Ms. Jeannie embarked on a road trip recently to the Southern town of Juliette, Georgia where they filmed the movie Fried Green Tomatoes.

If you aren’t familiar with the storyline it is about a middle aged woman, Eveyln Couch, (Kathy Bates) who is stuck in a rut and on the verge of a mid-life crisis.  She befriends a senior citizen, Mrs. Threadgoode ( Jessica Tandy) who shares stories from her past which eventually provide all the life lessons, hope and inspiration that Evelyn needs to get out of her rut.  This movie was based on the bestselling book Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe, by Fannie Flag.

The story switches between present day and 1920’s Alabama, but as you can see below Juliette, Georgia worked just fine in capturing the era. The historical aspect of the story centers around Whistle Stop, the train depot cafe and two women who run it; Idgy & Ruth.

Sets were built in Juliette for the movie and never taken down. Now they are used in the city’s tourism promotion. Ms. Jeannie was thrilled to see that the Whistle Stop Cafe in real life looks exactly like it did in the movie (minus the contemporary cars of course!):

Ms. Jeannie had lunch at the cafe. Of course,  she ordered fried green tomatoes!

If you’ve never eaten this before – you are in for a treat. Like most famous recipes, everyone has their own techniques but this recipe posted by busterbucks on hub pages is great because it explains the process step-by step and has lots of pictures.

A friend of Ms. Jeannie’s prepares a lot of Southern recipes using this cookbook from 1939. You might be able to find a fried green tomato recipe (or two!) in there!

After lunch Ms. Jeannie walked around town. Juliette is tiny and is just comprised really of  one main street and a few side streets:

There are little nods to the movie all around town.

Juliette is able to sustain itself just from tourism related to the movie. That is marvelous for a small town like this, which would have become a ghost town had Hollywood not come callin’. It was bustling the day Ms. Jeannie visited. There was even an hour and a half wait for lunch at the cafe. Ms. Jeannie took the time to poke around town.

This is the famous barbeque in back of the cafe:

This is Smokey Lonesome’s house which is the little shack you can see pictured above – just beyond the barbeque pit.

These are the falls Ruth (Mary Louise Parker) walks across at the beginning of the movie.

After first seeing Fried Green Tomatoes, Ms. Jeannie became interested in beekeeping. She has yet to own any bees of her own but she has quite a growing list of beekeeping related items in her Etsy favorites folder…

Ms. Jeannie could definietly use a few lessons from pros like these:

Until she gets her beekeeping operation up and running, she will shop locally for organic honey…

Did you know that people derive the most health benefits from honey that was produced within a 15 mile radius of their home? Support your local farmers and your local bees at localharvest.org