Is Paula Deen Trying To Take Over Dolly's Turf With New Restaurant?

Pigeon Forge, Tennessee is usually a quiet and peaceful place, the humdrum of everyday life only interrupted by the delighted screams of the fun-seekers at the town’s beloved main attraction: Dollywood. But now another southern beauty is moving into Pigeon Forge, and she’s about to cover everything in boo-ter.

Paula Deen, who’s bouncing back from legal troubles stemming from racism as well as trying to keep her diabetes under control, is opening a new and exciting family-style restaurant in the town formerly owned by Dolly Parton’s massive personality. While the chef and beloved cruise celebrity is also creating a mobile game and starting up a radio show, she tells E! that her focus is on building a restaurant that will leave customers “satisfied” and also probably hating themselves because what she’s serving sounds like it’s laden with carbohydrates and deep, deep regret.

From E!:

“I am so excited to serve the food family style—in big bowls to the table. Everyone will share like they are at their grandmother’s table,” Deen told E! News exclusively. “Everything is so fresh. I want to take people back to the time when their feet were under their grandmother’s table. I want them to relive those memories and create new ones.”

I am not going, because my grandmother was a horrible cook whose use of expired ingredients to create meals only edible by adding large amounts of salt to them is legendary among my family. Therefore, invoking the memories of me crying as my parent made me swallow another bite of rooster — ROOSTER — doesn’t bring me the same kind of warm excitement as Deen would like. But there’s something even more important than the food that she’s concerned about.

“Dining at the restaurant is going to be an unforgettable experience. I want to fill their souls as well as bellies.”

The restaurant opens on the 27th and will serve breakfast, lunch and dinner. Dolly Parton has not yet been reached for comment but she would probably be very pleased outwardly while secretly plotting Deen’s demise. I have no evidence of this, it’s just the kind of person I’d like to imagine Dolly is.