Louisville, Kentucky Serves Pride on a Plate
Pride Month may be nearing its conclusion in many places, but in Louisville, Kentucky the celebration continues through food, with Pride Plates.
As many cities wind down from Pride Month, Louisville is just getting started. In fact, inclusivity here isn’t seasonal, it’s cultural.
Just launched this summer, Pride Plates is one of the only queer food tours in the country, and the first of its kind in Kentucky. This new, year-round walking tour in Louisville pairs Southern cuisine with powerful, often overlooked LGBTQ+ history, all told by queer locals. It’s a joyful, community-driven experience that proves Pride in Louisville isn’t just a moment—it’s a movement.
Building on Louisville’s growing reputation as one of the South’s most unexpectedly queer-friendly cities, Pride Plates, a new year-round offering from Louisville Food Tours, brings LGBTQ+ history to life in an unexpected way: through food.
This guided walking tour, one of only two queer food tours in the country, invites guests to explore 1.5 miles of local queer history while enjoying five food and drink stops that celebrate Louisville’s Southern culinary roots. But the stories are the real centerpiece, from the city’s first Pride picnic to lesser-known moments of LGBTQ+ resistance, joy, and identity. It’s a walking, talking, eating experience rooted in community connection and historical integrity.
“This tour was a labor of deep love and connection,” says Richie Goff, Director of Marketing for Louisville Food Tours and the writer of the Pride Plates tour. “We knew it was important to not just tell queer stories, but to ensure they were told by queer people, and with historical accuracy. That meant consulting UofL’s extensive LGBTQ archives, partnering with local organizations like Queer Kentucky, and compensating LGBTQ+ creatives fairly for their work.”
Louisville, despite national narratives around the South, is creating a year-round, community-led model for inclusion, and proving that Pride here is personal, local, and loud.
Pride Plates is one of only two queer food tours in the U.S. (New York City is the other) It runs year-round, offering a sustainable and ongoing platform for LGBTQ+ history and tourism and is part of a broader ecosystem of queer-friendly experiences in Louisville: from queer-owned businesses in NuLu and Old Louisville to upcoming fall events like the Louisville Pride (Sept. 14) and Bourbon & Belonging: Kentucky’s Queer Bourbon Week (Oct. 3-5).
Find out more information and book online here. Search for LGBTQ-friendly accommodation in Kentucky here.
About Louisville Food Tours
Louisville Food Tours tells the story of Louisville one bite at a time on guided walking food tours through Louisville’s beautiful, historic neighborhoods. Their mission is to showcase Louisville’s world-class food, delicious drinks, and unique history—and to tell y’all a story you’ll never forget! They believe that great food and great stories have the power to build stronger communities. From the tours they design to the businesses they support, they are committed to ethical tourism, inclusivity, and reinvesting in the people and places that make Louisville special (read more about their commitment to ethical tourism here).
