Memphis: Upscale but Authentic Dinner for Mother's Birthday

Headed to Memphis next week and I plan on hitting a ton of lunch counter places like CozyCorner/A&R/Payne’s/Interstate/Gus’s. I’m also planning to check out a few dive bars like Ernestine and Hazel’s and Wild Bill’s. I’ll stop by Alcenia’s one day for lunch or breakfast.
 
BUT it will also be my Mother's birthday that week and I was hoping to find a real authentic Memphis restaurant that might be a little more upscale with some atmosphere and hopefully some entertainment. I know that might be a little mutually exclusive in this city. I need a good old-fashioned place that might serve wine or something other than beer in a brown paper bag and where she might be comfortable staying for an hour or two after dinner.
 
So far I've been looking into Owen Brennan’s or the Majestic Grille. I think Mollie Fontaine might be a little too trendy since we’ll also have my grandfather with us. Has anyone been to either one of the restaurants inside the Peabody Hotel? I’m willing to travel outside the city if it would make for a unique experience.
 
If anyone has any advice or can share other suggestions at all, I’d greatly appreciate it. Thank you.

The Peabody Hotel, the one with the fountain and the parade of ducks, has a very nice upscale dining room. We ate there many years ago and remember it fondly. Don't remember , but I'm quite sure they serve alcohol.

Cheers, John 

I would recommend the Peabody and then you can sit in the wonderful lobby bar and have a glass of wine and listen to the piano player and watch the people. Wild Bills is the best blues expereince in Memphis I think. Check out the burgers at hueys which is across from the peabody and stays open very late. They have a midtown location as well. Have lunch at the Cupboard. its a great place and a Memphis tradition.

This probably won't qualify for the upscale birthday dinner, but I just found this restaurant that sounds like it would make for as much of a "Roadfood experience" as there's ever been. Has anyone ever been to the Orange Mound Grill?

Here's a great story in the Commercial Appeal newspaper http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/restaurant_reviews/article/0,1426,MCA_503_2405382,00.html

I don't see any information on it from searching the forums. I really have to try finding this place.

If you make it out to Collierville stop in a place called Fino Villa. Its in a strip shopping center on Poplar. It started out a few years ago as a nice Italian Restaurant. Over the years its morphed into a EuroBistro with a great bar & great food. They just recently hired David Krog. Dave was the Exectuvive Chef at Morgan Freemans restaurant in Clarksdale MS called Mididi. And just before Fino Villa he was the exec chef at The Tennessean in Collierville (The Tennessean was an upscale restaurant on the square in Collierville located on one of the old passenger trains) He's a great chef & has completely transformed the menu. Last time I ate there I had the Chicken roulade (I think thats what it was called) Its a chicken breast pouned flat & stuffed with roasted bell pepper & goat cheese (and seems like something else) & then rolled up & cooked. Great sauce on it. Everything on the menu is great. I've always been fond of the Grouper & the steak's look incredible. I also tasted the Potatoes augratin that came with the steak. Best side dish I've ever had. There pizzas are great too if you're sitting in the bar. Wonderful beer selection (all the high grav beers you dont find in most restaurants...they even do beer dinners & wine dinners monthly). I think your mom would greatly enjoy a birthday dinner there.

Hey Jay Robert---------------not on the upscale end but on your Triple D selections add Gus's Fried Chicken!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Enjoy---------Russ

very late reply but Paulette's would have been perfect for your Mother's b'day.

So where did you take Mom, and how was it?

If I had seen this I would have recommended Restaurant Iris

Thanks for all the responses.

I was actually going to do Paulette's, but then we ended up on a trip outside of town to Collierville that day. We ate at the Silver Caboose right inside the town square there, for convenience more than anything else. It looked like a standard lunch place from the outside but on the inside they have a great old fashioned soda fountain bar where I had some form of a raspberry ice cream float/milkshake made with fresh raspberries. (Much better than anything they were serving at Wiles-Smith Drugs in Memphis.) And they probably had some of the best pie we tasted on the whole trip. (Better than anything you'll get at Alcenia's.) It also has a market next door called the Side Car with all kinds of baked goods. http://silvercaboose.com/

If it's not general knowledge, I should mention that there's also a Gus's Chicken in Collierville right outside the square. Not sure if it's a more recent opening or if it's been there for a while.

I hadn't heard of the Iris, hopefully I'll get back there one day to try it.

For your next trip to Memphis:
Automatic Slim's Tonga Bar and Grill
Houston's
Folks Folly
Huey's Midtown (Best of the bunch)
Cafe Ole'

Folk's Folly sounds like a place I'll have to try, especially on a night with the piano bar.

I was in Huey's just by chance one night because I wanted to see the The Dempseys perform and it was the only place they were playing that week. The food wasn't anything special and the atmosphere felt like a chain restaurant, but I know some people really love the burgers and blowing their toothpicks into the ceiling.

Hueys attraction is decent food, a full bar, and very late hours.