Mike Davis

Years of Participation

As a standard-bearer for local, seasonal ingredients, Chef Mike Davis grew up close to the ground in a farming family in Dothan, Alabama. After graduating from the University of Alabama, he moved to Charleston to attend Johnson & Wales. While in school, he worked at Magnolias under Chefs Donald Barrickman and Don Drake. Davis then moved to New Orleans where he worked under James Beard Award-winning Chef Susan Spicer. Davis then stepped up to work as sous chef at Birmingham’s Chez Fon Fon under Chef Frank Stitt.  In 2006, Davis opened the doors of Terra in Columbia, South Carolina where he’s
successfully making a mark for his seasonal preparation of the area’s most loved dishes. Chef Davis has cooked for Taste of the South and has been interviewed twice on NPR’s A Chef’s Table. He was invited to cook his Southern Roots dinner at the James
Beard House for a sold-out crowd of diners and has been featured in Garden & Gun. Davis has been named “Best Chef in Columbia” consecutively in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017, and Chef was named the South Carolina Restaurant and Lodging Association’s “2015 Restaurateur of the Year.”