Fav Wav Food Spots #3 Everybody Eats Café & Restaurant — Benton Park

Everybody Eats Cafe’ & Restaurant brings a different flavor to Benton Park’s increasingly diverse restaurant scene. Located at 1956 Utah Street, the locally operated restaurant combines Southern comfort food, Cajun influences and hibachi-style cooking under one roof.

The restaurant describes its approach as a “black hibachi” vibe, but its menu extends well beyond the grill. Signature Not Yo Mama’s Cajun Pasta can be paired with proteins such as chicken, shrimp, steak or salmon, while hibachi plates combine grilled meats or seafood with vegetables and rice or noodles. Fried green tomatoes, catfish, jumbo shrimp, smash burgers and po’ boys round out an unusually broad menu.

One particularly interesting element is the restaurant’s Legends Series, which connects food with Black cultural history. Menu offerings have included dishes named for figures such as Redd Foxx, Dick Gregory and James “Cool Papa” Bell. The Cool Papa Bell Po’ Boy, for example, combines fried catfish and shrimp on toasted hoagie bread with vegetables and remoulade.

Everybody Eats also emphasizes community in its identity, describing the Benton Park restaurant as a place where bold flavors and a welcoming atmosphere bring people together.

For a neighborhood already home to destinations such as Sidney Street Cafe and Blues City Deli, Everybody Eats adds something distinctly different: Cajun pasta, Southern comfort food, seafood and hibachi served with a contemporary St. Louis personality.

What to try: Not Yo Mama’s Cajun Pasta, blackened catfish, fried green tomatoes, hibachi and selections from the Legends Series.