Yes, Galloway’s is still open—its dumpy façade often belies the lively lunch crowd within. Although the east side grows steadily more gentrified, this is not one of the city’s lower-crime corners. But it couldn’t get any friendlier and more comforting than inside the hardly changing shop. The menu rotates daily through staples like meatloaf, fried chicken, smothered pork chops, and various preparations of chicken and beef, including oxtails. It’s fantastic to be able to eat them as the tradition of a culture dictates, and not as a soulless, de rigueur foam atop an uni soufflé.

The couple that runs the tiny kitchen has an uncommon knack for extracting flavor from the humblest of ingredients. A sweetness peeks through starchy black-eyed peas. Cabbage is laced with deep pork flavor. Rich mashed potatoes are whipped to a clumpless wonder. The seasoning hand here is careful but not timid. Peppery gravies are reduced to exemplary concentration, neither overbearing nor glutinous. Try the Salisbury-style pepper steak bathed in it.

The à-la-carte sandwich menu is beside the point. Most people take their goods to go, but there are a couple of ratty, fast-food-style tables on which you can plop your plastic plate. The sweet tea is tinny and thin—save the sugar for sweet-potato pie, which, when available, is a restrained and delightfully doughy-crusted revelation.