:30 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 16. refugehouse.com

WHISKEY MYERS

FEB. 17

Genre-bending band Whiskey Myers has played more than 3,000 live shows to ever-increasing crowd sizes since their emergence in 2007. The band will make a stop at the Donald L. Tucker Civic Center with special guests Rival Sons and The Weathered Souls. tuckerciviccenter.com/events/detail/whiskeymyers-2023-tour

PARKER MCCOLLUM

FEB. 23

Parker McCollum has had one of the biggest breakout years of any country music newcomer. The show will feature a roster of rising country stars, including Corey Kent and Catie Offerman. tuckerciviccenter.com/events/detail/parkermccollum

FSU SCHOOL PRODUCTION SOMETHING ROTTEN!

FEB. 24

FSU’s School of Theatre Production welcomes audiences into Renaissance London, the land of Shakespeare and the down-ontheir-luck playwrights Nick and Nigel Bottom. openingnights.fsu.edu/events/ something-rotten

MEKLIT

FEB. 28

Meklit Hadero is an Ethiopian American vocalist, songwriter, composer and cultural activist. She makes music that sways between cultures and continents, including a body of deeply personal Ethio-jazz songs. openingnights.fsu.edu/events/meklit

COME CELEBRATE WITH US! April 27-30, 2023

Attendees enjoy such attractions as Spirits Row, Savor South Walton Culinary Village, Nosh Pavilions, Tasting Seminars, Craft Beer & Spirits Jam, live entertainment and more than 600 wines poured by knowledgeable wine industry insiders.

ALL PROCEEDS SUPPORT

BE IN THE KNOW

THE SHOW GREG TISH

be used for whole-head radiation were concentrated into a single beam directed at the center of Michelle’s tumor.

“I went back for an MRI to see how it went, and when I saw the radiology oncologist, he said he was very surprised,” Michelle said.

He had anticipated that more tumors would have developed or that the subject tumor would have grown. He thought that she might experience more seizures due to swelling resulting from the radiation. But none of that had happened.

“We don’t usually see this outcome,” he said.

These days, Michelle takes 40 pills a day. Twenty-two of them are chemo and anti-seizure meds, and 18 are vitamins and meds that offset chemo’s side effects. She sees an oncologist at Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare every three weeks; her hometown oncologist is in regular contact with doctors at Mayo. TMH, Michelle emphasized, is a big part of a medical team that makes her a priority.

At some point, Michelle had to press for a prognosis. The Tallahassee oncologist gave her two years on the outside. An oncologist at Mayo gave her maybe three. But Dan makes the point that the number of women who have experienced breast cancer that metastasized to the brain is small. The sample includes women who may have been morbidly obese, smokers and in their 70s. He sees his wife as an outlier.

So does her 14-year-old son Dylan, a high school sophomore. When Michelle made him aware of her brain cancer diagnosis, she asked him, “What do you think is going to happen to me?”

“He looked at me and he shrugged and he said, ‘You’ll be fine.’ I asked him why he had that confidence and, in his way, he said, ‘Because I know you.’ That has stuck with me every day, especially when I am feeling overwhelmed.”

Michelle’s older son, Tyler, is 19 and a sophomore at Florida State. Dan has a son, Angelo, who is 14 and is autistic.

Michelle keeps in mind, too, a conversation she had with a coach as she was preparing for a fitness competition. She was struggling to lose weight, frustrated by the rigors of her training and whining.

TALLAHASSEE’S REAL TALK STATION 93.3

“He just looked at me in the eye and asked me, ‘How bad do you want it?’ That has stuck with me forever,” Michelle said.

Even as she is fighting cancer, she is writing a legacy. Her career as a loan officer — she is now on disability — didn’t give rise to a single good story, she said, and she is working to compose one now, to redefine what it means to fight cancer.

Her approach is multi-dimensional, carried out on physical, mental and emotional planes. Nutrition, exercise, social interaction and humor are all essential ingredients.

But above all, Michelle advises people dealing with cancer to be their own advocates.

Dan recalls how forcefully Michelle “negotiated” with her doctors in seeking permission to continue to work out.

“They wanted her to do only a half hour of cardio a couple of days a week, and they wanted her workouts not to be strenuous,” he said. “She didn’t listen and, after she got two or three MRIs and the swelling went down, the doctors said, ‘Just keep on doing what you’re doing.’”

“Your doctors work for you,” Michelle said. “We as patients sometimes look at doctors as almost gods. In some ways they are, but that doesn’t mean that they know everything. I always tell people that you don’t know what you don’t know.”

Be tough, Michelle advises, but don’t go it alone. She is active with a local support group, Joanna Francis Living Well, and is a member of a Facebook group comprising people dealing with the side effects of the chemotherapy drug, capecitabine. She makes appearances at runs and other events benefitting the American Cancer Society.

“You have to have support,” Michelle said. “Bring it about yourself if you have to. It could be your neighbor or your friends. A lot of people feel like they don’t know how to talk to people with cancer. I need my friends; I tell them I need them to ask me to go places — even though I have cancer, even though I can’t go party and hang out. Being social is part of fighting cancer. Even when I don’t want to, I force myself to go.”

Michelle knows that she has cancer cells floating around her body. After her breast cancer had been dealt with, they came from somewhere and settled in her brain. She cannot know where they might land next.

“But today, I got up and I felt like I was dressing for the prom. I put on a lot of concealer to cover the bags under my eyes. I know that I look normal, I act normal, but really I am not. I do and say some weird things sometimes. But I don’t want to look sick. That, to me, would feel like I am declining.” TM

McDermott M.D. Anna Koeppel M.D. Sarah Alvarez M.D. Caulley Soto M.D.

Tallahassee 2022 Best of

The 24th annual event celebrated outstanding businesses

PHOTOS BY KACEY LANIER

Top Shelf Band kept people hopping as hundreds of standout Tallahassee business owners and members of the community flooded into the Dunlap Champions Club for this year’s Best of Tallahassee awards event.

Event videographer and sponsor Live In Tallahassee captured all of the excitement and anticipation as attendees danced, enjoyed finger foods, sipped champagne and said “Cheese!” at photo booths provided by Smile in Style events. As if the stunning bird’s eye view of the stadium at sunset was not beautiful enough, the view inside the Dunlap Champions Club dazzled thanks to the efforts of venue design sponsor John Gandy Events.

You are likely to see Best of Tallahassee awards and stickers at your favorite restaurant, dry cleaner or boutique. This year, more than 200 businesses received first or second place awards in categories ranging from Best Event/ Wedding Planner to Best Barbecue.

Amid all of the excitement and fanfare, few could resist trying to sneak a peek at the carefully covered names on the awards table before Rowland Publishing associate publisher McKenzie Burleigh kicked off the Best of Tallahassee winners presentation.

Event sponsors, including presenting sponsor Ox Bottom Animal Hospital, Florida Blue, the Dunlap Champions Club, John Gandy Events, Live in Tallahassee, FastSigns, Crafty Crab Seafood, Adams Radio Group and the Greg Tish Show, were recognized. Just before the winners were announced, the Junior League of Tallahassee shared a special message, thanking Tallahassee Magazine and

all in attendance for supporting their work through the event.

“We are so honored to be the beneficiary of the 2022 Best of Tallahassee event,” said Mac Little, representing the Junior League. “It’s businesses and people like you in this room that make the biggest impact on the Junior League of Tallahassee and continue our mission to improve the lives of women and children.”

Those in attendance had the opportunity to show their support for the nonprofit’s mission and take home a special prize by purchasing $25 treasure boxes. Thanks to donations from winning businesses, each treasure box contained a minimum of $10 worth of products and services, up to over $600 in one of the boxes.

Best of Tallahassee winners were announced beginning with the services category, followed by the food and beverage category and ending with shopping and entertainment. Some winners added an award to a growing collection while others emerged as breakout stars. Each winner received raucous applause from the crowd in celebration of their hardfought success and contributions to the Tallahassee business community.

“Ox Bottom Animal Hospital continues to support Best of Tallahassee, as we truly love seeing our community come together and celebrate the wonderful businesses that make this town such a great place to live,” said Lauren DiMartino-Combs, lead veterinarian at Ox Bottom Animal Hospital. “Congratulations again to all the winners and runners up this year! You all deserve recognition and thanks for your hard work and all you do.”

BENEFITTING

SPONSORS

SPECIAL THANKS TO SMILE IN STYLE EVENTS

To see the entire recap video and access the photos from the event to download, scan the QR code or visit: TallahasseeMagazine.com/ best-of-tallahassee-2022/

Dr. Lauren DiMartino-Combs, Owner, Ox Bottom Animal Hospital

Woody Hayes and Marsha Doll Faulkenberry

Members of the Junior League of Tallahassee

Best of Tallahassee

OCT. 26 The biggest and brightest that Tallahassee has to offer were out in droves at the Dunlap Champions Club at Florida State University for the 2022 Best of Tallahassee awards honors, benefitting the Junior League of Tallahassee. It was the first inperson iteration of the event since 2019. This year, more than 200 businesses received first- or secondplace awards in categories ranging from Best Event/Wedding Planner to Best Barbecue. Event videographer and sponsor, Live In Tallahassee!, captured all of the excitement and anticipation as attendees danced, enjoyed finger foods, sipped champagne and said “Cheese!” at photo booths provided by Smile in Style Events. It was a magical night that put the spotlight squarely on the Tallahassee local community and the initiatives that it serves. A special thank you goes to presenting sponsor Ox Bottom Animal Hospital, as well as event sponsors Florida Blue, the Dunlap Champions Club, John Gandy Events, Live In Tallahassee, FastSigns, Crafty Crab Seafood, Adams Radio Group and The Greg Tish Show.

1 (Back row) Koral Griggs, Elizabeth Brooks and Christian Griffith; (Front row) Stephanie Shumate, Gwen Alexander, Elizabeth Greiner, Summer Griffith, Kate Smith and Daniela Echeverria

2 Sarah Sherlock, Greg Tish and Travis Sherlock

3 Lynnelle Bogan, Rebekah Dickinson, Rebecca Henderson and Chelsea Workman

4 Thanh Tran, John and Marilyn Buck, Mike Ludes and Jacob Moreno

5 Kim Cramer and Matt Scaringe

6 Jon Poulin and Madison Glaser

SOCIAL STUDIES

PHOTOS BY KACEY LANIER

SOCIAL STUDIES

Leadership Tallahassee Distinguished Leadership Awards

OCT. 27 Leadership Tallahassee, a program of the Greater Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce, announced the recipients of four awards at the 27th annual Distinguished Leadership Awards, presented by Centennial Bank. More than 250 community and business leaders attended the event, which recognized the best in community leadership. All proceeds from the event benefited the Youth Leadership Tallahassee program for high school juniors.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF FLOYD SELF

1 Event emcee Tony Carvajal and Charlie Belvin, creator of the 2022 Lifetime Leadership Award Recipient tribute film

2 Dr. Joseph L. Camps, Jr., Lifetime Leadership; Carmen Conner, Leader of the Year; Martha OliveHall, Servant Leadership; Eddie Gonzalez Loumiet, Leadership Pacesetter

3 Andy Harrison, Sondra Timpson, Dan McGrew, Will Hall, Melanie Quinton, Rocky Hanna, Sid Bigham, Sarah Deeb, Will Davis and Ramsay Sims

Women’s Leadership Breakfast

NOV. 16 Women United held its sixth annual Leadership Breakfast in celebration of outstanding women in business and philanthropy. With over 460 attendees, this year’s edition, headlined by keynote speaker Lauren Bush Lauren, founder and chief brand officer of FEED, served as a call to action for women and all members of our community to create positive change through sharing their time, talent and treasure.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF CHARLENE TRICKEY DURHAM, TRICKEY DURHAM PHOTOGRAPHY

1 Sally Bradshaw, Angie Sipple, Allison Manausa, Lauren Bush Lauren, Kim Campo and Berneice Cox

2 Keynote Speaker Lauren Bush Lauren, Founder and Chief Brand Officer of FEED

3 Attendee browses the mobile website for FEED.

Mar. 3–10, 2023

dining guide

AMERICAN

ANDREW’S DOWNTOWN

After 50 years, Andrew’s is still an energetic, casual, see-and-be-seen spot. House favorites include a popular lunch buffet, hamburgers, salads and pasta dishes. Downtown delivery. 228 S. Adams St. (850) 222-3444.

$$ B L D

BACKWOODS CROSSING ★

Sit down at this 2022 Best of winner for fresh gourmet food at Tallahassee’s farm-to-table, destination concept restaurant featuring locally caught and produced soft-shell crabs, sausage, duck and blueberries. 6725 Mahan Dr. (850) 765-3753. $$ L D

BAR 1903 ★

Located in the historic Walker Library, Bar 1903 honors the history of mixology while pushing the boundaries of the cocktail experience. Small plates, snacks, bar sandwiches, sweets. Intimate setting, 36-seat capacity. Voted Best Bar and Best Martini/Cocktail for 2022. 209 E. Park Ave., (850) 354-9739. $$ D

CHARLIE PARK

Tallahassee’s first rooftop cocktail experience offering small plates and shareables has an innovative and exciting menu built around plates to share and experience with others. The specialty craft cocktails are inventive and the views of Tallahassee’s downtown and beyond are spectacular. 801 S. Gadsden St. (850) 759-4300. $$ D

DOG ET AL ★

Foot-long and veggie entrees alike grace this award-winning menu. Also ask about their incredibly valued family packs. 1456 S. Monroe St. (850) 222-4099. $ L D

THE EDISON

This relaxed, fine dining establishment is equipped with a beer garden, wine cellar, casual cafe, open-air alternatives and a gorgeous view that has become a Tallahassee favorite. 470 Suwannee St. (850) 684-2117. $$/$$$ B L D

FOOD GLORIOUS FOOD ★

The name says it all! This restaurant boasts a palate-pleasing combination of personalized service, eclectic ambiance and award-winning cuisine and is the Best Desserts winner for 2017–22. 1950 Thomasville Rd. (850) 224-9974. $$ L D

HOPKINS’ EATERY ★

A Best of 2022 winner, Hopkins’

provides favorites such as the Ultimate Turkey, the Linda Special and a variety of salads to keep customers coming back. Multiple locations. Hours vary. $ L D

HORIZO NS BAR & GRILLE

Classic, homemade American cuisine along with a full bar serving premium liquors, local craft beers and wine. 3427 Bannerman Rd., Ste. 104. (850) 329-2371. $$ B D

HOT BIRDIE’S CHICKEN

Serving chicken sandwiches made with the best available chicken breasts. Signature sauces, the Hot Mess Cookie, Honey Slaw, Gooey Mac & Cheese, Spicy Pickles and seasoned breading are all housemade. Enjoy tasty waffle fries and signature milkshakes. Catering services available. 1898 Thomasville Rd.

(850) 765-9184 $ L D

ISLAND WING COMPANY ★

Get baked! This 2022 Best of winner for Best Wings won’t serve you up greasy, fried wings; instead Island Wing bakes them fresh. 1370 Market St. (850) 692-3116. $ L D

JUICY BLUE

Located in the Four Points by Sheraton Downtown, this cool lobby restaurant offers breakfast, lunch and dinner. Unique dishes include tapas with a twist, such as the Georgia peaches with caramel. 316 W. Tennessee St. (850) 422-0071. $ B L D

LIBERTY BAR AND RESTAURANT

Carefully crafted unique cocktails mixed with a gourmet menu that features fresh, local produce. 1307 N. Monroe, Unit No. 2. (850) 354-8277. $$ D

LOFTY PURSUITS ★

This old-fashioned soda fountain serves ice cream, milkshakes and candy — plus brunch dishes and a selection of vegan, vegetarian and gluten-free options. 1355 Market St., A11. (850) 521-0091. $ B

MA’S DINER

No one does it like Ma! Ma’s Diner serves family-style food in a familyfriendly setting. Homestyle classics are served for breakfast and lunch with quick, attentive and friendly service. 6668-9 Thomasville Rd. (850) 765-1910. $ B L D

OVERUNDER BAR + LOUNGE

Two experiences under one roof, OverUnder features specialty cocktails plus curated food and drink pairings. 1240 Thomasville Rd. (850) 597-7552. $$

The restaurants that appear in this guide are included as a service to readers and not as recommendations of the Tallahassee Magazine editorial department, except where noted.

Fresh, consistent, locally owned. Featuring a full bar and patio dining.

2022 Best of Tallahassee Winner

$$ $$$ Moderately Expensive Expensive

PROOF BREWPUB

Tallahassee’s first brewery, Proof’s brewpub in downtown offers shareables, such as sliders and fried oysters, plus burgers, sandwiches and tacos to pair with their tasty craft brews. 1320 S. Monroe St. (850) 577-0517. $$ D

R&R EATERY

Located in Hotel Indigo, R&R Eatery is a modern American restaurant with fresh takes on classic dishes and a mix of signature craft cocktails. 826 W. Gaines St. (850) 210-0008. $$ B D

ROOTSTOCK

With an ever-changing menu of unique flavors, Rootstock offers shareable plates, artisan cocktails and a selection of 25 wines by the glass. 228 S. Adams. (850) 518-0201. $$$ D

SAGE RESTAURANT

Sage’s menu masterfully melds regional influences, including Southern and French. The setting is gorgeous but cozy, and the outdoor patio sets a charming, romantic tone for a relaxing evening. 3534 Maclay Blvd. (850) 270-9396. $$$ B L D

TABLE 23 ★

This “Southern porch, table and bar” is cozied up among oak trees on one of Tallahassee’s favorite street corners.

Lucky Goat coffee-rubbed ribeye and Schermer pecan-crusted chicken are among the regional offerings. 1215 Thomasville Rd. (850) 329-2261. $$$ L D

UPTOWN CAFÉ

Specialties at the bustling, family-run cafe include apricot-glazed smoked salmon, oneof-a-kind omelets, banana bread French toast and flavorful sandwiches. 1325 Miccosukee Rd. (850) 219-9800. $ B L

VERTIGO BURGERS AND FRIES ★

Vertigo is home to some of the juiciest, funkiest burgers in town. The modern building provides a no-frills setting to enjoy such favorites as the Vertigo Burger — a beef patty served with a fried egg, applewood bacon, grilled jalapenos, sharp cheddar and Vertigo sauce. 1395 E. Lafayette St. (850) 878-2020. $$ L D

WALK-ON’S SPORTS BISTREAUX ★

Not your usual sports bar, this import from Louisiana offers seafood, traditional Cajun cuisine and burgers built for two hands — plus 40 beers on tap and wall-to-wall TVs for the big games. 3390 Capital Circle NE. (850) 597-7736. $$ L D

ASIAN

AZU LUCY HO’S

Enjoy an extensive array of classic dishes with a modern flare, including gyoza dumplings, crab rangoon, General Tso’s chicken and Szechuan beef, all in a relaxed setting. 3220 Apalachee Pkwy., Ste. 13. (850) 893-4112. $$ L D

DAO RESTAURANT

★

Asian fusion restaurant and a Best of Tallahassee 2022 winner in the Best Asian category. Indulge in lobster, blue crab, spicy prawns, Peking duck or a grouper filet with mapo tofu. 3425 Bannerman Rd., (850) 999-1482. $$ L D

KIKU JAPANESE FUSION ★

From tempura to teriyaki and sushi to sashimi, Kiku Japanese Fusion, voted Best Sushi in 2022, fuses vibrant flavors with fresh ingredients. 800 Ocala Rd. (850) 575-5458, 3491 Thomasville Rd. (850) 222-5458. $$ L D

MASA

Masa’s menu offers a creative blend of Eastern and Western cuisines. 1650 N. Monroe St. (850) 727-4183. $/$$

OSAKA JAPANESE STEAKHOUSE AND SUSHI BAR ★

Rated Best Hibachi for 2022, Osaka provides dinner and a show, with the chefs seasoning and preparing your meal right in front of you. 1489 Maclay Commerce Dr. (850) 900-5149. $$$ D

ROCK N ROLL SUSHI

This American-style sushi chain born in Mobile offers fresh rolls, salads and hibachi — all with a rock-and-roll theme. 1415 Timberlane Rd., #305. (850) 999-1748 $$ L D

BARBECUE

WILLIE JEWELL’S OLD SCHOOL BBQ ★

Platters, sandwiches or by the pound, Willie Jewell’s, the 2022 Best Barbecue winner, offers smoked brisket, pork, turkey, sausage, chicken and ribs with a bevy of Southern sides. 5442 Thomasville Rd. (850) 629-4299. $ L D

BREAKFAST/ BRUNCH/BAKERY

CANOPY ROAD CAFÉ ★

Traditional breakfasts, fluffy omelets, skillets, French toast and sweet potato pancakes keep customers coming back to this 2022 Best Breakfast winner. Canopy also goes all out on lunch favorites. Multiple locations. (850) 668-6600. $ B L

LUCKY GOAT COFFEE ★

Coffee roaster, wholesaler, distributor, online retailer and cafe serving highquality beverages. Flavored coffees include pumpkin spice and Southern pecan. Best Coffee winner as voted by the readers of Tallahassee Magazine in 2022. Multiple locations including Bannerman Crossings. (850) 727-4769.

REDEYE COFFEE

Serving locally roasted coffees, high-quality teas and hand-blended cocoas. Also serving pastries, chocolates, platters and grazing boards. Committed to local-centric business practices and sustainability. 1122 Thomasville Rd. and 1196 Capital Circle NE, (850) 999-8278.

THE EGG CAFÉ & EATERY

When you’re looking for breakfast favorites, even if it’s lunchtime, The Egg is the place to be. Second location now open in Kleman Plaza. Multiple locations. (850) 907-3447. $$ B L

TASTY PASTRY BAKERY ★

Tallahassee’s original cakery and 2022 Best Bakery winner features fresh breads, bagels, pies, cakes and catering. Mon–Sat 6:45 a.m. –6 p.m. 1355 Market St., Ste. A-5. (850) 893-3752. $

CAJUN

COOSH’S BAYOU ROUGE ★

This Best Cajun Restaurant winner for 2022 brings a menu jam-packed with Louisianastyle dishes, including favorites like jambalaya, crawfish etouffee, po’boys and seafood gumbo. Multiple locations (850) 894-4110.$$ B L D

CATERING

CATERING CAPERS

Offering meals, bar services and more, Catering Capers makes entertaining and planning corporate events, weddings or private parties in Tallahassee easy. 2915 E. Park Ave., Unit 4. (850) 385-5953.

SIMPLY ENTERTAINING ★

The Best of Tallahassee Catering winner for 2022 as well as a coffee roaster, wholesaler, distributor, online retailer and cafe serving high-quality beverages. Serving as a “onestop shop” for intimate parties. Committed to making events simple by taking care of everything. Also offering Simple Dinners on Tuesday and Thursday nights. 1355 Market St., (850) 668-1167.

ITALIAN/PIZZA BELLA BELLA ★

Voted Best Italian in 2022, this locally owned and operated restaurant has a cozy atmosphere and serves all the classics to satisfy your pasta cravings. 123 E. Fifth Ave. (850) 412-1114. $$ L D

GAINES STREET PIES

Locally owned and open since 2012, Gaines Street offers fresh ingredients and inventive pies, such as the Metal Mike with Sriracha. 603 W. Gaines St., # 3, (850) 765-9275; 1184 Capital Circle NE, Ste. E, (850) 329-2141; 1122 Thomasville Rd., # 4. (850) 765-4120. $$ L D

IL LUSSO ★

Homemade pasta, local seafood and a choice of prime steaks define this downtown fine dining experience. 201 E. Park Ave., Ste. 100. (850) 765-8620. $$$ D

LITTLE PARIS ★

Executive chefs Herve and Loic Alcesilas have reimagined casual French dining with an amazing menu and extensive French wine list. The brothers grew up in Charleville-Mezieres and began their careers in the same restaurant. In Tallahassee, they love providing unique flavors and experiences and were voted as having the Best Fine Dining restaurant in 2022. 1355 Market St., (850) 765-7457. $$ L D

MOMO’S ★

After devouring a slice “as big as your head” at this 2022 Best Pizza winner, chain pizza simply is not gonna cut it. Multiple locations. (850) 224-9808. $ L D

RICCARDO’S RESTAURANT

A Tallahassee tradition since 1999, Riccardo’s features savory Italian classics, from pasta and pizza to homemade subs and calzones — plus a wide-ranging selection of wines and craft brews. 1950 Thomasville Rd. (850) 386-3988 $$ L D

MEXICAN EL JALISCO ★

In the mood for sizzling enchiladas and frozen margaritas? Make your way to the 2022 Best Mexican/Latin American Restaurant, El Jalisco, where they do Mexican cuisine to perfection. Multiple locations. $ L D

THE IRON DAISY

Made-to-order Mexican food with a Florida flair, The Iron Daisy blends traditional cast-iron cooking with the funky vibe of the Arts District.

507 W. Gaines St. (850) 597-9997. $$ L D

MARIA MARIA

Fast casual restaurant serving homemade Mexican food. Named for owner Edgar Gomez’s mother and grandmother, Maria Maria never cuts corners — dishes are never prepped ahead of time. Choose the Taco Dorado, Maria’s Tostada or Chicken Mole and be assured that it has been created with the freshest ingredients. 1304 N. Monroe St., (850) 270-9057. $ L D

SEAFOOD/STEAK

CRAFTY CRAB

Offering the freshest seafood and most authentic recipes in the area, including crab, crawfish, calamari, lobster, oysters, mussels, scallops and more. 1241 Apalachee Pkwy. & 2226 N. Monroe St. (850) 671-2722. $$ L D

GEORGIO’S FINE FOOD & SPIRITS

George Koikos has over 50 years of experience in Tallahassee restaurants, and his hands-on commitment has made this upscale restaurant a local favorite featuring local seafood, prime steaks and banquet rooms for private parties. 2971 Apalachee Pkwy. (850) 877-3211. $$$ D

HARRY’S SEAFOOD BAR & GRILLE

Serving Southern, Cajun and Creole flavors in classic and modern dishes since 1987. Full bar is available at each location. 301 S. Bronough St., in Kleman Plaza. (850) 222-3976. $$ L D

SHULA’S 347

Located in Hotel Duval. Keep it light and casual with a premium Black Angus beef burger or a gourmet salad, or opt for one of their signature entrees — a “Shula Cut” steak. Reservations suggested. 415 N. Monroe St. (850) 224-6005. $$$ L D

SOUTHERN SEAFOOD ★

Whether you’re looking for fish, shrimp, oysters, scallops, crab or lobster, the 2022 Best Seafood Market winner brings the ocean’s freshest choices to Tallahassee. 1415 Timberlane Rd. (850) 668-2203.

The best @#%&! chicken sandwich in town!

The best @#%&! chicken sandwich in

Our food is made-to-order, fresh, crafted from scratch using real ingredients.

Our food is made-to-order, fresh, crafted from scratch using real ingredients.

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TALLY FISH HOUSE & OYSTER BAR ★

Explore four types of topped oysters, load up with stuffed grouper or opt for “turf” with a chef’s choice cut steak. Serving brunch on Saturday and Sunday. Voted Best Seafood restaurant winner in 2022. 6802 Thomasville Rd., (850) 900-5075. $$ L D

TED’S MONTANA GRILL ★

Voted Best Steakhouse winner for 2022, co-founders Ted Turner and George W. McKerrow imagined a restaurant that would provide friends and family with an experience founded on the ideals that made America great — simplicity, honesty and authenticity. And nothing is more authentically American than bison. 1954 Village Green Way, (850) 561-8337. $$ L D

A BACKWARD SPORT

Rowing teaches lifelong lessons

by HUW O’CALLAGHAN

With the new year comes the perilous impulse to sign up for a gym. You may tell yourself, as have I, that you will use it “all the time.”

If you are one of the few who make good on that promise and walk through the gym’s doors, consider this advice: Jump on the rowing machine, or “erg,” set the distance to 2,000 meters and go as hard as you can until the display reads zero meters remaining. Once you have picked yourself off the floor, I hope you will have a new appreciation of the world of rowing, albeit the land-based version.

Countless sports claim to be the toughest, most grueling or difficult to master. Whether or not rowing, also known as crew, can take these titles is for others to decide, but I can tell you that it should rank pretty high on anyone’s top 10 list. The simple physical action of rowing works 86% of the muscles in the body. The mental aspect is a challenge all unto itself. That said, rowing is as tough as the rewards are spectacular.

Aside from the glory of collapsing over a finish line in first place, the lifelong lessons and discipline that rowing instills are priceless. The “toughest” sport or not, I would challenge anyone to find a better team sport. Each crew member is invisibly tied to the next. Every movement, forward and back, in the boat has to be done at exactly the same time, the same cadence, as many as 38 times per minute over a 2-kilometer course. Spend long enough on a lake or a river in a crew boat, and you cannot help but build a sense of accountability, character, discipline and a deeply held feeling of not wanting to let your crew mate down. The rowing family that you build can, and in most cases will, last a lifetime. In my case, that same lifelong “family” recently suggested we try to row the Atlantic together for one last “hurrah.” No.

A former rugby coach once, somewhat jokingly, said to me, “Why do you want to row all year-round? It is a backward sport!” Thankfully I ignored him. I have been fortunate enough to row, coach and become a father whose daughter is as passionate about the sport as I was at her age. Likewise, Tallahassee is fortunate to possess Capital City Rowing (CCR), the area’s only youth rowing program.

CCR, is open to girls and boys in grades 6–12 from any Leon County school, private school or home school. It is something of a hidden gem in the world of rowing. CCR’s training grounds are nestled on the shores of Lake Hall in the beautiful Maclay Gardens. The program has a history of punching above its weight. Despite a relatively short stretch of water to train on, appearances at state and national championships have become a yearly occurrence with crews traveling to world-class rowing facilities in Sarasota, Tennessee, New Jersey and California, to name but a few. The numerous scholarships and signings with prestigious schools across the country have become a regular feature for CCR’s seniors, a fact that cannot be ignored. A current CCR rower was recently overheard saying, “When you find rowing, you find yourself.” Profound for a 15-year-old? Yes. Were they correct? Absolutely. You don’t need to have read Daniel James Brown’s The Boys in the Boat to appreciate how this sport balances the demands of an endurance sport with its lifelong benefits, but you do need to come out to Lake Hall with your future rower and have a look. The blisters and calluses on their hands will pass, but the time spent and memories made in this “backward” sport will last a lifetime. TM

Huw O’Callaghan is on the Board of Directors for Capital City Rowing. Learn more at capitalcityrowing.wildapricot.org or by emailing operations@capitalcityrowing.org.

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