The Original Whistlestop Cafe

In January 1992, the movie ‘Fried Green Tomatoes’ hit the screen. It premiered at the Cobb Galleria Theater in Birmingham. Fannie Flagg, Bess Fortenberry's niece and author of the book, came with a lot of her friends and associates. She left tickets for us at the box office. A couple of friends and three of our employees, including Virginia Johnson, came with us. Ms. Flagg always made Virginia feel special. Virginia had worked for Ms. Flagg's Aunt Bess and at the time still worked for us.
Right after the movie opened, tourists from all over started coming to the "Whistle Stop" Cafe. On February 5, 1992, The Birmingham News ran an article with a picture of two of my cooks holding a peck basket of green tomatoes. The caption read "Seen the movie? Now taste the title."
Everyone who came to the cafe for the first time wanted to know all about Miss Bess and our restaurant and almost all the customers new and old, ordered fried green tomatoes! We’d fry 60 or 70 pounds every weekday and more than that on Sundays. It's almost a miracle that we were able to do it. The people at the Finley Avenue Produce Market were more than helpful in keeping us supplied with all the green tomatoes we needed.
When we started frying so many tomatoes, we knew we had to have a batter mix that would be good to use in a deep fryer. We experimented, and my husband developed the Fried Green Tomato batter, which is now available around the country. We've found that it's also very good with any vegetable you want to fry that calls for a liquid batter. Years of tradition and cooking at the Irondale Cafe have led to the development of several batter and cobbler mixes, as well as a marinade, and spice blends.
Our delicious Irondale Cafe Original Whistlestop Recipes Brand Fried Green Tomato, Seafood, and Chicken Batter Mix and Apple Crisp and Cobbler mixes are available across the country in small markets and in local grocery stores.
A restaurant concept based on the WhistleStop Cafe was developed in 1995. This concept was built on the original family style, good home cooking that people had appreciated in Irondale for years. The detailed plans include a WhistleStop train theme, with professional illustrations of a depot and railroad memorabilia. These plans were based on the successes of a family cafe that could be duplicated in towns across the country.
We were the owners of the Irondale Cafe for 28 years, and looking back, I wonder what would have happened if Miss Bess Fortenberry had sold the cafe to the other couple who wanted to buy it. We were really thankful for our business. We worked hard and long and had a good business before ‘Fried Green Tomatoes’, and over the years continued to grow. No matter how many customers we got, though, we will still tried our best to give everyone the same good service, the same good food, and the same friendliness that we did before the movie.
Retirement was a dream that finally came true in 2000. In a family restaurant business there are few days off, generations of McMichaels spent our Sundays serving fried green tomatoes. The only way to get Billy and I away from the kitchen was to sell the cafe, which we did with mixed emotions. We have since learned to love having family and friends in our own kitchen, using WhistleStop batter mixes, and frying green tomatoes just a few at a time. We continue to work on another cookbook and future products for marketing. Our family has retained the rights to the name, our restaurant concept, and of course our fabulous mixes. Billy Jr. has taken the food product business and grown it in a way that reminds me of the early days at the café …hard work, family and friends, and a lot of faith. A delicious success story in the making.