2022 News

YES--WE ARE OPEn
7 days AGAIN!

The Kitchen Table is the “sister” restaurant and expansion to long time Raleigh southern comfort staple, Relish Craft Kitchen & Bourbon Bar. Just like at Relish, we are known for our Southern Comfort focus on craft foods and craft cocktails with a “new Southern” twist. And the big twist at the Kitchen Table is that we are also a board game café with 400+ GAMES plus our fabulous GAMETENDERS to help you choose, learn, and play any one you like.

So—check out our menus and our game list and come out to PLAY with us!!

Our Story

WHY A BOARD GAME CAFE?

Board game cafés are a concept coming to us from Europe and Canada that are gaining in popularity across the US. The Kitchen Table at Relish was the second one in North Carolina when we opened in 2019—the first was Well-Played in Asheville that opened in 2017.

My own family rediscovered board games just around a year before we opened and I fell in love and I love sharing the experience with others. No lecture intended, but so many of us (myself included) spend so much of our time connected to people only through technology. Finding ways to spend time just talking with no screens has become a bit elusive. But playing board games sets the stage for some of the best conversations about life and learning and they are also perfect ice breakers that can encourage a group to find common ground.

The games themselves have improved SO MUCH since the heyday of Candy Land and Monopoly. If you haven’t tried a “gateway” Eurostyle game like Settlers of Catan, Ticket to Ride, Sushi Go, Dominion, 7 Wonders, or Wingspan you may not know that modern board games are now less about random luck and more dependent on strategy, friendlier competition, and even cooperation.

We have a library of over 400 games that we have been sacrificing ourselves to learn to play—including the old standbys (like Scrabble, Backgammon, and Sorry) to the newest releases (like Root, Century Spice Road, Wingspan, and Scythe). We have trained “gametenders” available to help you choose a game that is a good fit for your group and teach you how to play it, if needed.

For the first year, all games were free to play (we had to get you hooked, right?) but we now charge a $5 per table game playing fee (up to 6 players and unlimited access to games) to help us cover the cost of upkeep on the game library (replacing those inevitable lost pieces and buying the latest games) and to help support our gametenders.

You can check out our current game list at https://boardgamegeek.com/collection/user/relishraleigh

So whether you want us guide you or to just pick for yourself, feel free to head on over to our game room to seek out an “old friend” or discover something new.

Enjoy!

Sharon May, Owner

Reservations

Ties to Relish

What's in a name?

The current kitchen at Relish had been too small for us for many years. Business was great, thankfully, but because of that and our extensive menu we need a LOT of prep and storage space—especially since we want to keep creating new dine in “Test Kitchen” menu items and to be able to keep up with the growing takeout demand.

So, when our landlord offered us the space next door to our kitchen in 2019, we jumped on it--and expanded both our kitchen and our concept in one big swoop.

If Relish is our "main dining room", then we consider the expansion space as our smaller more intimate “kitchen table”. We love the images that a kitchen table invokes. As the heart of the home it is the place where meals and memories are made and where you invite close family and friends to cozy and intimate gatherings.