After 100,000 votes, the winner of Sun Herald’s Best New Restaurant bracket is ...
With new restaurants opening up all over the Mississippi Coast, there’s more than enough to enjoy.
But if you had to pick the best new restaurant, could you?
Well, you did!
For several weeks, we’ve asked you to vote for the best new South Mississippi restaurant of 2023 and it looks like we’ve found the best of the best.
Two is better than one. After four intense rounds and more than 100,000 votes, the Sun Herald is crowning two new restaurants as winners of the Sun Herald’s “Best New Restaurant of 2023” bracket. Each received more than 31,000 votes in the final round with a mere 933 votes separating the two in the end. Since the vote was so close, we are declaring both winners.
And the winners are…
Indian Delight and Staigle’s Steakhouse.
We started the bracket with 30 restaurants in South Mississippi that opened in the last year. Here’s the list. Click on the restaurant for a link to the business:
Staigle’s (with 2,810 votes) and Indian Delight (with 1,264 votes) took 60% of the first round’s 6,822 votes, taking a commanding lead in the bracket. Round one trimmed the bracket down to the Sweet 16. The round included a three-way tie between Chef Scott’s, Brew Paddle and The Juicy Caboosy.
More than 3,000 votes and another three-way tie between Evergreen, Flamingo Landing and Bacchus on the Bayou brought the list of contenders down to nine. Staigle’s (with 1,894 votes) and Indian Delight (with 1,302 votes) took 96% of the votes in the round.
Four new restaurants rose above the rest in the third round, two of them (Staigle’s and Sleepy Bear Food & Drink) from Wiggins. But, things really started to heat up in the fourth round. More than 33,000 votes were cast, with 86% of them going to our top two: Indian Delight (14,260) and Staigle’s Steakhouse (14,838).
The battle for the best came down to another close round, with 31,985 votes for Staigle’s and 31,052 for Indian Delight.
Indian Delight, at 6615 Washington Ave. Suite C in Ocean Springs, opened last November, but they came with a well-established reputation or delicious Southern Indian cuisine and a bountiful buffet from their original Hattiesburg location that opened a decade ago in Hattiesburg.
Staigle’s Steakhouse, at 154 E. Pine Ave., became Wiggins’ first fine dining restaurant after its highly anticipated opening last month. With a farm-to-table focus, the restaurant features locally sourced ingredients on its menu and a warm, historical setting to enjoy the dining experience.
This story was originally published January 10, 2024 at 12:49 PM.
