Butcher & Bee (copy)

Ted Legasey enjoys lunch at Butcher & Bee Wednesday Oct. 7, 2020, in Charleston. File/Gavin McIntyre/ Staff

A Charleston restaurant was named a finalist for the 2022 James Beard Awards on March 16.

The downtown restaurant Butcher & Bee earned a finalist nod in the Outstanding Restaurant category. It is one of just five restaurants selected in the category. 

Butcher & Bee was joined by four other restaurants nationwide: Brennan's in New Orleans; Chai Pani in Asheville, N.C.; Parachute in Chicago; and The Walrus and the Carpenter in Seattle.  

Butcher & Bee first opened in 2011 on Upper King Street before moving to its current location, 1085 Morrison Drive, in 2017. The restaurant group, spearheaded by Michael Shemtov, also owns a location in Nashville, Tenn., and The Daily, a grab-and-go daytime destination with locations in Charleston and Atlanta. 

After earning the semifinalist nod Feb. 23, Shemtov told The Post and Courier he credited the original staff members who helped put the restaurant on the map and his current team for the honor, adding that he is confident they can meet the heightened expectations that come with being recognized by the James Beard Foundation.

“We like to say that in our daily lives we are really not competing against other dining establishments but rather against ourselves, trying to be better today than we were yesterday,” Shemtov said. “I think the team will use this recognition as fire to fuel that passion for improvement.”

This year the foundation brought the awards back for the first time in two years after canceling a virtual ceremony scheduled for September 2020 and announcing that it would begin a yearlong initiative to audit and overhaul the awards process, with intent to remove any systemic bias.

The foundation also returned to its traditional format of celebrating winners in person. Finalists for the restaurant and chef awards were announced in Scottsdale, Ariz.

Winners of the restaurant and chef categories will be announced June 13 at the Lyric Opera in Chicago, and James Beard Foundation Media Awards nominees will be unveiled April 27 in New York City.

Wild Common executive chef Orlando Pagán, who was named a semifinalist in the Best Chef: Southeast category, was bested by four chefs in North Carolina and one in Tennessee in the category. 

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Reach Parker Milner at 843-830-3911. Follow him on Twitter @parkermilner_.

Food & Dining Editor

Parker Milner is the Food Editor of The Post and Courier. He is a Boston College graduate and former professional hockey player who joined The Post and Courier after leading the Charleston City Paper's food section.

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