Shanty Town Biscuits: Walla Walla's Uptown Down-home Food
Let’s get down to it: These biscuits are really freaking good.
Shanty Town Biscuits is open for business in the Gut Grub food vendor court at 509 E. Main Street in Walla Walla, right across from the fantastic Harvest Smoothie Company. Their normal hours are Tuesday-Saturday, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. – or whenever they sell out, so get their early!
Aaron and Caitlin Mooney own the business. Caitlin is a talented baker who also works at The Patisserie. Aaron has been a top-flight chef in Chicago, Houston, and Walla Walla restaurants.
Aaron said his love for down-home food goes back to father-son breakfasts at the Flying J Truck Stop. “That was the beginning of it – me and my dad eating biscuits and gravy constantly,” he said.
Aaron said he and Caitlin first wanted to do the Shanty Town concept years ago. But then they added an extra level of difficulty when they went vegan. “We wanted to figure out how to do the same concept, only vegan,” Aaron said.
You can get biscuits served a number of ways – with gravy, TVP “sausage”, chickpea egg, scrambled tofu, or malt butter and jam. Special menu items pop up, too, like chorizo Field Roast sausage. Shanty Town fare is tasty – by any kind of standards, much less vegan standards. Our favorite was the biscuit with malt butter and jam.
“I have an affinity for bad diner food,” Aaron said. “To make it vegan makes it more fun.”