Road Tips

Big Horn - Estes Park, CO

During our trip to Colorado this past late summer, we stayed at a Swiss-style villa called the Appenzall Inn.  Even though it had a nice little restaurant/lounge, we had told the young lady at the front desk that we were looking more for where the locals go out to eat.   We were going to go back up into Rocky Mountain National Park for the day and we wanted to have a good breakfast because we didn't know when we'd eat lunch. One place that she wholeheartedly recommended for breakfast was a place called the Big Horn.  She talked so enthusiastically about the place that we didn't even seek any other place out for breakfast.  

The Big Horn has been a staple in the Estes Park community for over 40 years serving breakfast, lunch and dinner.  In the late 90's, Estes Park residents Sid and Laura Brown had retired from their local jobs and bought the Big Horn.  The Browns added deli sandwiches and Sid eventually brought in a smoker trailer for barbecue favorites.  

The Big Horn is located just west of Estes Park's downtown district on West Elkhorn (see map).  There's a large parking lot on the west side of the building that they share with a small strip mall.  The Estes Park Performance Park is located just behind the Big Horn.

It was around 8:30 a.m. when we pulled up to the Big Horn.  We went inside and were greeted by a young lady at the cash register near the salad bar.  The main dining room (below left) was already full and she took us into a back room area, sat us at a table and dropped off menus for us.  

 
There are a couple other rooms at the Big Horn that can be used for overflow or for meeting rooms.  It looked like the place had been added on to with the labyrinth of hallways and openings off the main dining area.  But the place was clean, brightly lit with natural outdoor lighting, and somewhat cozy.    

Inside the menu was a sheet that touted Big Horn's deli menu.  It said something along the lines of, "Going into the park?  Let us make a picnic lunch for you!"  It said that while we enjoyed our breakfast, they'd make deli sandwiches for us and pack them in bags for us to take when we went to the park.  I said to Cindy, "Hey, maybe we should do this."  

She looked at the sheet and said, "Yeah, that's not a bad idea."  After being with my wife just over 20 years now, I learned long ago that she needs three square meals a day.  I can get by with a big breakfast and then dinner on some days.  But she needs something in between.  

If we got a sandwich, then I figured I didn't need to go whole hog on a breakfast.  I was looking at getting an omelet, but decided against it.  Blueberry pancakes were an option, but that probably would have been a lot of food, too.  But then I saw that I could get blueberries on French toast.  Oooo...  I love blueberries on French toast.  

Our server, Janea, came over to greet us.  By that time, we were ready to order.  Cindy ordered up a croissant with scrambled egg whites, American cheese and bacon.  Hash browns came with the croissant and she said that I could help her eat them.  I ordered the French toast with blueberries, a side of bacon and a large milk.  Cindy said, "Don't you want to order a deli sandwich?"  

Janae said, "Are you going to take it with you?  I can take the order when I bring your breakfast out and we'll make it up while you eat."  That sounded fine with us.  

When Janae brought our breakfasts, the place had steadily filled up.  Our little room was full of people and they were beginning to seat people back in one of the two meeting rooms.  We figured we came at the right time.  

Cindy's croissant was big with a layer of fluffy egg whites topped with bacon and cheese.  Her side of hash browns inundated the plate.  In fact, it looked like she ordered hash browns with a croissant breakfast sandwich on the side.  

 
My French toast with blueberries were served on a smaller plate.  It featured six half-slices of white bread, battered and grilled, then topped with warm blueberries and powdered sugar.  

Before we dug in, I ordered a hoagie - that we could share - with ham and turkey, Swiss cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, and onions with yellow mustard and mayo.  Janae said she'd have them cut it in half for us.  

My French toast was sort of bland.  It was like they needed more sugar or something on it.  The blueberries were a bit over-ripe, as well.  But they still tasted great with the French toast.  It wasn't the best French toast I've had, but it did the trick for me.

Cindy was happy with her breakfast croissant.  The croissant was light and flaky, but seemed to hold together well as she ate it.  She said the taste of it was "good".  "I'm glad I got this," she said.  

She told me to take some bites of her hash browns.  I was getting pretty full from the French toast, so I declined.  But she insisted.  "I've got a load of hash browns here," she said.  "Help me eat some.  I don't want them to go to waste."  The hash browns were, quite actually, pretty good.  They had a nice crunchy and buttery taste combination along with a firm consistency to the shredded potatoes.  I generally don't go for hash browns, but these were good.     

When we finished, Janae brought our bill along with our hoagie sandwich, cut in half, wrapped in paper and put into a plastic bag with a bag of potato chips and napkins.  Cindy said, "What a great idea!  Why didn't we think about this yesterday before we went up into the park?"  

(Later in the day, we found a little picnic area along a babbling brook near Sprague Lake.  The sandwich was good.  It's pretty difficult to screw up a ham, turkey and Swiss hoagie.  It probably tasted better because we were soaking in the sunlight at 8200 feet above sea level next to a picturesque creek - which was probably a raging rapids five days later due to the excessive rains they received in the area.)

There's not many bad things that I can point out about our visit to the Big Horn.  The breakfast was good - not great - but satisfying.  Janae's service was good and it was a nice atmosphere.  The place was clean and it had a nice homey feel to the dining area.  There may be better breakfasts in the Estes Park area, but the Big Horn is definitely worth a try.

Kings Bar and Grill - Miesville (Hastings), MN

If you're a regular reader of Road Tips, you'll recall an entry on Weiderholt's Supper Club in the small southeastern Minnesota town of Miesville, near Hastings.  (Click here to see that entry.)  The only reason I ended up having a meal at Weiderholt's (and a great meal, it was) was because my original culinary target - Kings Bar and Grill, just down the road for Weiderholt's - was closed on a Monday night.  Still needing to get back to Miesville for a chance to have a King burger, I made a point to head up to the Twin Cities through Rochester on a recent trip, taking backroads off of Highway 52 to Miesville. 

As I pointed out in my previous post about Weiderholt's Supper Club, there's not much to the town of Miesville which has a population of roughly 130.  But it still has a town baseball team - the Miesville Mudhens - that play summer league amateur baseball at Jack Ruhr Field.  Minnesota has a number of "townball" teams that still play baseball in the summer and they still embrace the heritage of small town baseball.  Growing up in a small town in Central Iowa that had a summer league baseball team, I fully understand the culture of "townball".  Miesville's team is a "Class B" team in the Minnesota Baseball Association, which means it has to get its players from a 15 mile radius around the small town making it a truly local team.  "Townball" - which used to be big in Iowa until the 1970's - still thrives across the Upper Midwest into the Dakotas.  

(Pictured right - Jack Ruhr Field in Miesville.  Photo Courtesy Brian Gardner from mnartists.com) 

The history of the building that houses Kings Bar and Grill dates back to the towns founding in 1874.  The building was a saloon and boarding house for travelers going along the Mississippi River from St. Paul to Red Wing.  It later became a combination grocery store, saloon and post office.  

In October of 1984, Jerry and Arlene Greenlee purchased the little roadside grocery store/tavern that had a short menu featuring four different types of burgers.  Eight years later, the Greenlee's decided to turn the grocery store part of the business into a video rental store.  But it wasn't long after that they realized that they could make more money selling their delicious hamburgers.  

The Greenlee's knocked down a wall to make their main dining room.  They put up pine paneling on the walls, keeping the antique tin ceiling in the process.  They added booths and tables in the room that seats about 60 to 70 people.  Beer lights and signs that hang from the wall cast a colorful hue across the room.  There's also a small room in the back - the Hen's Room - for gatherings, parties or overflow.  Today, Jerry and Arlene's son, Jeff, and their daughter, Terri Lawrence, run the business after buying it from their parents over 15 years ago.  Terri is the chef and manager of the kitchen.  But Jerry and Arlene still stop in daily to check in on things.

 
I got into Meisville around 8 p.m. and easily found Kings Bar and Grill - also known to the locals as Kings Place - along Highway 61 (see map).  A number of motorcyclists were in the parking lot getting ready to take off after undoubtedly having a burger at Kings.  I went inside and found a seat at the long bar along the west wall of the establishment.  The bartender came by and asked if I wanted to see a menu and if I wanted a beer.  They had the Minnesota-iconic beer Hamm's (now brewed by MillerCoors), Grain Belt Premium and Pabst Blue Ribbon on tap - truly a signature of a Minnesota roadhouse bar - plus a number of bottled beers to choose from.  I got a Grain Belt as I looked through the menu.  

On the walls in the bar area are a number of pictures of Miesville Mudhen teams over the years.  And the menu - which features over 60 burgers - also pays homage to Miesville "townball" heritage.  The "Triple Play" is topped with bacon and three different types of cheese with green olives and sour cream.  The "Shortstop" has sauerkraut, bacon and cheddar cheese on it.  The "Bench" features peanut butter, lettuce, bacon and mayo, while the "Concession Stand" has a burger patty AND a grilled hot dog and is topped with sauerkraut, jalapenos, salsa and pepper jack cheese.  The "Umpire" burger features pepper jack, bacon and horseradish. That one actually caught my eye.  

Actually, my head was spinning from all the different types of burgers.  I ended up getting the one that started the whole shebang - the King burger.  It's 1/2 pound of ground beef, hand-pattied and grilled on a flat top.  (Below left - over 20 burgers cooking up on the small flat top grill at Kings.)  On the King burger, you get American cheese, bacon and fried onions.  I asked the bartender if he could put some mushrooms on my burger and he said it was no problem.  He asked if I wanted any onion rings or fries and I declined.  However, I found that I probably should have ordered some fries because the guy next to me got a basket of them with his burger and they smelled great and had that bright golden color to them.  

 
The bartender brought my burger to me about 15 minutes after I ordered it.  A knife was stuck into the top of the bun.  Yes, it was big enough where I needed to cut it in half.  

But first of all, I needed to take a look at the layout of what was going on underneath the bun.  The misshapen burger patty was covered with layers of fried onions, chopped mushrooms and a slab of cheese with bacon bits on the very top.  I usually don't get fried onions - even though I love the taste, they don't like me.  But, I thought, "What the hell..."  

 
After cutting the burger in half, it showed a cross section of a spongy and airy bun with a thick burger patty with the toppings in between.  The burger - cooked medium - had a hint of pink in the middle of the patty.  That's exactly how l like my burgers.

From the first bite, I was hooked.  Do you ever go, "Mmmmmmm...." as you're chewing your first bite?  Oh, boy.  That was me that night.  The King burger was fresh and flavorful, thick and juicy.  The bun - which I feel makes or breaks a good burger - was light, chewy and held together very well.  It was simply an outstanding tasting burger.  It was messy, to say the least, and I used four or five sheets of paper towels they keep close by to wipe your hands and face.  At the last bite, I was upset because it was gone and it tasted so good.  

Kings is not a fancy place, nor should you expect it to be down and dirty.  People of all ages, families, and motorcycle enthusiasts are frequently found at Kings Place - especially on warm summer nights and weekends from April thru October.  Remember, they are closed on Mondays as I found out on my first visit.  But the return trip for the King burger was very worth it.  It's one of the best burgers I've had and I've had a LOT of burgers in my lifetime.  If you get the chance to make the trip to Miesville for a King burger - or any one of the over 60 burgers they have on the menu - you will not be disappointed.  

Graziano Brothers Italian Foods - Des Moines, IA

One of the things I like to do on the road is seek out the unique grocery and/or meat markets that are known as institutions to the local populace.  One of those such places is Graziano Brothers on the south side of Des Moines.  It's been awhile since I'd been in Graziano Brothers and I've wanted to do a Road Tips entry on the place.  On a recent visit to Des Moines, I made the time to stop at Graziano Brothers to pick up some Italian meats before I took off for the Quad Cities.

For over 100 years, Graziano Brothers has been making some of the best Italian meats in the Midwest.  It all started in the small Italian village of San Morello in Italy's Calabria region.  Brothers Frank and Louis Graziano yearned for a chance to go to America to escape their impoverished surroundings.  In 1903, Frank and Louis - ages 21 and 17, respectively - made it to America and found their way to Des Moines working for a railroad company.  Working on the railroad was a tough life for the Graziano brothers and eventually it was decided that they would open a grocery store on Des Moines' growing Italian south side.  Louis left the railroad to start the grocery store in 1912 while Frank continued to work at the railroad to support the two while they got the grocery store going.

(Pictured right - Frank and Louis Graziano) 

They found a building at the corner of Jackson and S. Union that used to house a drug store.  Their business neighbors to the south were a cobbler and a tavern.  The Graziano brothers began to make sausage and smoked meats that they learned how to make growing up in San Morello.  The exploding Italian population in South Des Moines - many of whom came from the same areas in Southern Italy as the Graziano's - found that the brothers sausage and meat-making skills were as good as what they could find back home.   

After World War II, the Graziano's got into the wholesale food business in addition to their little grocery store.  The were able to get hard to find Italian specialties such as olive oil, garlic, and Italian spices, and they began to distribute these products to other stores and restaurants.   

In the early 50's, the Graziano brothers retired from running the day to day operation of their little grocery store/market.  Sons Mose, Mike and Gene took over the business and guided it into the salad days of little neighborhood grocery stores in the Des Moines area.  Mose's son, Frank, joined the company in the mid-70's after a stint in the armed forces and took over the business not long after.  

As the 80's came, the Graziano family found that even their famous Italian sausage and meats couldn't keep up with the rapidly changing grocery store scenery in Des Moines.  People who were walking to Graziano's in the 50's and 60's were now driving to larger, more modern grocery stores such as Hy-Vee and Dahl's.  It was in the mid-80's that Frank Graziano decided to make Graziano Brothers a specialty meat and Italian food market.  They were simply ahead of the curve when it came to specialty food stores and if you were looking for Italian cheese and meats in the Des Moines area - whether you were a restaurant owner or someone looking to simply make homemade lasagna - you went to Graziano Brothers.

Frances Graziano, Mike's daughter, joined the family business in 1996 and took over the business when Frank retired in 2000.  Frances had a penchant for good Italian cooking and she added food stuffs such as andouille sausage, sweet Italian sausage, homemade pesto, imported canned goods from Italy, and a wide array of pasta imported from Italy.  But the original Italian sausage recipe, the same one that Louis and Frank came up with when they first opened in April of 1912, is the same today.  And that was what I was looking for when I stopped at Graziano's recently.

With cooler weather coming, I like to cook in the house more often.  I like to make spaghetti with a meat sauce - usually a mixture of ground beef and Italian sausage.  But more than that, I like to make my own Gizmo's - an Italian grinder made with ground beef and Italian sausage that I like so much from Carl's Gizmo at the Iowa State Fair.  (Click here to see the recipe I use to make my own Gizmo's. It's as close as you can get, according to someone who used to work for Carl Cardamon a few years ago.)  Carl's - like other places in Des Moines who make similar sandwiches - uses Graziano's sausage in bulk to make their signature sandwich.  

There's still that old world charm to Graziano Brothers when you walk in the door. Almost immediately, the smell of fresh herbs and spices sitting on the shelf in the first aisle hits your senses.  As you walk down the first aisle, there's an assortment of condiments and salad dressing, imported olives and olive oil, imported aged balsamic vinegars and sauces.  The grocery store also has a number of imported tomato sauces and canned tomatoes including San Marzano tomatoes - the kind I like to use when I make my tomato sauce from scratch - just across the aisle from the olive oil and balsamic vinegar.  

 
The bread aisle features a number of fresh baked breads from a local bakery - Amodeo's in suburban Clive .  They also have some artisan breads form South Union Bakery, as well.   Graziano's also has numerous types of domestic and imported pasta, and snack items including cannoli and biscuits.  

The focal point of the place is Graziano Brothers meat and cheese counter.  On their website, Graziano Brothers says there are over 400 different types of cheese that are made in Italy.  They can't possibly offer that much variety in cheese, but they claim to have the staples of Italian-style cheese from fresh Asiago to fresh Parmesan to fresh Mozzarella.

The meat counter isn't all that big, but they have their famous medium-hot Italian sausage in there, as well as prosciutto, salami and mortadella.  My neighbor, Murray, told me that he used to get "wet" salami at Graziano's when he lived in Des Moines years ago and was married to an Italian girl.  "My mother-in-law always told me to get the 'wet' salami rather than 'dry' salami," he told me.  When I told him I didn't know there was a difference in wet versus dry salami, he said, "I didn't either.  That is, until I got the 'wet' salami at Graziano's.  It's killer."  

There didn't appear to be a lot of bulk medium hot Graziano ground sausage in the case and when it came time for me to order I asked the lady behind the meat counter if she had any more on hand.  She sort of snorted a laugh out and said, "Oh, yeah.  I got a lot more than what's in there."  Actually, the last time I went there a few years ago, Graziano's was out of their signature ground sausage.  I ordered up five one-pound packages of the ground Italian sausage.  I figured that I'd freeze them all and use them up one or two pounds at a time.

After she got the sausage for me, I ordered up a quarter pound each of the "moist" salami, spicy cappicola, and pepperoni slices for Italian sandwiches.  I also got 8 slices of provolone cheese from the cheese case.  The only problem is that when I got home, I had Murray come down and we got into the "moist" salami.  He said, "Oh man!  This stuff is great!  You should have brought home a pound of it!"  He was right - it was gone quickly just from just snacking on it.  But the cappicola had a great flavor - some of the best cappicola I've ever had.  It had a great spicy bite to it.  And a quarter pound of pepperoni slices goes a long ways.  I was snacking on pepperoni slices throughout the day for the next couple three weeks.  I never was able to make one of my Italian sandwiches.  

Graziano Brothers has certainly been a fixture on the Des Moines food scene for over a century.  Their famous sausages and Italian meats have fed generations of families over the years.  The specialty Italian market is worth a visit to pick up pasta, olive oil, or tomato sauce.  This is a place that anyone would wish would be in their hometown.   I highly recommend a visit to Graziano Brothers if you get to Des Moines.  And don't forget your cooler.   (Note - Graziano Brothers is closed on Sundays.)

New York Deli - Appleton, WI

After checking out the Experimental Aircraft Association AirVenture Museum (click here to see my entry), I decided that I still had time to grab a quick sandwich before a scheduled appointment in Appleton.  I had a hankering for a good ol' pastrami on rye sandwich and I did an Urbanspoon search for deli's in the area.  The New York Deli came up and I found that it wasn't that far away from where I needed to go.  I put the address into the GPS and headed to get to the New York Deli.  

The New York Deli is owned by Don Sanderfoot and his son, Carl Sanderfoot.  A few years ago, the Sanderfoots went to New York and were impressed with the old school Jewish deli's that piled the meat high on fresh bread.  After returning to the Fox Valley area, the Sanderfoots saw a need for an authentic New York-style delicatessen.  They opened their New York Deli in 2004 providing deli and sub sandwiches, expanding into wraps, panini sandwiches, soups, salads, and dessert as the years went on.

The New York Deli is sort of hidden if you aren't familiar with it.  It's located on Casaloma Drive north of the Fox River Mall and near Time Warner Fox Cities Stadium that houses the local  Wisconsin Timber Rattlers Class A Midwest League baseball team.  (see map).  Technically, it's in the Trasino Park business area of the Appleton suburb of Grand Chute.  I found the New York Deli in a small strip mall on the north side of Casaloma.  

Inside, the deli is heavy on corrugated tin siding, but in an elegant way.  Granite tiled floors and somewhat modern industrial chairs and tables were mixed throughout the dining area.  The area was well lit with natural light from large windows on the south and west sides.   

 
The menu is located on the wall behind the front counter.   I pretty much knew what I was going to get, I just had to make sure they had rye bread.  And they did.  As I was standing at the counter getting ready to order, I saw a small bag of Sprecher's beer flavored kettle chips.  Sprecher's is a micro-brewery located just north of Milwaukee in suburban Glenview.  I don't like their beer as much as I like other Wisconsin beers - it's a little too sweet for my tastes - but they do make a damn fine root beer.  But the beer-flavored kettle chips intrigued me.  I had to pick up a package of them to try.

When I order pastrami sandwiches, I'm pretty basic.  All I want is the pastrami, some Swiss cheese and yellow mustard on rye bread.  And that's how I ordered my sandwich.  I also got a bottle of water to go along with the sandwich and chips.  After I ordered and paid, the young lady at the counter gave me a number tent to place on my table so they could bring my sandwich out to me.

I had to open the bag of beer flavored kettle chips while I waited for my sandwich to show up.  I don't know if they really tasted like beer or not.  They had that crisp kettle texture to them and they were a little salty.  But I think they were more hype than substance.  I made a mental note that I wouldn't be sucked in to buying them again.

After a few moments, someone brought my sandwich out to me.  True to New York-style delicatessens, the meat was piled high between two slices of dark rye bread.  Thin slices of Swiss cheese were on the bottom of the sandwich and a thin layer of yellow mustard adorned the top.

The thin-sliced pastrami was flavorful and had that great salty taste to it.  The dark rye bread was a little dry for my standards and it didn't hold together very well as I ate through the sandwich.  I found that I had to use my fingers to pick up pieces of pastrami that fell from the bread that was slowly fell apart as I ate.  It wasn't a deal breaker by any means, but it was slightly annoying.  

Some deli aficionados - especially those from New York City - would probably laugh at the sandwich from New York Deli.  But for Appleton, Wisconsin, it's not bad.  The pastrami was fresh and tasty.  However, the bread was a little dry and I won't get fooled again on the Sprecher's beer-flavored kettle chips.  But for a quick deli sandwich - from a place that tries to be a real deli - I was happy with what I got at the New York Deli.  It wasn't the best pastrami sandwich I've had, but it certainly wasn't the worst.

The Alley Rose - Kearney, NE

On our recent trip to Colorado, we drove from the Quad Cities to Denver.  Traveling with my wife, I usually don't push the trip as hard as I would if I were by myself.  A ten-hour drive with a couple stops for gas and bathroom breaks is doable for me.  Five hours in a car is almost too much for my wife.  We compromised and decided to make it out to Kearney, NE for the evening's stop, a little over halfway between home and Denver.  We spent the night at the Hampton Inn near Interstate 80 and it had been quite sometime since I was last in Kearney so I wasn't familiar with a lot of places to eat.  We asked the desk clerk for a nice place to eat and he immediately told us of a place called the Alley Rose in downtown Kearney.  "It's my favorite place in town," he told us.  We took off in the car to find the Alley Rose.

Quite actually, Kearney used to be one of my favorite places to travel to when I first became a rep on the road in the mid-80's.  Kearney State College - now called the University of Nebraska/Kearney - was the main landmark in town and it was pretty much known as a party town.  In fact, I was told many times by the locals - with a somewhat proud tone in their voices - that there were more liquor stores in Kearney, per capita, than any other place in the United States.  I remember there was something like 1 liquor store per 800 people in the city. 

I had only been out to Kearney once since 1991 and that was probably in 1999 or so.  There used to be a nice restaurant in the Hilltop Mall in Kearney that I liked to go to, but it was out of business by the late 90's.  My last time I was in Kearney, I ate at a Pizza Hut across from my hotel.  I think that was the last time I've purposely set foot in a Pizza Hut.  

The Alley Rose would have been open the last time I was in Kearney about 14 years ago.  Owner Shawn Engberg opened his restaurant in 1991.  Over the years he built up a steady clientle with lunch and dinner six days a week (they're closed on Sunday) and their wine offerings have been recognized by Wine Spectator magazine.  Head chef Zach Nelson oversees the menus at the Alley Rose.  It is known as the place for receptions and dinner gatherings in Kearney.  

We found the Alley Rose on the east side of Central Avenue in downtown Kearney (see map).  There's still a large bar presence in the downtown area and the University of Nebraska was playing football that evening. Understandably, the bars were packed with fans and parking was a premium in the downtown area.  We finally found a car backing out of a spot across the street from the Alley Rose and we quickly pulled in and walked across the quiet street to the restaurant.  

Walking into the restaurant, we were greeted by a young lady at the hostess stand.  She asked us if we would like to sit in the Western rustic-themed bar area or in the more elegant dining room.  I looked at Cindy and she immediately took a look at the two choices.  The bar was nice, it had a lot of dark panel and a large fire place as a center piece on the wall across from the bar.  But the dining room was nicer with heavy tables and high-backed booths along one of the red brick walls with an antique tin ceiling.  On a riser near the front of the dining room were a handful of tables and an elderly lady playing flowing tunes on a baby grand piano.  Cindy said, "Let's do the dining room."   We were led to one of the booths along the north wall of the dining room and given dinner menus to look through.   

 
We were greeted by our server for the evening, Kiley.  She was dressed in a tuxedo vest and white shirt with a black skirt - stylish and elegant.  She took our drink order - I started off with a beer and Cindy got a glass of the Fetzer cabernet.  She asked us if we wanted an appetizer to start out and I noticed that they had pale ale beer battered onion rings.  I'm a sucker for good beer battered onion rings, but having the batter made with the forward hoppy taste of pale ale beer piqued my interest.  Plus, it was the lowest priced appetizer that included prosciutto-stuffed mushrooms (but my wife hates mushrooms), crab cakes, a tequila-lime shrimp that is flash-cooked in a pan tableside, and something they called "Black and Bleu Mussels", a pound of bleu mussels steamed in a white wine stock along with hickory-smoked bacon, Cajun seasonings, garlic and Roma tomatoes.  It was then topped with gorgonzola cheese crumbles and served with small slices of crostini.  To be honest, I almost jumped on the bleu mussels for my main entree for the evening.  But we ended up getting the onion rings to start.  

It wasn't long after we ordered the onion rings that Kiley brought out the onion rings.  Piled high on the plate, we both knew there was no way we were going to eat the whole plate.  Or, if we did eat the whole plate, we wouldn't have anything else.   The sweet Spanish onion rings were coated with a thick, but flakey crust of pale ale batter that had been deep-fried to a golden color.  A kind of ranch/garlic sauce with some Cajun seasonings mixed in was served with the rings.  The onion rings didn't need any help, though.  They were simply outstanding on their own.

Beef and seafood dominated the menu at the Alley Rose.  They had steaks such as a Flat Iron steak that is a popular cut in Nebraska.  In fact, some people feel the Flat Iron-cut is the tastiest part of the cow.  For years, butchers threw away the top shoulder blade of the cow because of an inedible connective tissue through the cut.  Once agricultural scientists at the University of Nebraska/Lincoln found a way to cut the meat into a tri-angled shape cut of beef (it looked like an old flat iron), the popularity of the beef took off.  In fact, some high-end steak houses in New York City tout the Flat Iron as their best cut of beef at a reasonable price. 

But the New York strip au poivre - a 14 oz. New York strip rubbed with cracked peppercorns and served with a cognac stock reduction sauce - caught my eye.   As did the prime rib - I haven't had prime rib in quite sometime.  And something that I didn't expect to see on the menu - a pork shank osso bucco - also got me thinking.  

They also had a number of sandwiches on their dinner menu including burgers, a club sandwich, a couple wraps and something called the Chicken Cordon Bleu Melt - a grilled chicken breast topped with smoked pit ham, mozzarella cheese, and a hollandaise sauce and served on toasted pretzel bun.  Their sandwiches all looked interesting and I was already trying to figure out if we'd be back through Kearney in time for lunch on our trip back home the next week.  

It was down to the prime rib or the New York strip au poivre for me.  But Cindy had made up her mind to get the steak au poivre.  I said, "OK, you order the au poivre and I'll get the prime rib."  And that's exactly what we did.  I asked Kiley if she could ask the chef to get me the rarest piece of prime rib that he had.  That usually means a good solid medium-rare at most places.  She said she'd see what she could do.  And for funsies, I also ordered up some sauteed mushrooms.  

In the meantime, Kiley invited us to go over to their salad bar.  Now, we had finished about half the plate of onion rings and we were worried that piling on at the salad bar would completely wreck our dinner.  It turned out that the salad bar wasn't that large, but had enough things to make it interesting.  I grabbed some greens and a little bit of their pasta salad.  The pasta salad was very good - I wished I would have gotten a little more.  But the greens were fresh and the housemade parmesan-peppercorn dressing was very good.

They also had thin slices of prime rib wrapped around green onion stalks.  Those, too, were unbelievably great.  It was stupid at how easy it is to make something like that and how great it tastes. 

Cindy got some things from the salad bar, but also got a cup of housemade chicken soup served in a tomato-based broth.  She said, "Oh, my gosh!  You've got to try this soup!"  It had large chunks of chicken breast in a light tomato broth.  It was actually pretty good.  But we made sure not to overeat on the salad bar offerings because we had a lot of food still to come.  

While we were enjoying the items from the salad bar, Kiley brought out some homemade bread that was sort of like a focaccia bread with chunks of mushrooms baked on top (below left).  The bread was light, airy, chewy and flavorful.  It went great with the salad.  Even my wife, who doesn't like mushrooms, liked the bread. 

 
After we finished our salads, we were served a small cup of fruit sorbet as a palate cleanser (above right).  It was an unexpected nice touch to what was turning out to be an A-Plus meal.  I decided that I wanted to get a glass of wine to go with our main entrees and I ordered a glass of the 14 Hands cabernet.  

Kiley brought out our steaks to the table not long after that.  Cindy's New York strip au poivre didn't have as much cracked peppercorns on them as I thought it would and the cognac sauce wasn't all that noticeable.  She got a medley of grilled vegetables with halves of roasted red potatoes.  Although the strip steak wasn't that big in area, the thickness made up for the lack of real estate.   

 
The prime rib was a slab-o-beef.   Thick cut and juicy, the prime rib had a bright pink color looking more like a rare-plus cut of meat.  But the meat was warm like a medium-rare and wasn't all that fatty.  I, too, got a grilled veggie medley with roasted red potatoes, but I knew I wouldn't be touching any of those.  But there was a sauce server filled with sliced sauteed mushrooms in which I was going to make a significant dent.

The prime rib was excellent.  It had great flavor and was very tender.  Dipped in the au jus sauce gave it a nice little punch in taste.  But the au jus wasn't as salty as you find in other places.  And the sauteed mushrooms were a great taste sensation with the beef.  And the full-bodied 14 Hands cabernet was a perfect compliment to the big taste of the prime rib.  This was simply a great meal.  

Cindy offered me a couple bites of her steak.  Although the taste was good, I was glad I went with the prime rib and not the steak au poivre.  It didn't have much of a peppery taste and I like more of a creamy sauce with my steak au poivre than the cognac reduction sauce that was served with the New York strip.  It was a mild steak au poivre in my estimation.  Most people would probably like it that way, but if I were to go back at some point and order the New York strip au poivre, I'd tell the server to have the chef "step on it" with the peppercorns.  

We both made significant progress on our meat, but there was no way that I could finish the whole prime rib that was served to me.  Nor could Cindy make it all the way through the strip au poivre.  We still had a lot of veggies left on the plates (although I did burn through all the sauteed mushrooms) and we sill had about half a plate of onion rings left to eat.  When Kiley came back and asked if we wanted anything boxed up, we told her we were traveling and didn't have a refrigerator in our room.  Cindy said, "Besides, onion rings generally don't taste that good reheated in a microwave."  

Kiley said, "You know, for some reason, ours warm up wonderfully in a microwave.  That's probably the number one thing that people have us box up to take home."  

When Kiley asked if we wanted to see the dessert tray, I groaned and said, "No way."  But my wife had other ideas.  She asked our server to bring the tray over to take a closer look.  Mixed in with the desserts was a key lime pie.  Kiley admitted that it wasn't made in house, but she said it was still pretty good.  Even with my protestations, Cindy order a piece of the key lime pie with two forks.

Unfortunately, the key lime pie was - by far - the lowlight of the meal.  The pie was drab in taste and even the lime slices that we squeezed onto the top of the small slice didn't liven things up.  Cindy said, "You make much better key lime pie at home.  This is not very good."  We didn't finish the pie.  

After finishing up and paying the bill, we walked around the restaurant and found a number of awards and plaques for excellence the Alley Rose had gathered for both their food and wine selection.  I'll have to say that I was thoroughly impressed with nearly everything I had at the Alley Rose.

The Alley Rose was about as best of a meal that you can have in Kearney.  Heck, it would have been about the best meal you could have in a market that was ten times the size of Kearney.  I've eaten in a lot of nice steak houses in my day and I would put the Alley Rose up against some of the best. Everything stuck out as being a great experience from the time we walked in the door at the Alley Rose.  It was a little pricey - it was well over $100 bucks for the dinner and drinks before tip.  And we left a lot of good food behind.  There's other places to eat in Kearney, but I'll have to say the experience we had at the Alley Rose was top notch and I wholeheartedly recommend going there if you get the chance. 

Taxco Restaurant - Sycamore, IL

A shout out today to my long-lost friend (and newly inducted member of the Iowa Rock and Roll Hall of Fame), John Christensen, who turned me on to a Mexican restaurant in the town of Sycamore, IL by the name of Taxco Restaurant.  John and his wife, Cindy, moved from St. Charles, IL out to nearby Maple Grove, IL earlier this year and he texted me one night with a simple message, "Got a new place for you!  For authentic Mexican food, this place beats a lot of them!"  On a recent trip home from Chicago, I got off I-88 outside of DeKalb and went north to Sycamore to give Taxco a try.  

The original Taxco Mexican restaurant was located in the Irving Park neighborhood on the near north side of Chicago.  Taxco in Chicago opened in 1985, but closed toward the end of 2010.  Born in Mexico and moving to the U.S. at the age of 17, Jesus Romero joined his uncle in Chicago working at the original Taxco.  The young Romero worked at Taxco and a number of other area Mexican restaurants before moving out to Sycamore in 1992 to open what was originally called Taxco Restaurant Too, but was eventually just shortened to Taxco Restaurant.  The Taxco in Sycamore still uses fresh ingredients and makes tortillas daily on a small tortilla table that's located in their front window, and they make their guacamole at the table with the ingredients placed on a movable cart that can be wheeled throughout the restaurant.  

Taxco the restaurant is named after Jesus Romero's uncle's home city - Taxco de Alarcón - located in south central Mexico.  Taxco is famous for their silver mines, silversmiths and jewelers that make jewelry out of silver.  (Hence, the "silver city" in Taxco Restaurant's logo.) 

Sycamore is far from Taxco de Alarcón, both in terms of mileage and the makeup of the town.  Sycamore is one of those Midwestern towns that has a bustling downtown area with parking meters that charge 10 cents for two hours.  I found Taxco on the main drag - State Street (see map) - and I found on street parking just down the way on Somonauk St.  

As I entered Taxco, I saw the tortilla table in the front window, then was surprised to find a bar that featured over 350 different types of tequila on its shelves.  Taxco boasts that they have the biggest selection of tequila in the state of Illinois and I have no reason to doubt them after looking at rows and rows of tequila bottles on the shelves.   

 
I was seated in a booth in the first of two dining rooms at Taxco.  I was given a menu by the lady who sat me and she asked me what I'd like to drink.  I asked if they had Sol beer at Taxco and she said, "I believe we do!"  And they did as she brought it out to me moments later along with a frosted mug.    

The menu at Taxco features a large number of authentic Mexican dishes including beef, chicken, pork and seafood specialties.  They have a lunch menu that is served Tuesday thru Friday from 11 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and has a lot of the same entrees that the dinner menu features, only smaller in size.  

Another server brought over some chips and salsa, telling me that she'd be right back to take my order.  I was fine with that.  The menu was so extensive that I needed some time to go through it.  The chips were warm and the housemade salsa was flavorful with a nice little bite to the taste.  

Because there were so many things on the menu, I was having a little bit of trouble figuring out what I wanted.  I saw that they had enchiladas verdes - seasoned ground beef enchiladas topped with a spicy green tomatillo sauce.  But I also noticed the al pastor tacos - seasoned pork tacos topped with chopped onions and cilantro. They also had a combo plate consisting of a pork tamale, a marinated steak taco and a cheese enchilada.  Decisions, decisions...

I finally figured out what I was going to order, but my server was nowhere in sight.  The lunch crowd had thinned out and the lady who seated me and got me my beer was clearing tables.  I think I sat there for about 10 minutes before the other lady finally showed her face, carrying a couple plates to a table across the way.  She, too, began to start to clear tables and I finally caught her attention as she was heading back toward the kitchen.  She said, "I'll be right back!"  

And after a few moments she was.  I ended up ordering the enchilada verdes - the lunch selection had two enchiladas with refried beans and rice.  And I asked if I could order an al pastor taco, ala carte.  She said it would be no problem.  

My food came out in a few more moments and I was glad I only got two enchiladas.  The enchiladas were covered in a large amount of the tomatillo sauce and cheese with a significant dollop of sour cream on top.  Actually, the sour cream sort of took away some of the taste of the slightly spicy green sauce.  But the seasoned beef in combination with the green sauce was very good.  

Sort of a nice little touch was the tortilla cup that was filled with refried beans.  The beans weren't much to talk about about, but I don't think I'd ever seen refried beans served that way.

The al pastor taco had two soft corn tortillas topped with a large amount of pork that was marinated in some sort of a citrus fruit concoction.  It tasted kind of like a sweet mango marinade and it had a good taste.  The fresh onions and cilantro on top of the meat was a great taste combination with the citrus marinade pork.  It was a unique taste, one that I'd never experienced in a pork taco before. The food at Taxco was as good as my friend, John, advertised.  

Other than the small hiccup in service, I thought my Taxco experience was exquisite.  The food was very authentic for Mexican food and I really liked both the enchiladas verde and my al pastor taco.   Even though it's located in small Illinois town, I'd put Taxco up against any Mexican restaurant in any large Midwestern city.  It's worth the little trip out from the western suburbs of Chicago and a little diversion off of Interstate 88.  

Colorado

We took a trip out to Colorado late this summer. It's been something that we've wanted to do for quite sometime.  Cindy hadn't been out to the Rocky Mountains since the mid-70's when she was a little girl, and I hadn't been out to the mountains since the mid to late 80's. (Although I've been to Denver many times for business over the years.)  I had a lot of Hilton Honors points saved up, so we spent many of our nights in Hilton properties, including The Curtis Hotel, a fun, funky and edgy hotel in downtown Denver.  (Click here to see my entry on The Curtis.)  We spent time in Denver, Boulder, Estes Park, and Colorado Springs ending up on top of Pikes Peak (pictured above).  The weather each day was warm to almost hot - temperatures were in the 90's at lower elevations with temps in the mid-80's at higher elevations.  It was even sort of warm on Pikes Peak - 48 degrees around 10:30 in the morning.  

We were lucky - the next week was when all the horrific flooding hit the areas we were at the week before.  We walked along beautiful Boulder Creek one warm afternoon and a week later it was a raging torrent of water. (Pictured left - courtesy ABC News) Roads in and out of Estes Park were closed due to flood damage.  The town of Manitou Springs outside of Colorado Springs was completely cut off by flood waters for a couple three days.  We took the road through the Big Thompson River canyon from Estes Park to Loveland and today the road is impassible due to damage from flooding.  It will be months before many of the roads will be fixed and reopen.  

Like I say, we were lucky. We met some people from Grinnell, IA (which is near where I grew up) at a rest area on our way home.  They were heading out to Colorado and up to Estes Park and the Rocky Mountain National Park.  We told them we had just been out there and that the weather - save for the occasional mountain rain shower - had just been beautiful.  I'm sure they got caught up in the mountains during the storms.  

In order to help save money, we decided to drive out to Colorado.  We made it out to Kearney, NE the first day, about a seven hour drive from the Quad Cities.  Then we drove the rest of the way to Denver the next day.  During the Kearney to Denver part of the trip, a near-disaster happened as I hit a 6"X6" block of wood going 80 miles an hour on Interstate 76 about 160 miles from Denver. I couldn't change lanes and I was on a bridge which had no shoulder to veer into.  It flattened the tire and we had to wait for 60 minutes in the literal middle of nowhere until AAA showed up to change the tire for us.  Then we had to drive 45 miles to Sterling, CO on a space-saver spare tire to wait in line at a WalMart to see if the tire was salvageable.  It was not, but the rim was OK, thank God.  After sitting at a WalMart in Sterling for over two hours, I bought a new tire and we ventured on to Denver.  We had expected to be sitting in the Cherry Cricket having one of my all-time favorite burgers around noon that day, but we ended up getting there about four hours late.  That was lunch and dinner for us that day.

The next day, we went up to Coors Field to buy tickets for a Colorado Rockies game the following evening.  Cindy has been a Rockies fan for about four years and I've promised to take her to a game when we went to Colorado.  It turned out the Los Angeles Dodgers were in town and we got a couple tickets along the first base line for the game.  

 
After getting our tickets, I had always wanted to go out to the Red Rocks Amphitheater, one of the more famous concert venues in the world.  Formed out of rock formations, Red Rocks seats just under 9500 people and hosts all types of musical performances from late April/early May until early October.  

One of the things that amazed me about Red Rocks were the number of people there using the facility to work out.  Dozens of people were running the rows or jumping steps from the bottom of the amphitheater to the top in the light mountain air (Red Rocks is about 6400 feet above sea level).  I went down to the stage against my better judgement - it's a long way back up those steps and I had to stop several times to catch my breath.  But it was worth it to get a picture like this:

This is center stage at Red Rocks, the same stage that has hosted the likes of the Beatles, Grateful Dead, Tom Petty, Jimi Hendrix, Dave Matthews Band and Bruce Springsteen.  U2's breakout concert video "Under a Blood Red Sky" was filmed at Red Rocks in 1983.  I was frankly surprised that the stage wasn't built up all that much and the people in the first row were almost at the same height as the stage deck.  

After getting back up the hundreds of steps to the top of the amphitheater, we went down into the museum that they have on the grounds.  They had a number of plaques with a yearly list of performers who had played at Red Rocks since the early 60's.  I didn't know that they banned rock acts at Red Rocks for nearly five years in the early to mid 70's due to a riot that broke out during a Jethro Tull show in 1971.  Over 1000 people without tickets to the sold out show came out to Red Rocks and some rushed the gates trying to get in.  Denver police responded with tear gas and it became known as the Riot at Red Rocks.  A promoter successfully sued the city to allow rock acts to be re-booked into Red Rocks in 1976 and the venue annually won the Pollstar award for best concert venue.  In fact, Red Rocks won so many times that they were eventually taken out of consideration and the award for best concert venue was renamed the Red Rocks Award.

From Red Rocks, we drove up to Boulder, a place that Cindy hadn't spent much time in, if any.  The Pearl Street Mall was active that day and we stopped into a small brewpub along Pearl Street for a couple beers and some appetizers.  (We had a big breakfast that morning at Sam's No. 3, the great breakfast place in downtown Denver.  Click here to see my entry on Sam's No. 3.  I had a sausage, mushroom and cheese omelet topped with Sam's exceptional green pork chili.  It was outstanding.) 

Our second day in Denver took us over to the Denver Botanic Gardens, a wonderful urban setting filled with colorful flowers and plants with a number of sculptures with walkways through small ponds, around fountains, through herb and flower gardens.  Even though it was over 90 degrees outside, it was a great place to go and hang out for a couple hours.  

 
We took a number of pictures of flowers and lingered about to enjoy the late summer day.  It was a very relaxing place to be in the middle of a large urban area.  

We went to see the Colorado Rockies play the Dodgers that evening.  We went to see a series in St. Louis between the Cardinals and the Rockies about three or four years ago.  Our seats were right in front of the Colorado family seating area at Busch Stadium.  During each of the three games, a young Hispanic woman with a baby was seated behind Cindy.  She was the wife of one of the Rockies relief pitchers and she spoke little to no English.  She was so shy and quiet that Cindy fell in love with her and her baby.  And it didn't help that the Rockies swept the Cardinals in St. Louis that weekend, so Cindy became a Rockies fan.  That's one of the reasons why we have the Major League package on DirecTV just so Cindy can watch the Rockies play. 

Coors Field was a very nice ballpark and we sat about 30 rows above the Rockies dugout so we could get a glimpse of both the field, but also the purple foothills of the Rocky Mountains off in the distance.  We had a pretty bad hot dog (it was $1 Hot Dog night) and a few beers.  Surprisingly, they sold Budweiser products at Coors Field.  Frankly, I was completely surprised with that.  I knew that they sold a number of Colorado microbrews at the ballpark, but I thought that with the merger of the Miller and Coors breweries they'd keep Budweiser out of the concession stands.  They certainly don't have Budweiser products at Miller Park in Milwaukee, just like they don't have Miller or Coors products at Busch Stadium in St. Louis.  Oh, yeah.  I had a Budweiser at the game.  

The next morning, we took off up through Boulder to Estes Park and the Rocky Mountain National Park.  It had been years - back in the 70's - from the last time either of us had been up in the park.  Cindy wanted to go hiking.  I'm in no shape to go hiking - especially on mountainous terrain at over 9,000 feet above sea level.  So we found some easier hiking areas.  I'd call it hiking - Cindy would call it "taking a stroll".   

This a panoramic shot of Bear Lake, one of the most popular spots in the park.  We got up there around 10:30 and we were told by a park ranger that no parking was available and that we'd have to go back down the road and catch a shuttle bus back up to Bear Lake if we wanted to walk around it.  Fortunately, we did the loop around the parking lot and a car was pulling out when we were coming up to it.  We whipped in to take the parking space and we were able to go on our little hike around the lake without any delay.  

Later in the day, we decided to take U.S Highway 34 - known as Trail Ridge Road - the road that takes you up to the Alpine Visitor Center in the park and further on to Milner Pass which sits on the Continental Divide.  Cindy was there as a little girl and I was there in the mid-70's.  I don't remember the road being as winding and somewhat scary as the first time I drove it.  But I was young and dumb - as compared to old and dumb, now - and things didn't scare me as much as they do now.  First of all, I don't like heights.  Secondly, I have a tendency to drift to the right while driving and looking at stuff.  When you begin to get up toward the tree line on Trail Ridge Road there are no safety rails or no road shoulder on the roadway.  A quick turn to the right and we'd be over the side.  That's all I could think about as we kept going up and up the mountain road.  

On top of all that, we started to encounter a nice little mountain shower at about 8500 feet above sea level.  However, the nice little rain soon turned into a torrential downpour and then it began to hail around 9000 feet.  We reached Rainbow Curve on the road and there is a parking lot that looks out into a large valley.  A number of cars were parked there waiting out the hail storm.  The hail stones were small - about pea-sized - but they were starting to accumulate.  We waited about 15 minutes before venturing on. 

When we started out heading up Trail Ridge Road, the temperature was a beautiful 82 degrees F.  By the time we hit the rain and hail, the temperature had dropped to the mid-40's.  With water rushing down the road straight at us along with accumulating hail on the roadway, it made for a treacherous slow climb up the mountain road.  Remember, there's no guard rails or shoulders between the roadway and sliding 7000 feet down the mountain to a certain death.  My sphincter was tight and I was nervous as all hell.  Finally at about 10,500 feet - about three miles from the Alpine Visitor Center and another 10 miles to the Continental Divide - I found a little turn-in on the opposite side of the road.  I pulled in there, turned around and started back down the mountain.  Cindy protested, "If you're that nervous, I can drive!"  Uh, no you can't, dear. I'd be in the passenger seat looking straight down the mountain from the roadway.   She finally realized that the conditions were too treacherous - my acrophobia be damned.  We made it back down the mountain, out of the rain and into Estes Park.

We stayed at a place that we found on the Internet, the Appenzell Inn.  It was a Swiss-chalet-style hotel with rooms that opened to a common deck that overlooked the mountains in Rocky Mountain National Park.  It had a little restaurant/lounge there where we went and had a drink on their patio deck, but decided to eat elsewhere.  We saw the menu for both dinner and breakfast.  We wouldn't have had a problem eating either meal there, but we're the adventurous types who like to find stuff.  And if we had eaten at the Appenzell Inn that evening we would have missed the best meal on our trip.  

 
Estes Park is still a tourist-based place, although it isn't quite as schlocky as I remember it to be over 30 years ago.  (I particularly missed the Ripley's Believe It or Not Museum that I remember seeing on my previous visit to the area years ago.)  It was also one of the very few places where we saw any type of indigenous wildlife.  A herd of elk were grazing on the fairways of the Lake Estes Executive Golf Course just down the road from our hotel.  We counted a total of 16 elk including this big-assed buck (above right) that had about a dozen points on his rack.

 
We went back up into the park the next day and started to take backroads that we found on the map.  We saw waterfalls, rushing trout-filled streams that emptied into beautiful mountain lakes, and stunning vistas.  We hiked up rocky formations, down through grass laden valleys and stopped off at scenic overlooks to get pictures such as the one below of Long's Peak, the tallest mountain in the park.

It was around 2:30 when we decided to head down the road through Big Thompson Canyon, toward Loveland and down Interstate 25 through Denver and on to Colorado Springs.  The only problem was that the Denver Broncos were slated to open their season that evening and coupled with rush hour traffic and a wreck that turned the road into a parking lot, it took us about 90 minutes to drive through Denver.  

When we got into Colorado Springs it was just after 6 p.m.  We saw an exit for the Garden of the Gods, a national natural landmark in Colorado Springs.  Cindy had that on her list of places to see and we took the exit and ended up at the park (see map).  The sun angle was perfect for taking pictures of the rocky faced sandstone towers with deep crevices in the face of the walls.  The rocky formations are popular with technical-trained rock climbers and there were a handful of guys who were scaling the sandstone walls while we were there.  

 

The Garden of the Gods was originally owned by railroad magnate and a resident of Iowa, Charles Elliott Perkins.  Perkins was the president of the  Chicago, Burlington and Quincy railway and he purchased much of the land that was home to the Garden of the Gods in 1879.  Upon his death in 1907, his will instructed the family to turn over the land to the city of Colorado Springs with the provision that it would always be a free public park.  On Christmas Day in 1909, Perkins' family turned the land over to the city.  The city purchased more land around the park over the years and it is now up to over 1350 acres that includes a visitor and nature center across the road from the park entrance.  

As the sun set and pictures became harder to come by, we decided to head to our hotel for the evening.  We stayed at the historic Antlers Hilton in downtown Colorado Springs.  General William Palmer founded Colorado Springs in 1871 with the intention of making it a tourist destination with the many therapeutic mineral springs in the area.  He opened his high-end Victorian-style resort, The Antlers, in 1873 and it became a popular stop with people seeking Colorado Springs' warm days and dry climate.  The original Antlers burned to the ground in 1898 and was rebuilt later that year.  The second incarnation of The Antlers hotel lasted until 1964 when it was demolished and a new, modern hotel was built in its spot.  That is Antlers Hilton of today.  

The Antlers also holds the distinction of being the place that Katharine Lee Bates, a visiting teacher at Colorado College, wrote "America the Beautiful".  After taking a trip by wagon and mules up to the summit of Pikes Peak, Bates went back to her hotel room and penned the words for the song.  Several years later, a hymn song adopted the words and it became the song that we know today.  

When I booked the room on-line, it indicated that we would get a "corner room, city view".  Knowing that they had stunning views of Pikes Peak and other mountains in the range west of Colorado Springs, I requested an upgrade for a charge for a mountain-view room during the reservation process.  When we checked in to the Antlers Hilton that evening, the young lady behind the desk was extremely helpful, treating the two tired and weary travelers who looked rather disheveled after a long day of hiking and driving like royalty.  She said, "Oh, by the way, we were able to honor your request of a mountain-view room and we were able to get you into a corner room like we had you in originally."  The room was on the northwest corner on the 11th floor, and when we woke up the next morning around 6:30 this is the sight we saw out of the west window of our room.  Pikes Peak was getting the first rays of sunshine while the foothills in front of it were still in the shadows.  The picture taken through the glass window doesn't do the scene justice.  It was breathtaking.     

That morning, we set off for Manitou Springs, just south and west of Colorado Springs, to go to the Pikes Peak Cog Railway, the world's highest operating rack railway.  The diesel locomotives are fitted with cog gears on the bottom and still use conventional tracks for the train.  This allows trains to work at grades better than 7%, the maximum grade allowed for conventional adhesion track rail trains.  The grade going up to Pikes Peak was as much as 25%.  

We initially contemplated driving up to the top of Pikes Peak, but I decided that if I had trouble with getting up to the Continental Divide in Rocky Mountain National Park, I'd probably have trouble getting up the steep Pikes Peak Highway.  We decided to look into the Cog Railway and we had our choice of either first thing in the morning at 9:20 a.m. or late in the afternoon.  We took the morning train.   

The train was nearly full and the seats in the cars face one another.  Most of the people on the train were either old retired people or families with little kids.  We were lucky to get paired with a couple from Los Angeles who were about our age.  He owned a software company that dealt with many of the movie and television production studios in Southern California.  It was quite evident that they had money, but they were also very nice and down to earth.   

Most of the 90 minute ride up was punctuated by commentary from our guide, a younger guy who had kind of a strange delivery that made him sound somewhat annoying after listening to him after about a half hour.  But he did point out some interesting landmarks and I did learn a few things.  For one thing, I found out that Zebulon Pike was not the first man to go to the top of Pikes Peak.  That honor went to a man by the name of Edwin James.  Pike led a group to explore parts of the Louisiana Purchase in 1806 and ended up in what would eventually be the Colorado Springs area.  They tried to ascend to the peak of the tallest mountain in the region three times during the fall of 1806, but were turned back by weather each time.  Fourteen years later, Edwin James was part of an expedition to explore the region and he is the first documented white man to climb to the top of Pikes Peak.  When he sought to have the mountain named "James Peak", he found out there was already a James Peak in the region.  He then decided to call it "Pikes Peak" after the man who first documented the sight of the mountain years before.  After his service was over, Edwin James settled in Burlington, IA and lived there the rest of his life.  (That's the second Burlington, IA/Colorado Springs-area historical connection that we found in our visit to the area.)   

 
The terrain heading up was a mix of rocks, coniferous trees and running mountain brooks.  The side of the train we were on gave us good views of the mountain.  However, the other side of the train had some breathtaking views of valleys between the mountains.  We couldn't get any pictures of those views that looked good.

We began to get up to the alpine tundra of the mountain and the trees began to disappear above the tree line.  Since it was late summer, there was little to no snow on the mountain.  Before we decided to go up to the top of Pikes Peak, we found that the temperature at the summit usually doesn't get above 50 degrees F.  A sometimes stiff breeze can make for a chilly visit to the top.  I hadn't packed any jeans or brought a coat with me (like I said - the temps were in the 90's in the lower elevations and in the 80's further up the mountains).  We had to stop at a store before we got to Colorado Springs to buy a pair of jeans and a sweat shirt for me to wear. 

 
Less than a mile from the summit, we had to stop for a moment because a herd of big-horned sheep decided to use part of the tracks as a resting place.  The engineer of the train couldn't plow through them, so we had to wait until they got up from the tracks and got safely out of the way.  Most of the sheep were young, but there was a young male (to the left in the picture above right) who was beginning to get his horns.  

We made it to the top and, quite actually, the weather was very nice.  There was little to no breeze, the temperature was in the mid-40's, but with the light atmosphere and being closer to the sun than you'd be 14,000 feet lower it felt warm.  I realized that I could have gotten by with just a sweat shirt and a pair of shorts.  The views from the summit were spectacular as shown by the picture at the very top of this blog entry and this picture of Cindy.  Most of the air was hazy closer to the valleys.  The light air also made me a little woozy at first, feeling a little light-headed when we first got off the train.  After a few minutes, I got a little more acclimated to the thin air, but it was still a little disconcerting.  

When we were at the top of Pikes Peak, Cindy remarked that there were no cars in the parking area.  She asked someone who was working at the gift shop/restaurant on the summit what the deal was because she remembered driving up Pikes Peak with her family when she was a little girl.  The lady told Cindy, "Oh, the road up to the peak is closed.  There's some movie company filming on the road today and they didn't want any cars getting in the way."  It turned out that they were filming scenes from an upcoming "Fast and Furious" movie.  So, even if we wanted to drive up Pikes Peak that day, we wouldn't have been able to.

After about 35 to 40 minutes on the summit, we made our way back down the mountain on the cog train talking with the couple across from us.  The lady was originally from Western Colorado and they were heading out to her hometown of Montrose after spending the weekend in Colorado Springs watching their nephew play for the Air Force Academy football team.   They were telling us that there were some spectacular state parks in Western Colorado and Eastern Utah that they were going to visit.  The guy told us, "Forget the national parks and the tourist areas.  The state parks are the hidden gems."  Cindy immediately put "check out Colorado and Utah state parks when we get home" on her to-do list.  

It took us about an hour to get back down the mountain and we took off back to the Antlers Hilton to change our clothes thanks to a late check out I'd asked for the night before.  After lunch, I wanted to find out where the United States Olympic Training Facility was and we drove there to take a look around.  Actually, there wasn't much to see without taking a tour of the facility.  We looked through the grounds, the gift shop and a hall of fame that they had in the Visitors Center.  We were there about a half-hour, tops.  Still, it was neat to see.  

 
We had heard there were some nice falls in the area and one person told us to forget about the highly tourist-y Seven Falls - "They charge you for everything," we were told. "And it's not that great for the price."  On that person's recommendation, we ended up at the Helen Hunt Falls named after Helen Hunt Jackson, a 19th century writer, poet and activist for Native American causes, and not after the actress Helen Hunt.  Actually, it was pretty underwhelming.  

After seeking out and quickly finding the spectacular Broadmoor resort, we made a loop around the property looking at the stately buildings, golf course and spa areas.  We could have parked the car in a ramp that was designated for day visitors and taken a closer look around, but it was getting later in the day and I still wanted to make it up to the Air Force Academy to look around before the sun set.  I have my mind made up that I'd like to spend a couple more days exploring in and around Colorado Springs at some point down the road.  

We made it up to the Air Force Academy a little before 6 p.m.  Technically, visitors hours end at 6, but they still let us through the check point after a quick look at our identification and a snoop through the trunk of the car.  We immediately drove to the heart of the academy and found the beautiful Air Force Chapel.  Since it was after 5 p.m., the chapel was closed so we couldn't take a look inside to see all the colors radiating from the stained glass windows. We hung around the grounds for awhile, learning about some of the buildings and looking at the parade walk and honor court that was just below us near the chapel.  We ended up driving around, going over to see the football stadium - Falcon Stadium - and taking in a few other sights before we headed back to Denver for the evening and the start of our journey home the next morning.  Cindy and I decided that our time in Colorado Springs was too short, that we could have cut our earlier stay in Denver down to two nights and done two nights in Colorado Springs.   There was just more that I wanted to see in Colorado Springs and we didn't have the time.  

Our trip to Colorado was too short, but we certainly saw a lot of things.  We'd like to get back at some point to see more out of the way things such as some of the state parks in the Western part of the state and to go to the heart of the Rocky Mountains in the central part of the state.  Denver is a nice town, as is Boulder. And Colorado Springs is a great town, too.  But we found that the traffic anywhere we went is somewhat annoying.  We could easily see why people want to live in Colorado.  It's beautiful, the weather is nice most of the time and it has a very vibrant feel with the people.  I suppose like anywhere you'd get used to the traffic, but it was certainly good to get back home to the Quad Cities.  

Riefe's - Davenport, IA

When it comes to comfort food for us on the Iowa side of the Quad Cities, we have a triumvirate of places that we go to - Harlan's (click here to see the entry on Harlan's); Ross' (click here to see the entry on Ross'); and an old stand-by that has been in west Davenport for well over 60 years - Riefe's (pronounced REE-fee's). Our neighbors, Murray and Mary, were raving about the meatloaf to us one afternoon. "Meatloaf Monday", Murray said.  "It's tough to beat."  On a recent Monday night date night, Cindy and I decided to go to Riefe's for some comfort food and to try the meatloaf. 

Del Riefe was going to college in the mid-1940's. In the summertime, he and a fraternity buddy ran a small drive-in stand on the Iowa side of what is now the I-74 bridge over the Mississippi.  After Del graduated from college and married his high school sweetheart, Mary Jane, the young couple took off for the promised land of California.  However, Del found jobs tough to come by after World War II ended and Mary Jane became pregnant.  Del's father, local grocer Orville Riefe, proposed a deal for the young couple to come back to Iowa and help out in a small drive-in restaurant he was looking to buy in west Davenport with the promise to turn the business over to Del sometime down the road.  

Riefe's Drive-In opened in 1946 and featured burgers, tenderloins and chicken - all of which were served by car hops.  The business moved to its present day location along West Locust in Davenport (see map) in 1948.  True to his word, Orville Riefe soon turned the reins over to his son, but he continued to work in the restaurant business for nearly 40 more years.  

Sensing changing times in the restaurant business, Del Riefe tore down the drive-in building in 1960 and constructed a 45-seat diner on the same plot of land.  11 years later, Rick Riefe joined his father in the family business and in 1980, Dan Riefe joined his father and brother in the business.  Del Riefe continued to work in the family business nearly up to his death in April of 2008.  

Riefe's is segmented into three different dining areas denoting three separate additions to the original building.  The area up front looks more like a coffee shop from the 60's, there is a center room that is a little more ornate with booths and tables with high back chairs, and the third part is a room with a number of booths.  It was in the third room where we were seated by the hostess on our recent visit to Riefe's.  

We were greeted by our server that evening, Amber, who dropped off a basket of two rolls and two pieces of Riefe's cinnamon-sugar soda bread, a long time tradition at the restaurant.  It's sort of like coffee cake and a nice little touch to start the meal.  (Riefe's serves warm cinnamon-sugar donut holes in the morning for breakfast.)  She wanted to know if we wanted anything other than water to drink to start out.  Riefe's is alcohol free, but I wasn't looking for a beer that evening.  She told us she'd give us a minute to look through the menu and would be back shortly.  

The dinner menu at Riefe's has your typical family restaurant fare - burgers, sandwiches, salads, and dinner plates.  They also have Mexican items on the menu, as well as vegetarian choices and a kids menu.  Riefe's has a series of nightly dinner specials in addition to the menu items.  And Riefe's is also well known for their breakfasts which include their famous made-in-house monster-sized cinnamon rolls - you can't be a legitimate breakfast place in the Quad Cities without huge cinnamon rolls - that are made with cream cheese frosting.  Personally, I think the cinnamon rolls at Riefe's are the best.  There have been times we've had people over to our house for breakfast and I've run to Riefe's to get cinnamon rolls for the group. 

Since it was "Meatloaf Monday", I was set on the meatloaf dinner.  Cindy loves the hot beef sandwich at Riefe's - as do I.  When Amber came back to take our order that's exactly what we ordered.  I got a choice of potato with my meatloaf dinner and I got the mashed potatoes and gravy.  And a dinner salad came with the meal, as well.  I asked for their wonderful sweet French dressing to go with my salad.  Oh - and I got a large glass of milk.  Nothing better than a glass of milk with comfort food.  

After finishing the salad - like I say, the sweet French dressing is delicious - Amber brought out Cindy's hot beef sandwich.  They don't skimp on portions at Riefe's and Cindy usually eats about half of her hot beef and takes the rest home to have for lunch in the next day or two.  The hot beef sandwich and two scoops of real mashed potatoes were slathered in Riefe's homemade gravy.  About the only complaint I have with Riefe's is that their gravy is too salty.  We're drinking water continuously starting an hour after we've eaten the hot beef sandwiches.  The gravy is very good - don't get me wrong.  It's just that it's very salty.  

 
Amber then brought out my meatloaf dinner and along with the mashed potatoes and gravy, I got a half ear of sweet corn.  All this and a salad for $6.95!  Meatloaf Monday's are a helluva deal at Riefe's. The big slab of meatloaf covered half the plate.  I got a scoop and a half of the mashed potatoes with a little gravy on top.  If I would have been thinking, I would have asked Amber to put gravy on the meatloaf, too.  

But it didn't matter - Murray was right, the meatloaf at Riefe's is very good.  It held together well, but wasn't dried out like some meatloaf can get.  It had a wonderful flavor and it was very filling.  I had a few bites of the mashed potatoes even though I was full and I had to finally push my plate away because I was afraid I'd eat all of the potatoes after I'd gone through the meat loaf.  

Cindy ate a good portion of her hot beef sandwich - "I was really hungry," she protested when I looked over to see that she had left only parts of the bread and about half the potatoes, eating up all the tender roast beef.  Between Harlan's and Riefe's, it's difficult to say who has the better hot beef sandwich.

With a tip for Amber, who did a fine job taking care of us, the total bill was a titch over $20 bucks, which is a great deal for a lot of very good comfort food.  A comfortable setting with good food - including breakfast - at a good value with good service, Riefe's is one of those places that is tough to beat for comfort food in the Quad Cities.

Update - After 69 years in business, 66 of which were in the same place, Dan and Rick Riefe decided to close their restaurant in December of 2015.  

Basilico Italian Ristorante - Norridge, IL

On a recent trip into Chicago, I was staying out near O'Hare International Airport and was looking to try an Italian restaurant.  I was looking through Urbanspoon and Yelp for restaurants in the area and found a place that seemed to get some favorable reviews - Basilico Italian Ristorante.  I determined that it was less than a 10 minute drive from the hotel, so I took off along S. Cumberland toward Basilico.  

Years ago - back in the mid-80's when I first became a rep in the audio business - I was in Chicago with my new boss and a co-worker for the Summer Consumer Electronics Show (which no longer exists).  We stayed at a hotel near O'Hare and we were told that a certain Italian restaurant just down the road had pretty good food.  When my then-boss - who was sort of a food snob and who taught me a lot about fine dining - pulled up in front of the restaurant and we found it to be in a strip mall, he about came unglued.  "No good restaurant is EVER in a strip mall," he bellowed.  For the longest time - thanks to my old boss - I had a prejudice about restaurants in strip malls.  But I quickly found that there are some pretty damned good restaurants in strip malls.  We went into that particular Italian restaurant that evening over 25 years ago and had some outstanding Italian food.  Even my boss was impressed that a restaurant in a strip mall was that good.  

It could have very well been Basilico that we went to as the restaurant has been in business since the mid-70's.  It has gone through a number of ownership and name changes since its inception.  In the beginning, it was known as Back Stage.  In the mid-80's, it was sold again and renamed Fettuccine with the restaurant going through a heavy makeover with the-then owners giving it the styling of a European bistro that it has today.  In the 90's, the original owners came back into the picture and transformed the restaurant into Basilico Ristorante.  Five years ago the restaurant was bought by an investment group, but the long time chefs - Mario, Italo and Manuel - and many of the staff stayed on board.   

Driving down Cumberland Ave. south of the Kennedy Freeway, you eventually cross into the near northwest Chicago suburb of Norridge.  Just south of Lawrence on the east side of the street is a rather drab looking building by the name of the Cumberland Business Center. (see map)  On the south side of the building was a windowless wing with a lighted sign that said "Basilico Ristorante".  I wasn't certain what I was getting into with this place - Basilico shared space in the mall with a DUI consultation center and a Homeland Security immigration office in addition to a number of other small professional businesses.  In fact, some of the reviews I saw online talked about how some people thought twice about going into the restaurant because of the drab exterior, but ended up that they were pleased they did.

You enter the Cumberland Business Center and take an immediate right to the front door of Basilico.  The place was less than half full, but it looked rather classy.  Spiffy dressed waiters were moving through the tables and one eventually met me at the host stand to seat me.  I sat in one of the plush booths along the west wall of Basilico.  He dropped off a dinner menu and a wine list and a bus boy dropped off a basket of bread.  Soon, my server for the evening - German (with a hard "G") - came over to greet me.  I immediately ordered a bottle of Bud Light while I perused both menus.  Unfortunately, the beer was lukewarm, at best.  Not a good start in my book.  

The menu at Basilico is very extensive.  In addition to a number of pasta dishes, they also feature chicken and veal dishes, as well as steaks and pork chops.   Alone, Basilico had about a dozen different types of veal entrees.  One that piqued my interest was the Vittelo Sorrentino - veal medallions cooked with prosciutto, eggplant, artichoke hearts in lemon wine sauce and topped with mozzarella cheese.  The Vittelo alla Francese featured veal slices cooked in an olive oil and garlic, lemon, and white wine sauce, then set on a bed of fettuccine.  

But they also had a load of pasta dishes - two dozen items on the menu, alone.  The Spinach Fettuccine caught my eye, as did the Linguini con Cozze - linguini and mussels in a white wine sauce.  But eventually, I found something that made my stomach do backflips - the Tortellini alla Panna.  It featured seasoned ground beef rolled into tortellini pasta and served in a cream sauce with chopped onions, mushroom slices, peas and imported Italian ham chunks, then topped with fresh parmesan cheese.  I had to get that when German came back to take my order.  I also ordered a house salad with their homemade Italian dressing, but I asked German if they had crumbled blue cheese.  He said, "We have imported crumbled blue cheese."  Oooo... Imported!  

The salad was actually kind of blah.  The blue cheese was sort of bland and didn't have the kind of kick that I enjoy with Maytag Blue Cheese.  Along with the oil-based Italian dressing, it was all right, but not the taste sensation that I was expecting.  

 
I had finished about half the salad when German brought out the tortellini.  It was a massive amount of ground beef filled tortellini pasta with large chunks of sliced mushrooms and a smattering of peas mixed in with punguent chopped onions in a thick cream sauce.  The picture above right doesn't do the dish justice.  

From the first bite, I realized that I had gotten into something very good.  No, not very good - outstanding.  The creamy and cheesy sauce, the perfectly cooked tortellini filled with the seasoned beef, the fresh sliced mushrooms, even the peas - which I normally don't care for - were all so flavorful.  It was, oh, so good - but it was, oh, so rich.  I had gotten a glass of the Santa Margherita pinot grigio with the meal and it was a nice complement to the meal.

Have you ever liked something so much that even when you feel yourself getting full that you still can't stop?  That was me with the tortellini alla panna at Basilico.  When I first started, I figured that I *may* be able to eat half the dish.  Halfway through the bowl of tortellini, I figured that I could eat about another half of what I had left.  I was down to about four or five tortellinis left in the bowl and even though I was stuffed, I couldn't quit eating.  It was that good.  I finished the last of the tortellini and then began to sop up some of the parmesan cream sauce with a piece of bread.  I had to finally tell myself, "Stop!  This is ridiculous!"  

I felt like crap - both physically and mentally - when I left Basilico that evening.   I had feelings of deep guilt because I severely overate.  The tortellini was simply outstanding and I was so unpleasantly stuffed afterward because I couldn't stop.  Basilico was a hidden gem, one where you cannot fully judge until you go inside and try some of their food.    

Larsen's Pub (and Catering) - Elk Horn, IA

Since 2003, the Iowa Pork Producers Association has been searching for the best pork tenderloin sandwiches in the state.  I've eaten at the winners of the 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012 competition, but have the other past winners on my list to try if I ever got in their area.  Just north of Interstate 80 in Western Iowa between Omaha and Des Moines is a small town by the name of Elk Horn.  It's the home of Larsen's Pub, the 2007 winner of the best pork tenderloin in Iowa.  On a drive back from Omaha a few weeks ago, I decided to stop in to Larsen's and give the tenderloin a try. 

Now, I've been to Elk Horn a couple times in the past, but it's been a long, long time since I was last there.  Elk Horn is a village deep in Danish heritage.  Years ago when I was a regional representative for Bang and Olufsen audio and video equipment that's made in Denmark, I was contacted by the curator of the Danish Museum in Elk Horn to see if we would put some Bang and Olufsen products on display.  She basically wanted Bang and Olufsen to install an audio system as a gift to the museum.  When I explained that the American arm of Bang and Olufsen was not directly owned by B&O, and that we couldn't just *give* them an audio system, well, she got a little nasty with me.  And when I came back with a price that was basically B&O America's landing cost of a system, she came unglued.  (It was over $3000 bucks.)  She basically threw me out of her office.  That was in 1988 and it was my last visit to Elk Horn since then.  

Neal Larsen and his wife, Brenda, grew up in Elk Horn before moving to Guthrie Center in 1997 for work.  Neal's parents, Lynn and Doreen Larsen, had a catering business back in Elk Horn that Neal and Brenda would come back and help out during weekends.  When Lynn and Doreen retired, they sold the business to Neal and Brenda.  

Neal and Brenda Larsen ran their catering business out of an old retirement home building on Main Street in Elk Horn.  When the building was sold in 2005, the Larsen's knew they had to move.  Wanting to stay in Elk Horn, they found that the building that housed a sports bar that had gone out of business was up for sale.  The Larsen's jumped at the chance to buy the building and they opened their doors in March of 2006.  

It was Neal's brother who talked him into making a deep fried pork tenderloin sandwich and putting it on the menu.  Someone nominated the Larsen Pub pork tenderloin for the best in Iowa in 2007 and they won.  On the day they were awarded the best tenderloin, the 2006 winner, Terry Town from the Town House Supper Club in Wellsburg was on hand with Iowa Pork Producer representatives.  Town asked Neal Larsen how many fryers he had and Larsen responded, "Just one.  This table top fryer we have back in the kitchen."  

Town told Larsen, "Oh, my gosh.  You're gonna need five times the fryers now that you won the award.  People are just gonna flock from all over to try your tenderloin."  (Town House Supper Club sold 30,000 pork tenderloin sandwiches within the first couple years after they won the award in 2006.)  Within a couple weeks, the Larsen's had three more fryers on hand to handle to multitudes of people who descended upon their little restaurant in Elk Horn.  

Larsen's Pub is located on Main Street in Elk Horn. (see map)  Main Street is Iowa state highway 173 that runs north from Interstate 80 and Larsen's is located just north of the intersection of Highway 173 and County Road F58 on the west side of the street.  I pulled up in front of Larsen's Pub around 1:25 and walked to the door.  Their hours said that they closed at 1:45, but reopened around 4:30.  

I walked in and was greeted by Neal Larsen.  The restaurant was empty and he was alone behind the bar.  I asked if it was too late to get a sandwich and he said that he was going to close up in about 15 minutes, but he'd make me something.  I said, "I hear your pork tenderloin is pretty good.  I'll take one of them."

He said, "That won't take all that long."  He asked if I wanted anything to drink in the meantime and I had him grab me a Bud Light that he had in the glass cooler behind the bar.   I sat at the bar and waited for my sandwich.  

In addition to their pork tenderloins, Larsen's pub also has burgers, chicken sandwiches, a couple deep fried fish plates and a "Danish" pork tenderloin where they had havarti cheese to the sandwich.  

On the back of the menu, there was a list of things with the heading, "Remember, We Are A Little Place!  If you're expecting a full service restaurant, you need to lower your expectations!"  Then they went through a litany of rules that patrons had to follow at Larsen's Pub.  It started off innocent enough - "May we suggest a Danish beer or frozen drink?"  Then it went on to tell people that they Coke products and 1919 root beer on tap.  Then it began to get heavy.  "We charge for refills", "We charge $1.00 for split plates", "We don't use real plates", and "We don't have lemon for your water" were just a few of the lines of the missive on the back of the menu.  At the bottom, it basically said, "There's just two of us here most of the time.  These are the answers to the questions we get most.  We hope you got a chuckle out of reading this and enjoy your meal!"  I could see where some people would take as a heavy handed attempt at humor, but it was actually kind of funny to me.  

Neal Larsen came out of the kitchen and asked me where I was from and I told him Davenport.  He said, "Wow, that's a long way from here."  When I explained that I was on my way home from Omaha and had wanted to stop in for a long time to try his tenderloin versus some of the other winners, he said, "Oh, well.  That's great.  I'll be interested to hear how ours stacks up against the others."  

He brought out the tenderloin.  It was big and thick, had a nice layer of breaded batter on the outside, and it was somewhat misshapen.  He apologized for it's shape - "It curled up on me in the fryer.  Happens like that from time to time."  I said that it didn't matter for me.  A slice of red onion and a smattering of dill pickles were sitting on the crown of an oval shaped split-top bun.  I asked Neal where he got his buns since I'd never seen one like that before.  I wondered if it was from a local baker that specialized in Danish breads and pastries.  But he blew the mystique that I had in my mind by replying, "Naw, we just get 'em from Sam's Club.  We saw these buns one time and thought they'd be kind of good to go with our tenderloins."

After dressing the tenderloin with the onion, pickles and some yellow mustard, I cut off the misshapen part of the tenderloin that was sticking out from the bun.  The tenderloin was still too hot to consume, so I waited a few moments before I bit in, talking with Neal Larsen while I waited.  He told me that he and his wife still do a lot of catering jobs.  Larsen told me that he has a couple local kids help out for the catering business and one or two people help out at nights in the restaurant.  He said his biggest problem with the catering business is "saying no".  He explained that there were times when they bit off a little more than they can chew and they'd sometime have a couple catering jobs going on at the same time.  "We've learned to say no to some of the jobs," he said.  "We had to.  We were getting sort of burned out."

He went back into the kitchen to turn off the fryer and I determined the tenderloin was now cool enough to try a bite.  I cut off a bit of the misshapen chunk that I had cut off from the main part of the tenderloin moments before and took a bite.  The tenderloin was tender, flavorful and juicy.  The breaded batter on the outside was very tasty as well.  (I surmised initially that it was just a batter that they used on their tenderloins at Larsen's Pub, but Neal Larsen told me, "No, it's a breading.  It's basically a breading and a batter mix, but it's still a breading that we use.)  

The breaded batter was also very rich and I thought I'd have trouble finishing the whole sandwich.  After finishing off the misshapen part that I'd cut off, I concentrated on the sandwich.  The bun was tender and chewy and it was a good complement to the pork tenderloin.  The combination of the taste of the pork tenderloin along with the yellow mustard, dill pickles and red onion slice was outstanding.  It was one of the best pork tenderloin sandwiches I've ever had.  THEE best?  Hmmm....  Possibly yes, maybe not.  If it isn't the best I've ever had, it's damned close to the best.  And that's what I told Neal Larsen when he asked how his pork tenderloin stacked up against the other winners that I've had.   

Larsen's Pub doesn't take credit cards, but the pork tenderloin and a beer came to less than $10 bucks.  It was a great value because it was a lot of food.  (I didn't have dinner that evening as I was still full from my lunch.)  As I was leaving, Neal Larsen said, "Be sure to tell people about us out here."  I told him to not worry, I would tell others.

And I just did...

Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) AirVenture Museum - Oshkosh, WI

I've always been fascinated by air travel and we have a couple three very good air museums in the Midwest.  There's the National Museum of the Air Force in Dayton, OH (click here to read about our visit to that air museum), and the Strategic Air and Space Museum about half way between Omaha and Lincoln, NE. (Click here to read about some of the visits we've had to that museum.)  Along U.S. Highway 41 outside of Oshkosh, WI is one of the more famous air museums, the Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) AirVenture Museum. (see map)  I've driven past the museum a number of times over the years, but on a recent trip up to the Appleton area I found that I had some time to kill before I had an appointment with a dealer in Appleton.  I passed the EAA Museum and decided to double back and go walk around the museum for a bit.

Each summer, thousands of people fly or drive to Oshkosh's Wittman Regional Airport for the week long International Experimental Aircraft Association Fly-In Convention, or it's official name - the EAA AirVenture.  It's the largest convention of its kind in the United States.  It's part convention, part airshow and usually has its share of interesting planes on display - including private, commercial and military planes.  I've always wanted to attend one of the EAA conventions and I have a dealer friend in Madison who is a pilot.  He told me one time, "Oh, man, you'd love it.  My dad and I go up all the time and we have a ball looking at all the planes up close and seeing some of the wild things they have flying up in the sky."  He said the crowds each day hover between 75,000 to 90,000 people.  At the recent AirVenture convention held in late July into early August, there were an estimated 500,000 people that attended with over 2300 planes that flew in.  Of those 2300 planes, there were over 800 each homebuilt and vintage airplanes, over 300 war planes, over 100 ultralights, along with a handful of seaplanes, aerobatic aircraft and miscellaneous show planes.

I didn't really know what to expect when I got into the museum around 1:30 that afternoon.  It cost $12.50 to get admitted to the museum, but the guy working the cash register tried to get me to sign up for an annual EAA membership for "only" $40 that got me admitted to the museum for free for the next year.  I figured that this could be a "one-and-done" visit, or it would be awhile before I'd be back to go through the museum again.  

From the lobby area, which also houses a gift shop, you find yourself on a balcony that overlooks the Pioneers of Flight area of the museum that includes a nearly exact replica of the Wright Flyer, the airplane the Wright Brothers used for their historic flight in 1903.  There were other exhibits and some audio-video presentations on the Wright Brothers in the area.

 
Further down the balcony area to the right is an exhibit of racing and aerobatic airplanes.  These colorful airplanes are fast, nimble and can be somewhat dangerous to fly.  They're always a hit at air shows and airplane races are becoming more and more popular. 

After the aerobatic area, I went past the Hilton Theater that has continuous videos of many of the planes on display at the EAA AirVenture Museum to the balcony of the Eagle Hanger (below left).  It usually has more planes on display in the hanger, but the EAA AirVenture Convention was held a couple weeks prior to me being there and they had a lot of war planes still out in the Pioneer Airport area of the museum.  Still, there were a couple three that I went downstairs to see close up.  

 
Above right is an XP-51 Mustang, a prototype plane that was built in 1940 for Great Britain.  This one is the last of the four prototypes that were built as predescessors of the remarkable P-51 Mustang, one of the greatest aerial fighters of its time.  The plane was in storage at the Smithsonian Museum until the mid-70's.  The EAA took possession of it and restored it to flying condition.  It flew in the air show at Oshkosh from 1976 until 1982 when it was permanently retired.   

Below left is a Grumman J2F-6 "Duck" plane, the first "flying boat" built by Grumman.  It was used primarily for reconnaissance, transport, rescue and depth-charging.  The plane usually had a crew of two, but it also had space for a third crew member - primarily a radio man - and two seats under the lower wing for passengers.  It was sort of ugly and fascinating at the same time.  

 

I wondered back out into the Pioneers of Flight wing and found a replica of the Spirit of St. Louis, the plane that made the first trans-Atlantic flight with Charles Lindbergh at the controls.  This Ryan NYP replica was built in 1977 and was flown around the United States that year to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Lindbergh's flight.  It was shipped to France in 1987 and flown into Le Bourget Airport to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Lindbergh's 33 hour flight at the biennial Paris Air Show.  It was eventually retired and put on display in the EAA AirVenture museum.  However, in the early 90's, the EAA built a second replica plane that still flies around to selected air shows today.  

Off the main floor of the Pioneers of Flight is the Innovations gallery that includes an exhibit to celebrate the legacy of Burt Rutan, one of the true pioneers of aircraft design known for his planes that were lightweight, energy efficient, and somewhat unusual looking.  Hanging on the wall is the Rutan VariVuggan, a prototype plane that Burt Rutan built in the early 70's.  Rutan first flew the plane to the Oshkosh airshow in 1972, eventually donating the plane to the museum in 1988.  

There was also a fuselage replica of the Burt Rutan designed Voyager aircraft which made the first non-stop, non-refueled aircraft trip around the world in 1986.  The plane was piloted by Rutan's brother, Dick Rutan.  It took 9 days, 3 minutes and 44 seconds for Rutan and co-pilot Jeanne Yeager to circumnavigate the world.  The Rutans had conjured up the idea of a non-stop, non-refueled flight around the world in 1980.  They figured it would take 18 months to come up with the design and manufacturing of such a plane.  It took them six years.  

I had a chance to go out to to the Pioneer Airport, a series of hangers that holds more vintage planes (open from May thru October), but I was running out of time.  I figured that I could go back sometime when the Eagle Hanger was full of planes (I'm particularly intrigued with war planes), and then take the tram out to the Pioneer Airport hangers to see more of the vintage planes they have on display.  While some of the EAA AirVenture Museum didn't hold my interest as other aircraft museums I've been to, it was enough of a tease to make me plan a second trip to the museum sometime early next summer when I get back up to the Fox Valley area.  

Legends Corner - Rock Island, IL

On a Monday night "date night" a few weeks ago, Cindy and I decided to drive over to the venerable Belgian Village Inn in Moline to get a Vandereuben sandwich.  (Click here to see my entry on the Belgian Village Inn.)  A severe thunderstorm had come through the area earlier in the day and as we got over to the Olde Towne neighborhood in Moline, we saw that a lot of places didn't have power.  When we pulled up to the Belgian Village, it was dark inside.  Not knowing what to do at that point, we started to drive around thinking of alternatives.  Finally, Cindy suggested a newer place that I'd driven by a couple times over by Augustana College in Rock Island - Legends Corner.  She said that a co-worker had been there with her husband and they thought it was pretty good.  "And they have Cajun food," Cindy said.  We pointed the car in the direction of Rock Island and took off for Legends Corner.

Legends Corner opened in November of 2012 in a building that previously housed Mexican and Chinese restaurants, but was originally a Henry's Hamburgers location.  Henry's Hamburgers was based out of Chicago and was a precursor to McDonalds in terms of fast food restaurants in the Midwest.  Once McDonalds became the rage, Henry's would open in locations where McDonalds deemed the market too small.  Rapid growth in the 60's for Henry's gave way to massive closings in the 70's.  Today, there is only one Henry's Hamburgers still in business in Benton Harbor, MI.  

Greg Hiner is a school teacher by day and a bar and grill owner by night.  Along with his wife, Deni, the two ran Legends bar and grill in Aledo, IL.  Hiner is a native of Rock Island and he grew up near the corner where Legends is today.  When the opportunity to buy the building and start a second Legends restaurant near where Greg grew up, the Hiner's jumped at the chance.  When Legends Corner opened last fall, the Hiner's daughter, Cara, was the manager of the restaurant.  

We pulled into the decrepit parking lot at Legends Corner at the corner of 30th Street and 7th Ave (see map) around 6:30 p.m.  (Note to Legend's Corner ownership - FIX YOUR PARKING LOT!)  We found a seat in the adults only bar area up front in what looks to be the original part of the building.   There's also a dining area for all ages off to the side that appears to be an addition to the building at some point.  Flat screen televisions and sports memorabilia dot the walls at Legends Corner. 

 
Our server came over and dropped off a couple menus.  She asked what we we wanted to drink and Cindy looked up at a sign on the window and she said, "Hey, look!  They have (Kona) Big Wave Golden Ale on tap!"  My favorite beer!  I immediately liked the place and from then on out, I figured they could do no wrong in my book.  

Well, not so fast...

Cindy was correct in saying that Legends Corner had Cajun food.  Only the menu called it their "Kajun Korner".  They also had the prerequisite appetizers, salads, burgers, sandwiches and wraps on the menu.  One thing that caught my attention was a special they had that evening on boneless chicken wings.  You got 8 boneless chicken wings for $5.99.  I've been on kind of a chicken wing kick as of late and I thought that would be a good appetizer.  The only problem was that Cindy didn't want any.  So I thought I'd get the boneless chicken wings and some of Legends Corner's gumbo.  I saw that it came with something called "Legends Sauce".  I asked our server what that was and she said, "Oh, it's a combination of ranch, blue cheese and Buffalo sauce."  All right, I'll give it a try.

Cindy also went the Cajun route and ordered their jambalaya.  She also got a side of collard greens to go with her jambalaya keeping her pledge of eating something green in color to go with her dinner.  

More people began to filter into Legends Corner while we were waiting for our food to show up.  Some of them were people whose power was out and looking for a place to eat and get out of the muggy air for a bit. 

There was a bit of a communication error with my order.  I thought we were getting the boneless chicken wings as an appetizer.  But they didn't come out until the rest of our meal showed up.  It was no problem, however.  The boneless chicken wings looked more like large pieces of chicken nuggets doused in the Legends sauce.  The chicken was meaty and tender.  And I liked the combination of the Buffalo wing sauce with the ranch and blue cheese dressing that made up the Legends sauce.  I munched on the boneless chicken wings in between bites of my gumbo.

 
The gumbo was served on a flat plate over a bed of steamed rice.  The broth was thick like gravy.  The basic taste of the gumbo was all right.  It had chunks of chicken and shrimp in it and while it was good, I've had better.  Four half slices of garlic toast came with the gumbo and I'll have to say they were very good.  Probably the best tasting thing on the plate.  

Cindy's jambalaya looked promising with large chunks of chicken and andouille sausage.  However, Cindy has some problem with chicken that has been cooked and then microwaved to heat up.  She determined that's what they must have done with the chicken in her jambalaya.  She complained that the chicken wasn't that warm and that it had a rubbery taste.  She offered me a bite and I had to concur with her.  The chicken was sort of overdone, sort of lukewarm and sort of tough to chew.  But after having a bite of the andouille sausage, it was, quite frankly, outstanding.  I wanted to find out where they source their andoullie sausage at Legends Corner because it had a wonderful spicy flavor.  But the great andouille sausage couldn't make up for the disappointment Cindy had with the jambalaya.    

 
She offered me a bite of her collard greens.  The warm greens had a vinegar taste to them that helped with the taste.  I'm not big on collard greens, but Cindy's been eating a lot of kale as of late and she knew that collard greens and kale were of the same cultivar group.  She seemed to like them.  

I ate all of the boneless chicken wings (well, Cindy did try one - she liked it) and a good portion of my gumbo.  Cindy ate a good portion of her collard greens and about half of the jambalya, leaving most of the chicken and a few bites of andouille sausage that she let me have.  The andouille sausage was outstanding. 

A couple three weeks later, we went back over to Legends one more time.  This time, the restaurant was a little more busy and there was only one server working both the bar and the dining area.  Service was slow that evening and we had to wait a little longer for service than the first time we were in.  

After contemplating getting the muffaletta sandwich - then talking myself out of it knowing that I'm forever spoiled with the muffaletta sandwich I got years ago at the famous Central Grocery in New Orleans - I got the mushroom/Swiss cheese burger basket with fries.  I asked our server, Jaymie, if I could get some bacon on that, as well, and she said it would be no problem.  Cindy ordered the Cusabi salmon sandwich on flat bread.  It was a grilled salmon filet topped with a cucumber/wasabi sauce.  

It took well over 30 minutes from the time we ordered to the time we got our food.  A younger couple sitting at the table next to us was experiencing the same problem and they were getting overly annoyed at the wait.  It was a little too long to wait for food, no matter what kind of place you were eating at.   

My burger looked promising with crispy bacon, sliced fresh mushrooms and a good amount of Swiss cheese on top.  But looking at the burger, I could tell that it was overcooked and appeared to be sitting under a heat lamp for more than awhile. I'm guessing that happened due to only one server in the place and they probably finished my burger long before they finished my wife's salmon sandwich.  The fries were basically a throwaway - I should get cottage cheese instead of fries when I order burgers like this.  

Actually, the burger did have some flavor to it, even though it was slightly overcooked.  The Swiss cheese gave it good flavor and the sauteed mushrooms were tasty, as well.  The bacon was a nice complement to the burger.  And the bun was very good, too.  It was light, tasteful and chewy.  It held together with all that was going on with the burger.  Still, as I said, the burger was overcooked and a little dry.  I'd give it a B- if I were grading it. 

 
Cindy's Cusabi salmon sandwich came on what was nothing more than a pita.  It looked like 4 to 6 ounces of grilled salmon topped with the cucumber/wasabi drizzle.  Two large tomato slices and some greens completed the Cusabi salmon sandwich.  At first, Cindy thought she needed a lemon wedge, but after eating a couple bites with the Cusabi drizzle, she decided that it was fine.  I asked her if it was fishy - I could kind of smell that fishy smell in the air - and she said, "A little, but it's not bad."  After she finished, she said, "Ah!  It was all right.  I don't think I'd get that again."

Legends Corner was all right.  I think they're trying hard, but they just don't pull it off in terms of culinary excellence.  If you go into the place thinking that it's nothing more than a sports bar with an interesting menu, you'll be fine.  Just don't expect those interesting menu items to be anything exquisite.   

Jim's Coney Island - Des Moines

My neighbor, Murray, works for UPS and used to live in Des Moines a number of years ago.  He travels to UPS terminals in Eastern and Central Iowa and earlier this summer he was going up to Dubuque.  I said, "Oh, you've got to go to Mulgrew's in East Dubuque and get a chili dog."  (Click here to see my entry on Mulgrew's.)  After he went to Mulgrew's (and told me how much he loved the place), he said, "Have you ever gone to Jim's Coney Island on SW 9th in Des Moines?"  I wasn't familiar with Jim's, although I'd probably driven by the place numerous times over the years.  Even though I grew up in Central Iowa, but haven't lived in the Des Moines area for over 20 years, I'm still woefully short of Southside Des Moines restaurant knowledge.  On a recent trip to Des Moines, I made a point to stop at Jim's Coney Island for a chili dog or two.

Murray talked Jim's Coney Island up pretty big to me.  "They've got a chili cheeseburger that is just to die for," he told me over a couple beers in my garage a few weeks ago.  "The chili is an acquired taste.  Some people don't care for the chili, but I like it a lot.  I'd be interested in what you think of it."   I was looking forward to giving it a try.  

Given that Jim's Coney Island has been in business since May of 1971, I know I've driven past the place dozens of times in the past.  It's housed in a non-descript building at the corner of SW 9th and Wolcott in the Watrous Park neighborhood on the south side of Des Moines (see map).   It's been 42 years since Jim Frangos opened his eponymous Coney Island restaurant serving chili dogs, burgers, pork tenderloins and homemade onion rings.  

Jim's son, Eric, began to work in his family's restaurant at the age of 14.  Today, he and his wife, Tonya, run the business that features not only the chili dogs, but "Coney-style" cheeseburgers that my neighbor, Murray, is so fond of.  

After a meeting with one of my dealers in Des Moines, I made my way down SW 9th and found Jim's Coney Island on the right side of the street.  Even though it was after 2 p.m., there were a number of cars and trucks in the parking lot.  Jim's is a pretty popular lunch stop with laborers working in the area.  

I went inside and was greeted by a lady behind the counter.  There were a few booths in the large, well-lit area up front.  The menu was on a back-lit board above and behind the counter, just above a serving window from the kitchen.  I took a moment to look over the board before I stepped up to order. 

 
As I said, included on the menu were burgers, pork tenderloin sandwiches, sausages and chicken sandwiches.  They also had something called the "Big Bite" that was a combination of a chili dog and "Maid-Rite"-style loose beef.  (It's similar to the "Tavern Dog" at Bob's Drive-Inn in LeMars, IA.)  But I decided to get a couple chili dogs, which was against Murray's recommendation of getting a cheese burger "coney style" which is topped with Jim's homemade Greek style chili, in a basket that includes both fries AND onions rings with a side of cole slaw.  To me, that's a lot of food.  Plus, I'm not too big on chili on cheeseburgers.  They also have a bar at Jim's and I got a glass of beer to go with the chili.

I decided to sit in the bar area at Jim's.  It, too, is a clean, well lit area full of tables and booths.  Stuffed deer heads and trophy fish hang on the paneling which probably is the same as it was when Jim Frangos opened the place years ago.  The bar wasn't big, but it looked like the kind of place that would still be fun to sit at and have a couple beers with some chili dogs.   

 
The same lady who took my order came out with my two chili dogs served on a plastic tray on top of a paper with ads of local businesses.  Interestingly, the chili dogs were garnished with a small dill pickle spear.  That's a Des Moines chili dog signature.  I've had kosher dill spears on Chicago-style hot dogs, but the only place I've ever seen a dill pickle spear on a chili dog have been at Des Moines area chili dog joints.    

My first taste of the chili dog at Jim's Coney Island was sort of a mystery to me.  Murray told me the chili was an acquired taste and I found it to be somewhat bland at first bite.  However, a few moments later the spices and flavor broke through on the taste buds.  It had a bit of spicy bite to the aftertaste.  It was very subtle at first, but it heightened as I took more bites.  The chili dog buns were spongy and chewy, and the hot dogs had a nice snap to the bite.   I wasn't certain that I could have had fries, onion rings and slaw with the chili dogs, but I thought I could probably down three chili dogs in one setting.  

I reported back to Murray that I thought the chili dogs were pretty darned good.  I told him how the taste of the chili sneaked up on me and it had a pretty good flavor after a bit.  He said, "Man, you should have gotten the cheeseburger 'coney-style'.  The taste combinations are just unbelievable."  Ahhh... I don't know about that.  Chili goes on hot dogs, not beef, in my world.  

I was never a big fan of some of the other Coney Island-style restaurants around Des Moines - notably George the Chili King or Ted's Coney Island - and it's been years since I've been to either one of those places.  While I liked the chili dog at Jim's Coney Island, it wasn't one of the best I've ever had.  Now, I'm sure that it is an acquired taste and I'll probably like it better the next time I stop in since I'll know what to expect.  

Valley Lodge Restaurant - Glenview, IL

I've driven past the a place in the northern Chicago suburb of Glenview a few times - Valley Lodge Restaurant - and it's sort of piqued my interest.  I was in the area one afternoon and decided to stop in and check out this unique little place to see what it was all about.

Valley Lodge Restaurant began in 1969 when brothers  Taki and Peter Adamis bought a small house on Waukegan Road and converted it into a small tavern - the Valley Lodge.  Its center piece was an old fire place that people would sit around to enjoy the burgers and ribs that the Adamis brothers made.  Eight years after they opened, they made a significant addition to the front of the building expanding their seating area while making sure to keep the signature fireplace intact.  

Spero Adamis - the son of Peter and nephew of Taki - eventually took over the business and he added a partner, Bill Stavrou.  The two renovated the bar area and continued the tradition that Spero's father and uncle began in the late 60's with good food in a comfortable setting.  Today, Bill Stavrou is the sole owner of the Valley Lodge Restaurant with his son, George, helping out as the restaurant's general manager.

Along busy Waukegan Road, if you're coming from the north you have to really know where the Valley Lodge is as it just sort of pops up just south of Winnetka Road on the west side of the street.  (see map)  I passed it on my first drive-by and had to double back to get back into the parking lot that extends behind the building.  I walked in and was greeted by a guy who asked me if I wanted a table or booth, or to simply sit at the bar.  I told him that I'd take the booth in the bar area.  

It was about 1:30 and there were a number of people in the place finishing up their lunches.  A smattering of golfers were at the bar discussing their game they had just finished at one of the area golf courses.  My server for my visit to Valley Lodge was an older lady by the name of Roberta.  And she looked like a Roberta - and I'm not trying to be mean.  She was pleasant, calling me, "Hon" when she asked me what I wanted to drink.  I noticed that they had Old Style on tap and I ordered a glass of that.  

The menu at Valley Lodge Restaurant is mainly traditional American food with burgers, ribs, steaks, chops and chicken dishes.  But they also have some Greek specialties including the Saganaki flaming cheese, a Greek salad with imported olives and feta cheese, gyros and lamb chops.  I was concentrating on the burger and sandwich side of the menu.  They had an Italian beef sandwich topped with mozzarella cheese and served with a choice of sweet or hot peppers, but I'm sort of particular to the Italian beef sandwiches at Portillo's.  Their reuben also caught my eye as it was made with thin-sliced Vienna corned beef, topped with Swiss cheese and sauerkraut, and served on dark rye bread.  

But their burgers sounded pretty good, too.  They feature all beef, hand-pattied 1/2 pound burgers at Valley Lodge.  And they have a "build-your-own-burger" in addition to some of their signature burgers that they have on the menu.  I was pulled between the reuben and the burger.  When Roberta came back to take my order, I ended up telling her that I'd get the burger - medium - topped with Swiss cheese, sauteed mushrooms and bacon.  I had my choice of fries, cole slaw, veggie of the day or homemade potato chips.  I ordered the French fries, fully thinking that I wouldn't eat more than one or two.   

Roberta brought my burger out to me and it definitely wasn't small.  A large chunk of Swiss cheese covered the top of the misshapen burger patty.  Sauteed fresh mushrooms - a major plus - and pieces of crispy bacon topped that.  Cut rings of red onion were sitting on the bun crown - also a plus for any burger. The fries were piled off to the side and I got a thick dill pickle spear and - for some reason unknown to me - a small container of cole slaw.  

 

The bun didn't look like it was anything special, but my first bite into the burger told me different.  It was light and flavorful, making for a wonderful addition to the multiple taste sensations that were going on with the bacon, Swiss cheese and sauteed mushrooms.  It was one of those burgers that made me go, "Mmmmm..." at the first bite.  None of the toppings overpowered the fresh taste of the flat-grilled burger patty.  It was juicy, cooked to what I call a perfect medium with a bit of pink in the middle.  When Roberta came back to check on me, asking, "How's burger, hon?"  I couldn't lie to her - it was a very good burger.  

Surprisingly, the French fries were also very good.  They were crispy on the outside, yet light and flaky with a good potato taste on the inside.  I normally don't eat many French fries if they're served to me - if at all.  But the fries at Valley Lodge Restaurant were well above the norm in taste and quality.  I ended up eating nearly all of the fries in addition to finishing up my delectable burger.  The cole slaw, however, was sort of bland.  One taste told me that it was the weak link to the lunch.  And that's all right - there wasn't a lot of it and I was very happy with the burger and fries.

I immediately liked the Valley Lodge Restaurant, not only for the classic supper club style and cozy nature of the place, but for how good their burger was.  I made a mental note to come back some time for a steak dinner, but I also realized that it's probably a very popular place in the evening.  Nonetheless, I was glad I finally pulled into Valley Lodge Restaurant and gave it a try and can't wait to make it back for another meal at some point.  (Picture at right courtesy City Data.)   

Dr. Gyros - Rock Island, IL

A place over in Rock Island that I've been wanting to try for a number of years and finally got around to going there recently is Dr. Gyros.  I'm fond of a good gyro and we're starting to find some pretty good places that have gyros in the Quad Cities.  For lunch one day a while back, I ventured across the river to have a gyro at Dr. Gyros.

Actually, I've wanted to try Dr. Gyros even before I found out it was connected with The Doc's Inn restaurant in East Moline.  (Click here to see the entry on The Doc's Inn.)  While my wife and I weren't too thrilled with the food at The Doc's Inn, I've heard nothing but good things about Dr. Gyros and their gyros.  

The connection between Dr. Gyros and The Doc's Inn is owner John Stopoulos and his wife, MaryBeth.  The two opened Dr. Gyros ten years ago and then they opened The Doc's Inn in March of last year.  In addition to  their primary food option of gyros - including chicken gyros - Dr. Gyro's menu also features Italian beef sandwiches, burgers, pita sandwiches, wraps, soups and salads.  Actually, there's some cross-pollination between The Doc's Inn and Dr. Gyros with menu items.  The biggest difference I see is that The Doc's Inn sells beer while Dr. Gyros does not.

Dr. Gyros is located on 18th Avenue in Rock Island, south and west of Augustana College. (see map)  There is a Hungry Hobo sandwich shop and a Whitey's Ice Cream store directly across the street.  I walked into the restaurant and was met by a young lady standing behind the small counter up front.  The menu was above and behind her on the wall and the kitchen area was to her right and my left.  I ordered up a traditional gyro ($5.39) and then saw that I could get additional gyro meat on it for another $1.99.  I went with the additional meat and got some water to go with it..  I was going to eat in and she gave me an order number.  I didn't know the drill, however, and was standing around the counter area waiting for my gyro to show up.  She said, "Uh, you're eating in, right?  You can have a seat and I'll bring it out to you."  

Oh!  All right! Sure!  I found an open booth the wall of windows and waited for my gyro.  The dining room was bright with a lot of natural light coming in.  It was after the lunch rush, so there were only a handful of people in the place.  (Picture of Dr. Gyros dining area at right courtesy Trip Advisor.)

On the wall near the pop dispensers was the picture of a young guy who conquered Dr. Gyros' "Man vs. Food"-style challenge - he ate the Mount Olympus gyro.  The Mount Olympus challenge starts with a pita that is supposedly the size of a large pizza, then they top it with 3 1/2 pounds of gyro meat, then they add chopped onions, tomatoes and tzatiki sauce.  To make it even more interesting, they add Greek seasoned French fries to the Mount Olympus.  The competitor has to finish the Mount Olympus and fries, AND a Greek dessert in less than one hour.  Only one person has done it - the guy in the picture on the wall at Dr. Gyros - Alfredo Villareal of Rock Island.  While these "Man vs. Food" contests were sort of the rage four or five years ago, I find them to be boring and somewhat obscenely gluttonous in nature.  "Man vs. Food" inspired too many restaurants to come up with their own "challenge", hoping they'd be featured by the show at some point.  But Adam Richman has sort of gotten away from doing these challenges himself and that's why his "Man vs. Food Nation" show only highlights the big food challenges that other people participate in. 

About 10 minutes after I ordered, one of the guys in the back brought out my gyro wrapped in aluminum foil.  Now, my gold standard for gyros in the Quad Cities is Uncle Pete's.  (Click here to see my entry on Uncle Pete's.)  The pita was smaller than the pita they use at Uncle Pete's.  And there didn't seem to be as much gyro meat as they put on the Super Gyro at Uncle Pete's.  Large chunks of fresh onions and tomatoes were added.  The other small quibble I have with the gyro at Dr. Gyros is that they spread a thin layer of tzatiki sauce on the pita before adding the meat and veggies.  They're much more generous with the very good tzatiki sauce at Uncle Pete's with their Super Gyro, even giving an extra tub of sauce to go along with it.  

The taste of the pita on the gyro at Dr. Gyros was very good.  It was fresh and had somewhat of a wheat taste to it.  Actually, I liked it better than the pita at Uncle Pete's.  

The other thing that I liked at Dr. Gyros was the gyro meat.  It was less salty than the gyro meat at Uncle Pete's.  (I'm always drinking a couple glasses of water a couple hours after having one of the gyros at Uncle Pete's to combat the salt.)   Once again, the quibble I had was that for nearly the same money the traditional gyro with extra gyro meat still wasn't as big as the Super Gyro at Uncle Pete's.

But, overall, the taste of the gyro at Dr. Gyros was pretty good.  There's not much difference in the taste of the gyro meat from place to place - save for the less salt in the meat at Dr. Gyros vs. Uncle Pete's.  I would have liked to have gotten some more tzatiki sauce on the gyro, but it was fine for what I had.  The gyro at Dr. Gyros got a "thumbs up" from me.

There's a couple other places around the Quad Cities where we really like the gyros - Olympic Gyros in Davenport (click here to see my entry on Olympic), and Sultan Mediterranean Restaurant in Rock Island (click here to see my entry on Sultan).  Uncle Pete's still probably has my heart more than Dr. Gyros, but only because Uncle Pete's has been around so long and is probably a little better value.  Still, Dr. Gyros does a good job with their gyros and I'd have no problem giving them a good recommendation on their gyros.  (Photo at right courtesy Quad City Times.) 

Syberg's - Maryland Heights, MO

On our annual baseball trip to St. Louis earlier this summer to see the Cardinals play, we met up with my friend, Mike, who works for the St. Louis Rams.  Mike has a friend who works for the Cardinals who helps us out with tickets.  When we go to St. Louis - and if he's in town - we like to go out to lunch with Mike and catch up.  We decided upon a place that Mike and I have eaten at a couple times - Syberg's on Old Dorsett Road in Maryland Heights. (see map)  We were staying out in Westport and the restaurant is about a five minute drive from Mike's office at the Russell Athletic Training Center in Earth City. 

Syberg's has its beginning as a family catering company that began 41 years ago.  And it wasn't intentional.  Richard and Sally Syberg catered a family member's wedding in 1972 and everyone raved about the food.  One thing led to another and they started Syberg's Family Style Catering, using a kitchen in a church basement as their base of operations.  As their business and reputation for good food grew, the Syberg's opened their first restaurant on Gravois in the St. Louis suburb of Affton.     

As they continued their catering business, the Syberg's children - four boys and two girls - became involved in the business.  With that, Syberg's has expanded to now five locations with the newest location opening earlier this year in far western suburban O'Fallon, MO.  They continue to run their catering business, and they also own Helen Fitzgerald's, an Irish pub located on the southwest side of St. Louis. 

The shark in Syberg's logo also sort of came about by accident.  Wanting an interesting look to the exterior for their newly opened restaurant, the Syberg's turned to a neighbor who moonlighted as an artist.   The movie, "Jaws" was out and the artist was taken by the movie.  He developed what turned out to be an underwater mural with a three-dimensional shark swimming at the top of the building.  Then someone within the family then said, "Hey, if we have a shark on our building, maybe we ought to sell shark!"  They began to sell grilled shark chunks and now go through about 500 lbs. of shark meat a week at their restaurants.  (Photo at right courtesy Examiner.com) 

We had agreed to meet Mike at the Syberg's next to the Quality Inn at the corner of Dorsett Road and I-270 around noon.  (I've stayed at the Hampton Inn next door on a couple of occasions and Syberg's is familiar to me.  I've also eaten at the downtown location on Market Street that was also attached to a hotel I used to stay at when it was also a Hampton Inn, as well as the location in the Chesterfield Valley.)

As you walk into the restaurant, you walk down a long hallway that has a number of pictures that pays tribute to a number of American icons of the 50's and 60's.  Large dining rooms for private functions are on the right as you walk down the hall toward the host stand.  

We were greeted by a guy who asked how many we had.  I said that we were meeting someone and at that point, Mike popped up from behind the half wall where he was already seated at a table.  We got some menus, ordered some drinks and caught up on what's been going on with Mike and the Rams.

The food at Syberg's is probably classified as "family friendly".  They have the pre-requisite burgers, appetizers, salads, and sandwiches, but they also serve pizza, steaks, chops and pasta.   They also have a kids menu at Syberg's with all meals priced out at $4.95.

The atmosphere at the Old Dorsett Syberg's is similar to the other Syberg locations I've been to - it's mainly a sports bar with a ton of televisions hanging all over the place.  It doesn't matter where you're seated at Syberg's in the bar area - there's a good chance that you'll be able to see at least six televisions in any direction.  It's a sports fan's heaven.  

 
Syberg's are famous for their chicken wings - they have eight different types of sauces that you can choose to go on to their wings.  I'll have to admit, they are pretty good.  They also have very good onion rings.  We ordered up a plate of the onion rings to get us started.

The onion rings are beer-battered and deep fried.  The outer crust is flaky and flavorful, and the onions are sliced thick.  Oh, man.  I love the onion rings at Syberg's.  (My stomach is doing jumping jacks screaming for Syberg's onion rings, as I write.)

One thing that I've always wanted to try at Syberg's are their shark tacos.  You get three softshell tacos filled with grilled shark bites, topped with a slaw mix and then drizzled with a homemade spicy sauce.  I didn't even look at anything else on the menu once I decided that was what I was going to get.

Cindy went the light route and got a patty melt.  Our friends, Scott and Marcia, went with the mushroom Swiss cheeseburger, and the cobb salad, respectively.  Mike went with Syberg's signature chicken strip salad - hand-breaded chicken strips, deep fried then put on a bed of greens, drizzled with their homemade sauce and topped with shredded provel cheese and homemade croutons.   

It took a bit of time for our orders to come out, given that it was at the height of the noon rush in the restaurant.  But that was all right as we were caught up in conversations.  Our server dropped off the shark tacos in front of me and they were not small.  Large chunks of grilled shark sitting on the slaw mix were doused in some of the Syberg's sauce.  I realized it was going to be a lot of food for lunch. 

But the first bite told me that the fish would not go to waste.  The shark bites had a wonderful grilled flavor, they weren't fishy in the least, and the shark meat was tender, yet firm.  There were at least four or five large shark bites on each taco.  I was able to eat two of the tacos (thanks to the onion rings we'd ordered), then I picked the shark meat out of the final taco, eschewing the taco shell and slaw mix.

The salads at Syberg's are not small, either.   I took a picture of Marcia's cobb salad, but it didn't come out.  Both Mike and Marcia's salad bowls were good sized and heaped in greens and veggies, with Mike's chicken strips on his salad big and meaty.  In fact, Mike got what he couldn't eat of his salad boxed up.  

Scott and Cindy both liked their burger choices, as well.  Scott said, "My burger is very good."  I think he was sort of surprised, but it did look good.  The mushroom Swiss cheeseburger (I would have added bacon) would have been my second choice past the shark bite tacos.  

Frankly, I'm sort of surprised I hadn't written about Syberg's before.  While the food is far from gourmet quality, it's well above average for a sports bar.  The menu is extensive and they seem to do everything well.  I've never had a bad meal in all my visits to any of the Syberg's locations.  One caveat - the prices on the menu can be a little high compared to similar sports bars, but they have much more to offer at Syberg's than your typical sports bar.  Our server at the Westport location that day did a good job, well, as well as she could waiting on multiple tables during the lunch hour.  Syberg's is a fine place for casual dining if you're looking for lunch, dinner or for appetizers when you're watching a sporting event.