While uniting two cuisines on one menu can produce an explosive mealtime experience, combining baking soda and vinegar in a paper-mache volcano no longer impresses Nobel Prize committees. Delight tongue buds with a dazzling duo with today’s Groupon: for $15, you get $30 worth of Southern and Italian cuisine at Puleo’s Grille, with five Knoxville locations.

Crowned Best Overall Restaurant by the Knoxville News Sentinel in 2010, Puleo’s Grille takes tongues on a whirlwind taste tour with its eclectic menu of Southern and Italian classics. Circle tooth wagons around scrumptious orders of fried green tomatoes partnered with a savory side of stone-ground cheese grits and country gravy ($6.99), or lay a delectable claim on Italian mainstays such as lasagna ($11.99) or artichoke- and caper-flecked chicken piccata, which gets its beauty sleep atop a bed of linguini draped in lemon wine sauce ($14.99).

Meat seekers can warm their bellies around the hearty hearth of the hickory-grilled rattlesnake prime rib ($15.99/queen, $18.99/king), and sweet teeth can make saccharine eyes at slices of hazelnut-mousse cake ($2.49/half, $4.99/full).

Reviews

Knoxville.com named Puleo's Knoxville's best overall restaurant in 2010. Yelpers give its various branches 3.5 to 4.5 stars. Yahoo Travelers give the Region Lane location a perfect five star average, and Insider Pagers give a number of locations between four and five stars.

• Mix fried green tomatoes or shrimp and grits with chicken penne pasta or pasta alfredo. Or go with the steak or seafood. You can't miss. – Knoxville.com
• I have always experienced great service and great food there. Every single dish I have tried at this restaurant has been delicious. – Tiffany B., Yelp, 3/6/10