Restaurants in Columbia

The best things come in pairs—particularly in the realms of poker, romance, dueling banjos, conjoined twins, and today's deal. For $15, you get $30 worth of cuisine and any accompanying fermented grape juice at the Wine Loft in The Gulch. The restaurant gets pretty busy, so be sure to call ahead and make reservations.

After relocating from New York to Nashville, the owner and founder of Coco's Italian Market & Restaurant had a hankering for something from his childhood: homemade Italian food. Following the tradition of his family, he opened his very own place, Coco’s. Both a restaurant and market, the space is stocked with Italian imports, such as meats, cheeses, pastas, and oils, which also are used to create the eatery's housemade feasts. Chefs, for instance, use imported flour to create their hand-stretched pizza dough, topped with simple mozzarella and basil. Other menu offerings include pasta such as baked ziti, eggplant-parmesan panini, and italian-beef subs. Served every Sunday, brunch gives breakfast an Italian flare with Tuscan-style egg dishes and chocolate-caramel espresso drinks, a well-earned treat after a bout outside on the bocce court.

Corky's menu lets you bite into smokehouse wings ($7), a Delta catfish sandwich with fries ($8), a full slab of wet and dry ribs with two sides ($19.50), a barbecue-stuffed spud ($7.50), and other sure cures for the blues, as well as certain strains of the purples and lycanthropy. Corky's offers family meals that serve three to four people and include a pound of meat, two sides, and buns, rolls, or corn muffins ($16 for a barbecue pork meal, $38 for two slabs of ribs). You can also create your own combination for $16.50 by choosing two sides (fried okra, spiced apples, corn on the cob, and more) and three meats (such as fresh pulled pork shoulder, smoked sausage, barbecue chicken, beef brisket, hot tamales and chili, and Southern fried catfish). Corky's offers lunch specials starting at $6 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. during the workweek.

Citysearchers give the Sizzle-recognized Red Pony a four-star average, Yelpers and OpenTable diners give 4.5:

Every juicy burger on Gabby's menu is forged from grass-fed cattle, much of it from Gourmet Pasture Beef in Springfield, resulting in leaner, healthier protein disks than those fashioned from corn-fed bumblebees. The signature Gabby burger ($8.50) quells carnivorous cravings with a tasty twosome of beef patties smothered in american cheese. Vores of the herbi persuasion can tuck teeth into the homemade Coreen burger, bursting with black beans, brown rice, and barbecue sauce ($6.95). Charbroiled-chicken burgers ($6.95) and barbecue-chicken sandwiches ($7.15) are also on hand to offer carryout customers company while crossing the street. All sandwiches come with your preferred side of Gabby's sumptuous sweet-potato fries, regular fresh-cut fries, or pasta salad, or a cup of chili ($0.75 extra).

Because cooking at home can prove cumbersome if you’re a busy bee or a freelance astronaut, Pranzo Jersey Italian Café offers time-strapped time travelers throughout Nashville a practical alternative. Patrons can place an order by 1 p.m. and swing by anytime between 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. Monday through Friday to pick it up. Pranzo's to-go menu changes weekly, and one type of dinner is offered each night. Recent tasty Italian fare has included turkey Marsala meatloaf with baby peas and quinoa; marinated grilled flank steak with roasted acorn squash; and shrimp and spinach risotto with Caprese salad. All meals include two side salads and bread or dinner rolls.