Growing up, Michael Morris spent many summer afternoons enjoying his grandmother’s signature pimento grilled cheese with fried tomatoes. Standing in her kitchen helping assemble the sandwiches was one of his first introductions to cooking. Today, as chef de cuisine at PL8TE, Southern Table, Pinehurst Resort’s new Southern-inspired restaurant, Morris’s childhood favorite sits on the eatery’s lunch menu. “That dish itself is really my grandmother’s dish, almost exactly. I’ve evolved it a little bit, but our homemade pimento cheese is an inspiration of my grandmother’s recipe,” he says.

At PL8TE, many of Morris’s creations reimagine classic Southern comfort foods. “I think our culinary world has become huge, and there are so many amazing different cuisines from all over the world, it’s easy to overlook what’s right outside your back door,” Morris says. “With PL8TE, I wanted to bring the focus back home. That’s what I was ultimately trying to make, just the idea of home.”

This familiar warmth extends beyond the menu into the restaurant itself. Perched atop the rolling green of Pinehurst’s No. 8 course, a wall of windows overlook the sweeping fairways below. On the sprawling, crimson brick back patio, white rocking chairs offer guests respite after a day on the iconic course.

Pair your order with a cocktail, such as the spicy margarita with a Tajín rim. Photography courtesy of Pinehurst Resort

Not too long ago, the back patio looked very different. Before the dining spot’s official re-branded launch in May 2025, the open-air space served as a temporary kitchen, the command center for taste tests, food photography, and menu development. In the midst of an extensive kitchen renovation, the team transformed the lunch-only Restaurant and Bar at No. 8 into PL8TE, serving breakfast, lunch, and dinner with a clear identity rooted in upscale Southern cuisine.

Morris reminisced on the collective effort as a defining moment. “We took a brand new group of people that had never worked together and we became a team. We went from an empty kitchen being renovated and cooking outside to PL8TE in about four weeks. It was a once-in-a-career moment that just came together so smoothly.”

For Morris, Southern food is rooted in simplicity, a tradition he wants to honor, while also incorporating modern ingredients, plating, and techniques. “Grandma let her green beans cook on the back of the stove all day. I don’t have all day, so I have to do things a little differently,” he says. “It’s an interesting exercise to take foods I grew up with and try to transfer that to a professional environment. I was curious how much I could bring home to work in that sense.”

Start your meal with a round of appetizers, like the blackened shrimp cocktail, served with a Cajun comeback sauce. Photography courtesy of Pinehurst Resort

PL8TE’s take on shrimp and grits is another dish that brings Morris back to his grandmother’s kitchen. He distinctly remembers the tiny prawns tossed in Cajun seasoning and folded into salty, buttery grits. At his restaurant, he builds on that foundation. “I go a little lighter on the butter and salt,” he chuckles, and tops it with succotash and a smoked tomato beurre blanc, a Southern riff on the classic French sauce.

Expanding on his original intent to give North Carolina classics a fresh spin, Morris has begun to branch out, taking other cuisines and turning them Southern. His drive to experiment in the kitchen is nothing new. “From a young age, I was always fascinated with cooking. It was just magical to me that these ingredients would come out of the refrigerator and transform into this great food,” he says. One of his favorite recent fusions has been mole-braised duck confit, served on a slider and topped with a green tomato relish and crispy onions.

As Morris continues to build out PL8TE’s menu, he keeps his Southern roots and the lessons learned in his grandmother’s kitchen at the center of every dish. From buttermilk fried chicken to bourbon-molasses short ribs, modern touches on familiar North Carolina flavors keep the focus right where it belongs — at home.

PL8TE, Southern Table
100 Centennial Boulevard
Pinehurst, NC 28374
(844) 345-1098
pinehurst.com/dining/pl8te-southern-table