Justin Fox Burks
While the rest of Memphis is sleeping, Terri Fleming is going nuts.
Every morning around 7 a.m., she rolls into Crosstown Concourse, where she operates her business called So Nuts and Confections. She is ready to roast: Cajun almonds, praline pretzels, bacon and cheese cashews, and barbecue peanuts.
Along with flavored nuts, Fleming sells other desserts and confections, such as chocolate-covered strawberries, cupcakes, and a chocolate cake invention called Nannie Pups.
The roasting process at So Nuts is relatively simple. Fleming dumps the nuts inside the roaster to cook, and then after they are done, she rolls them to dry. Now they are ready to be seasoned, but the seasoning recipes are a secret Fleming is not quite ready to tell.
Her business, quite literally, started as a dream. Fleming was working for a waste treatment facility and wanted a way out. “It was very dangerous,” she says. “There were chemicals. It was hazardous to my health. I wanted a way to earn income and to be a business owner. So, I just prayed to God: What do I do?”
And so, over a series of dreams and visions, Fleming found her calling: Roast nuts in unique and inventive flavors. “It was all kind of divinely orchestrated, for a lack of better words,” says Fleming, who relocated her business from Horn Lake, Mississippi, and hopes to expand to larger cities within the next five years.
The exotic flavors, like garlic Parmesan walnuts and sour cream and onion peanuts, also come to Fleming in dream-like visions. Her newest flavor, rolled out for the holidays, is sweet potato for both walnuts and pecans.
“I can’t even explain to you how it comes — it just comes,” Fleming says.
Customers walk by and ask about the flavors, and when Fleming starts to name them off, they are shocked. “You have bacon and cheese cashews?” they ask, amazed.
Customer Angela Sherrill says Fleming’s sweet potato walnuts taste exactly like a slice of sweet potato pie. “There’s cinnamon, sweet potato, and I can even taste some brown sugar,” she says.
The location of So Nuts near the entrance to the main atrium was intentional, says Todd Richardson, co-leader of Crosstown Concourse. “If you talk to anyone over the age of 50 about the Crosstown retail store, the smell of roasted nuts and popcorn is the first thing they say.” Richardson says. “From a development standpoint, we knew early on that we wanted to bring back the nostalgia.”
(Editor's Note: A multi-story package on the restaurants at Crosstown Concourse appeared in the February issue of Memphis magazine. For the online edition, look for individual stories, including an interview Todd Richardson., and stories on Mama Gaia. and Next Door Eatery's Kimbal Musk. Up next: French Truck Coffee and So Nuts and Confections.)
