With a curl of sweet wood smoke, Kathy Cary woos me in the parking lot of her Louisville restaurant called Lilly's.

Inside, surrounded by sprays of fresh flowers and bluesy horn music, I discover why the sophisticated, hip little restaurant is drawing national buzz.

The young wait staff drawls the menu knowledgeably, unpretentiously. No need to flaunt the restaurant's four Mobil stars -- the only such restaurant distinction in the commonwealth.

It's the creative caliber of the food that allows Lilly's to breathe confidence: creamy grits smothered with wild mushrooms and Gorgonzola, house-smoked Amish Chicken Fettuccini tossed with English peas, spinach and Asiago, and -- the cause of my parking lot fantasies -- smoked pork tenderloin with spicy orange sesame glaze.

Brilliantly conceived, well-executed dishes.

Cincinnati has the Maisonette and other top-notch restaurants. But we don't have a Lilly's: a homegrown, chef-owned place that champions local products and farmers. A dining room in which to marvel about flavors and ingredients, yet feel comfortable just eating.

CLEAR PERSONALITY

Many say Lilly's is a true reflection of its striking 43-year-old chef-owner.

"The restaurant has a very clear personality," says Sarah Fritschner, food editor of the Louisville Courier-Journal. "It's Kathy."

That's because she invests every available ounce of energy into her restaurant.

"I don't think I could work this hard for anyone else," Ms. Cary says.

Her career-guiding epiphany struck in 1975, when she was 22. After cooking in the Georgetown area of Washington and France for two years, Ms. Cary returned home to Louisville to get married and work in a local restaurant. She quit after a year.

"I left (the Louisville restaurant) in tears, " she says. "I worked 18 to 20 hours a day, and wasn't treated very well.

"I decided then, that if I was ever going to work again in a kitchen, it was going to be mine."

For four years, Ms. Cary worked as a department store fashion director and catered on the side. While attending New York fashion shows, she ate in the best restaurants, tasting and learning.

She plunged back into food in 1979 by opening a takeout and catering shop called La Peche -- just as gourmet take-out was catching on in the East.

Nine years later, Ms. Cary and her husband, Will, created a dining room adjacent to La Peche on Bardstown Road. They named the restaurant Lilly's for their 3-year-old daughter.

"Lilly's has always been well-respected here," Ms. Fritschner says. "And Kathy has always been ahead of the curve."

She was one of the first in the region to build dishes and menus around locally grown products -- beans, tomatoes, Bibb lettuce, Kentucky lamb, Indiana goat cheese.

Raised on a farm in nearby Prospect, Ms. Cary ends every menu with the simple declaration: God Bless Our Local Farmers!

"Sometimes it costs more to buy local," she says. "But the quality is better, and I want to help preserve the farmers' lifestyle."



NATIONAL REPUTATION

Her support of farmers and the Louisville community (she founded an educational program in 1993 for inner-city teens called "From Seed to Table") has helped Ms. Cary earn a national reputation.

The New York Times has raved about Lilly's, and Gourmet magazine named her a "Great American Chef" for 1997. She has cooked four meals for the foodie elite at New York's James Beard House. And she frequently appears on the national cable TV Food Network.

But she's not always impressed by what she eats at big-name restaurants -- no matter the city or chef.

"They don't all have access to the kind of products we have," Ms. Cary says.

Another rush of confidence, tempered by a willingness to learn.

"Everywhere I go I try to learn something and bring it back," she says.



Too bad.

Louisville has Kathy Cary and we don't