Banner Elk Cafe & Lodge: Two Menus at One Table

Feeding a large group in a restaurant is a harder problem than feeding one at home, and it is not about the size of the table.

It is that a party of sixteen contains a child who wants pizza, an adult who wants a steak, somebody who has been walking all day and wants breakfast at six in the evening, and at least one person who just wants a salad. Most restaurants make you pick a lane.

Banner Elk Cafe & Lodge does not, and that is the entire reason it is in this guide.

This is researched rather than lived: the owners have not eaten here.

Two menus, one table

Two menus run side by side: an American breakfast and lunch menu, and an Italian dinner menu. Guests can order from either menu regardless of which side they are seated on.

That single arrangement removes the negotiation that usually decides where a big group eats. Nobody has to be talked into a cuisine. The person who wants eggs Benedict and the person who wants pasta can sit at the same table and both get what they came for.

One qualification, and it comes from the restaurant’s own menu. Orders placed across the two menus come out of different kitchens, so preparation times can vary. Do not assume a table ordering from both sides will be served all at once. With children in the party that is worth knowing before you order rather than after.

On the American side there are eggs Benedict, burgers, sandwiches, salads and lunch specials. On the Italian side, ribs, steaks, fish, pizza and pasta.

It is known locally for mountain trout, which is worth knowing if you want one thing from the area on your plate rather than something you could order at home.

The name, and why you may have seen a different one

Worth settling early, because searching turns up more than one version.

The business is Banner Elk Cafe & Lodge. It is three venues in one location: the Cafe, the Lodge and the Tavern, plus an espresso bar, a bakery and a smoothie bar.

So if you have been told about “the Tavern in Banner Elk,” that is part of this rather than somewhere else. One address, one kitchen operation, three rooms.

It serves breakfast, lunch and dinner. We publish no hours and no opening days; those are the fastest-moving facts any restaurant has.

Room to wait, and room to sit outside

Two details that matter more with a large party than they would with two people.

There is a waiting area with couches, and a fireplace in a log cabin interior. A wait with a group of fourteen is a different experience somewhere built to absorb one than it is standing in a doorway. If you arrive without a reservation on a busy evening, this is the difference between a pleasant half hour and a decision to go somewhere else.

There is a covered patio and an open outdoor patio. The covered one is the useful half: mountain weather changes fast, and a covered patio is outdoor seating that survives a shower.

Dogs are allowed in outdoor seating, which for a group traveling with one turns dinner from a logistics problem into an ordinary evening.

Three ways to use it

Reservations are taken. For a group this size that is the plan rather than the fallback, and worth arranging earlier than feels necessary.

Takeout is available, and this is the option most groups overlook. For a full house it can be the best one: everybody orders what they want from either menu and nobody negotiates seating for sixteen in a restaurant at all.

Delivery is listed in some descriptions of the restaurant, but the online ordering page linked from its own site offers pickup only. If delivery rather than collection is the plan, confirm it by phone before you build an evening around it. Our restaurants and groceries guide covers the rest of eating in rather than out.

Or breakfast, which is the underused one. A group that has been out late tends to reconvene slowly, and a place serving breakfast alongside everything else absorbs a party arriving in shifts better than a dinner-only restaurant can.

What we have not put in this article

No opening hours, no opening days, no menu prices, and no rating or ranking from any review site.

For all of that, and to make a reservation, go to the restaurant directly at bannerelkcafe.com. If you are still deciding how the week’s meals break down between eating out and cooking at the house, the restaurants and groceries guide is the place to start.