Road Tips

OSO Early - Orange Beach, AL

During our trip to the Gulf Coast of Alabama, my wife didn't really care for the breakfast offerings at the hotel where we stayed.  We went out one morning to look for a place that had breakfast and we remembered a place on the north end of Orange Beach that we had passed during a reconnaissance mission getting our bearings of the area a couple three days prior.  I remembered where it was and it was mid-morning when we pulled into the parking lot at OSO Early.  

For over 19 years, Tyler Kean was the chef/proprietor at the Fairhope Inn - a bed & breakfast/restaurant in the nearby town of Fairhope, AL.  Kean purchased the inn and restaurant in 2000 after a stint as a chef in an upscale restaurant in Louisiana after graduating from culinary school in New York City.  Fairhope Inn became an award winning restaurant under Kean known for their Gulf Coast cuisine.  

In early 2019, Kean had a chance to sell the Fairhope Inn and looking to do something else - plus the fact that his wife had just given birth to the couple's 4th child - he sold the inn and restaurant to a lady who had no experience in either running a hotel or a restaurant.  He helped out during the transition - an old manager of the Inn agreed to come back to help run things, as well.  Then by the summer of 2019, he set out to find his new venture.  

A place called Flipper's Seafood and Oyster Bar was located on a point overlooking Bear Point Harbor on the north and east side of Orange Beach.  Known for their live music, their fresh seafood and stunning views of the sunset, the owners of Flipper's were looking to relocate to a larger space.  Kean came into the picture and offered to buy the restaurant.  He named his new restaurant OSO at Bear Point Harbor (Oso is Spanish for bear) and it opened in January of 2020.  

Pictured at right - Tyler Kean.  Photo courtesy Elizabeth Gelineau, Mobile Bay Magazine

Just like millions of restaurants across the nation, OSO at Bear Point Harbor was forced to close in March of 2020, but maintained a brisk to-go business until restaurants were allowed to reopen last summer with restrictions.  But on September 14th of last year, another disaster happened - this time a natural disaster by the name of Hurricane Sally.  

OSO at Bear Point Harbor was devastated by the hurricane losing nearly all of their kitchen equipment in the storm surge that inundated the building.  So, what do you think Kean would do while he waited for OSO at Bear Point Harbor to reopen?  Well, he decided to open a second restaurant.

A couple miles away from OSO at Bear Point Harbor was a restaurant called Barefoot Island Grill that had been closed up for awhile.  Kean would drive by the building on Canal Rd. and saw potential in the place.  He put a bid in on the building and it was accepted in the fall of 2020.  His concept for the restaurant was two-fold - he wanted a sit-down restaurant with limited hours that featured breakfast/brunch/lunch, as well as a place where people could stop by and grab a sandwich/drink/coffee to go.  OSO Early opened in January of 2021.  

We pulled into the parking lot at the corner of Canal Road and Wilson Blvd. around 10:15 that particular morning.  (see map)  The sun was out - the first time we had experienced a nice morning during our trip to the Alabama Gulf Coast, but the wind was still brisk off the Gulf.  

My wife and I made a rookie mistake by going into the "grab-n-go" area of OSO Early instead of the front door of the restaurant.  There were arrows on the floor that pointed the way to the restaurant for people like us.  The area for the "grab-n-go" featured a number of comfy chairs and sofas where people could hang out after getting coffee or fresh-squeezed (daily) fruit drinks.  

The arrows took us out of the large room and into the bar area.  It was a small bar with six chairs and large copper light fixtures overhead.  It was a full bar for people who wanted to have alcoholic drinks for breakfast.  I passed that day, but a bloody mary and a beer is always a nice eye-opener for me.  

We found our way to the lively-colored main dining area and one of the ladies working as servers that day saw us as we came in.  She showed us to a booth in the center of the room where she dropped off a couple menus for us to look through.  My wife got a coffee and I got a quadruple espresso to get me going.  We both later got fresh-squeezed orange juice to go along with our food.  

On the walls and hanging from the center partition at OSO Early were a handful of large fish pieces of art made by driftwood artists in the area.  Tyler Kean offers local artists to display their artwork and put it up for sale with 100% of the proceeds of the sale going to the artist.

Looking through the menu, my wife confessed that she wasn't all that hungry, but thought she needed something.  I wasn't very hungry, either, but thought that since it was later in the morning and we were going to be out exploring, it would be best to get something in my stomach.  

The menu at OSO Early is leveraged heavy toward breakfast options.  For starters, they had house-made beignets served with a white chocolate sauce on the side.  They had omelets, eggs Benedict plates, chicken and waffles, pancakes, and French Toast stuffed with banana cream cheese and Kahlua chocolate.  That sounded highly decadent.  

They also had a handful of "bowls" that went from healthy to hearty.  The "Parfait" bowl featured yogurt, pecan granola, fresh fruit and finished with an artisanal honey.  On the other extreme, the "Southern Loco Moco" was OSO Early's take on the Hawaiian breakfast favorite.  It featured country fried steak topped with fried eggs, a potato hash and fried onions, then topped with a hollandaise sauce and brown gravy.  (Yow!)  For those looking for lunch, OSO Early has a burger, a Monte Cristo sandwich, and Nashville hot chicken.

My wife went with the avocado toast for her light breakfast.  Only this was probably the most complex avocado toast that I've ever seen.  It featured guacamole, goat feta cheese, a bloody mary pico de gallo, arugula and finished with a drizzle of a lime vinaigrette all served on 4 halves of full grain whole wheat toast.  My wife was amazed at the taste.  "This is wonderful," she exclaimed after a couple of bites.  "There's so much going on with each bite!"  She was more than happy with her choice.     

I was sort of torn between a couple things, but I went pretty basic.  I got two eggs over easy, some bacon, a side of OSO Early's house-made corned beef hash, and full grain whole wheat toast.  The eggs were pretty basic, the bacon was better, but the house-made corned beef hash was outstanding.  In addition to fried potatoes and house-made corned beef, the hash had red and green peppers mixed in giving it a bit of a zippy taste.  They had a corned beef hash bowl on the menu that I wish I would have revisited.  But it would have been a lot of food - more food than what I really wanted or needed that morning. 

We drove by OSO at Bear Point Harbor one evening after we'd eaten at OSO Early a couple days before.  The place was understandably packed as it was just before sunset and they had music going on their deck.  We never got a chance to try the food there, but we were more than happy and impressed with the food at their sister restaurant OSO Early.  My wife raved about the avocado toast and I was happy with my basic breakfast consisting of two eggs - over easy, some very good bacon and some excellent house-made corned beef hash.  The service was fine and the atmosphere was, well, I guess you'd call it charming and laid-back.   OSO Early was a great choice for a light breakfast during our trip to the Gulf Coast of Alabama.

Cabos Cantina and Grill - Eldridge, IA

Good friends of ours were telling us about a Mexican restaurant in the Quad City bedroom community of Eldridge, IA earlier this year.  "The food is great and the portions are huge," my friend gushed.  "You really ought to try it sometime!"  On a recent Sunday evening when we didn't feel like cooking at home, we took a trip out to Eldridge to try Cabos Cantina and Grill.  

Jose Vazquez is originally from the Santa Ana Pacueco neighborhood in Pénjamo, Guanajuato, Mexico.  Vazquez's grandmother always had a busy kitchen making food for her family.  In his teens, Vazquez and members of his family immigrated to the U.S. and some ended up in the Midwest, while Vazquez's family ended up out in Virginia.  

As a 16-year-old, Jose Vazquez was working as a dishwasher at a Mexican restaurant in Blacksburg, VA.  The owners of the restaurant saw his dedication and they soon moved the young Vazquez into a waitstaff position in the restaurant.  They then moved him back into the kitchen where he learned how to cook and to run a kitchen.  He did just about everything in the restaurant including running the day-to-day operations as the restaurant expanded into multiple locations.  It was a great learning experience for Vazquez who ended up moving to Peoria, IL to be with family members there.

It was when Vazquez was in Peoria that he opened his dream restaurant, Los Cabos Cantina and Grill with the help of two of his brothers in 2008.  Many of the recipes Vazquez used at Los Cabos came from his grandmother's kitchen in Guanajuato.  Los Cabos immediately gained a following and became one of the premier Mexican restaurants in the Peoria area.  But Vazquez wanted to expand and he looked west toward the Quad Cities where he had relatives living.

Vazquez's cousins invited him to spend some time in the Quad Cities to get to know the area and to possibly scout for a site where to put a restaurant.   As I've said many times over the years, the Quad Cities - with a solid and longtime Hispanic population in the area - already has a number of very good to outstanding authentic Mexican restaurants.  Undeterred by that fact, Vazquez continued to look for a spot and spied a building in the growing town of Eldridge, just five miles north of the Davenport city limits.  The building had been a number of bars and restaurants over the years, but had been sitting vacant for awhile.  

Vazquez took over the building in early 2017 and by the summer, Cabos Cantina and Grill opened its doors.  Vazquez's brothers Juan and Alfonso, along with his cousin Luis, ran the restaurant while Jose Vazquez came up three times a week from his Peoria restaurant to check in on the operation.  In 2019, a small Mexican restaurant that was in a strip mall near the Walmart on the north side of Davenport closed its doors.  Vazquez took over that spot and opened Cabos Cantina and Grill 2 later that year.  

It was around 6 p.m. when we pulled up to the parking lot at Cabos Cantina and Grill, located just off U.S. Highway 61 at the LeClaire Road exit.  (see map)  There was something going on as a number of vintage and unique sports cars had congregated in the parking lot and the large meeting room they have at Cabos Cantina was filled with the owners of those cars.  When we walked in, we were asked if we were there for the party.  Nope, not us.  But we did notice more people being directed to the party room behind the bar area while we were there.  

Festive and bright colors abound inside Cabos Cantina.  The bar area featured a long bar with a faux brick background with a faux awning over the back bar.  Cabos Cantina features a full bar including domestic and imported beers on tap.   

We were seated in a booth just outside the kitchen entrance to the main dining room.  Booths lined the three walls of the dining area with tables in the center of the area.  There was a small patio area on the front of the restaurant, but it was sort of warm that day and we decided to sit inside.  

As we were seated, we were given menus and it wasn't long before a basket of warm corn chips with a tangy salsa with a hint of cloves and nutmeg was brought to the table.  Surprisingly, my wife didn't order a margarita and stuck with water on this visit.  I got a large Dos Equis Ambar that they had on tap.  

They had an extensive menu at Cabos Cantina - shrimp and seafood dishes, chicken plates, pork and beef entrees were featured on the menu.  Of course, they had the Mexican stand-by's - burritos, fajitas, enchiladas, quesadillas and tacos - to choose from.  Poblano chile peppers stuffed with a choice of ground beef, beef tips, shredded beef or chicken was something that caught my wife's eye right off the bat.  I was sort of interested in the pork chile verde entree they had, as well as the Fiesta Burrito - chunks of pork tenderloin that are simmered in beer and stuffed inside a large flour shell.  The tacos al pastor also got my attention.  

In the end, I went with the chile verde shredded beef enchiladas.  The menu said that it came with two enchiladas, Mexican rice and refried beans.  Since there were only two enchiladas on the plate, I went with a ground beef taco.  Well, imagine my surprise when I found not two, but three shredded beef enchiladas on the plate covered in chihuahua cheese and a tomatillo salsa.  The beef taco was covered with cheese, onions and cilantro.  

My wife got the No. 12 combo - a chile relleno with topped with a beef/tomato sauce (as I said, the stuffed chiles got her attention), a beef burrito, and a beef enchilada covered in a molé sauce.  All three had shredded chihuahua cheese on top.  She exclaimed, "This is a lot of food!"  Well, our friends warned us that the portions were huge.  

My shredded beef enchiladas were very good.  The tomatillo sauce on top wasn't all that salty like you can get with some chile verde sauces.  The shredded beef was moist and easily cut with a fork.  The ground beef taco that I got was also very good.  The beef was slightly seasoned and the freshness of the cheese, cilantro and onions all went well together, flavor-wise.  I was able to finish the taco and put a serious dent in the enchiladas, but I couldn't have finished everything that was in front of me.  

My wife also couldn't come close to finishing everything in front of her.  She said that of the three things on her plate she liked the chihuahua cheese-stuffed chile relleno the best, then the burrito, then the enchilada.  "The molé sauce is a bit too much for me," she said as she pushed her plate away so she wouldn't be tempted to eat any more.  

Our first experience at Cabo Cantina and Grill was a pleasant one.  Service was fast and friendly, the food was very good and there was lots of it, and the atmosphere was festive and inviting.  I thought my shredded beef enchiladas with the tomatillo sauce were very good, as was my beef taco that I really didn't need to get.  My wife really enjoyed the combo platter that she had - a cheese-stuffed chile relleno with a ground beef/tomato sauce, a ground beef burrito with an enchilada sauce, and a ground beef enchilada with a molé sauce.  I was also fixated on the spices in their salsa thinking that I'd like to try to put some crushed cloves or nutmeg in our next homemade salsa just to make it a bit more interesting.  Eldridge is a bit of a drive for us, but we do have a Cabo Cantina and Grill in Davenport that we'll be checking out at some point in the near future.

Anchor Bar & Grill - Orange Beach, AL

During our vacation to the Gulf Coast of Alabama, my wife and I had come out of our flu (or food poisoning) episode sort of wobbly and still a bit queasy in our stomachs.  We had a little bit to eat during the day after we had the stomach ailments, but we were looking for something substantial to put in our guts.  My wife ruled out seafood as she thinks she got sick from the oysters a couple nights before.  I said that I needed something sort of like a good ol' greasy cheeseburger to put something substantial in my stomach. Somewhat to my surprise, she agreed.  

We were seated at the bar at the area's only craft brewery - Big Beach Brewing Company - and I asked one of the bartenders where the locals would go for a good ol' cheeseburger in the area.  They mentioned a couple places - one was literally around the corner from our hotel - and then one of them mentioned the Anchor Bar & Grill.  "It's not anything fancy, but they have deck seating and great view of the back bay," one of the bartenders said.  After finishing our beers, we headed over to the Anchor Bar & Grill.  

Jonathon Kastner was a Louisiana native who ended up going to Chicago for culinary school.  After getting his degree from Kendall College - one of the more premier culinary and hospitality schools in the U.S. - Kastner moved back to Louisiana in 2007 where he was worked as a chef for the City Club, a private restaurant in Lafayette.  Kastner also worked at Bella Figura, a now-closed upscale Italian restaurant, as well as at the upscale Cafe Vermillionville in Lafayette.  Kastner also worked as a culinary life coach coming up with low-carb/low-fat/gluten-free meal plans for people who wanted to lose weight and get healthy using primarily locally-grown and organic ingredients.  

Pictured right - Jonathon Kastner.  Photo courtesy AL.com

Two friends of Kastner's - Bryan Jewell and Ryan Trahan - knew of his penchant for looking for locally-grown foods and came to him with a business plan for a restaurant they wanted to open in Lafayette and beyond.  The restaurant - Brick and Spoon - was going to be a breakfast/brunch/lunch spot that Jewell and Trahan were looking to franchise out for other locations around the South.  Kastner helped develop the menu and the first Brick and Spoon opened in Lafayette in May of 2013.  

Two years later, Jewell and Trahan sold their first franchise to Eric Beech who was going to put his restaurant in Orange Beach.  (There are now 13 Brick and Spoon locations in six states in the South.)   Kastner and his girlfriend, Sarah Arceneaux, went to Orange Beach in August of 2015 to help Beech open his restaurant.  Kastner and Arceneaux fell in love with the Orange Beach/Gulf Shores area and told Beech that they'd like to live there at some point.  It turns out that Beech knew of a restaurant opportunity at a local marina and said that Kastner should look into it.

Kastner met with Hudson Marina owner Rodney Jones who had an empty waterfront restaurant space that was available.  The agreement was made almost instantaneously, and within two months Kastner and Arceneaux had moved to Orange Beach and the Anchor Bar and Grill opened in October of 2015.  

Kastner kept the menu simple, but with more of an upscale twist to just regular bar food.  The brisket tots that he came up with - whiskey-smoked brisket beef on tater tots - were an instant hit.  The chicken wings were an ever-changing item as Kastner would experiment with brining his wings in things such as lemon zest and fresh thyme, or even brining the wings in whiskey.  The Anchor Bar & Grill was famous for their Cuban sandwich, their burgers, and their Philly Cheesesteak sandwich made with braised beef belly.  Kastner continually fidgeted with the menu adding and subtracting some items, and he became known for some of his unique nightly specials made with fresh locally-sourced ingredients.  

Now, every once in awhile, I'll go to a restaurant and it usually takes me six to eight weeks - or longer - to get around to write about it for Road Tips.  There have been a couple three times in the past where the restaurant closed from the time I was there to the time I started to write about it.  Well, from the time we were there and now, there's been a big change in the Anchor Bar and Grill.  

Late last year, Kastner - like many chefs his age - felt that he needed to do something different after five years steering the Anchor Bar and Grill.  Not long after he had opened the restaurant, Kastner had made friends with Craig Williams, a restaurateur from Tuscaloosa, AL who grew up in the Orange Beach/Gulf Shores area.  Williams and his wife would vacation in the area and they began to hang out with Kastner when they would get to Orange Beach.  

Williams opened his first restaurant - the Avenue Pub - in Tuscaloosa in January of 2014.  It was an immediate hit with the locals and it allowed Williams to open his second restaurant - Central Mesa - a couple years later.  From there, he took over an Italian restaurant, then took over a specialty grocery store and delicatessan after that.  

When Kastner decided to make a change, he naturally told Williams of his plans.  Kastner eventually asked Williams to take over the Anchor Bar and in April of this year the handoff was made.   Williams ran the restaurant from afar for a couple months - including while we were there - but by June, he decided that he couldn't sustain Kastner's hands-on business model.   So, Williams decided to transition the Anchor Bar and Grill into an Avenue Pub location.  

The menu at the restaurant changed dramatically after Williams turned it into the Avenue Pub.  Gone were many of the food items that Kastner had made famous at the Anchor Bar.  But given that it's only been a couple months since Williams changed things over, it's my guess that they'll be adding more items along the way.   

We made our way down Canal Road and turned at the corner of S. Wilson Blvd.  We were familiar with the area as we had a late breakfast a couple days before at OSO Early right at the corner of Canal Rd. and S. Wilson Blvd. (Look for an upcoming Road Tips entry on OSO Early.)  We went down to the end of S. Wilson Blvd. and pulled into the parking lot across from the Anchor Bar and Grill and the Hudson Marina.  (see map)  As we started to walk toward the restaurant we heard screeches from an osprey that was in a nest on top of a pole near the parking lot.  It turned out that there was a family of ospreys in the nest and the parents were feeding their babies.  It was actually kind of neat to see.  

The front wood facade of the Anchor Bar and Grill that faces the parking lot is shaped to appear like a boat.  There were two different entrances to the place, both stair steps up the "bow" and the "stern" of the building.  We went up the "bow" side and found ourselves in the kitchen.  I sort of stopped and someone said, "No, no!  Come on in!"  We walked past the open kitchen and out onto the deck in the back of the "boat".  

The patio area consisted of a plank floor with a number of metal tables and chairs.  The sun was setting and there were some flimsy shades that didn't do much in keeping the sun out.  It was still very windy - as it had been all week - and we were having trouble keeping stuff on the table.  

This is the view off the patio at the Anchor Bar of Terry Cove, a small area that is part of Perdido Bay.  (Click on picture to enlarge.)  Centered in the picture is the Perdido Pass Bridge that connects Orange Beach with Perdido Key.  To the left of the bridge between the tall buildings is Cobalt, the Restaurant which we went to for our anniversary dinner.  (Click here to see the entry on Cobalt.)  To the right of the bridge in the large block house is the Orange Beach home of entrepreneur Art Favre - the owner of The Wharf at Orange Beach entertainment/retail/restaurant complex on the north side of Orange Beach.  (Favre is the uncle of former NFL legendary quarterback Brett Favre.)  To the right of Favre's magnificent contemporary house is his covered boat dock for his ocean going yacht.   In the foreground of the picture, you may be able to make out a pirate ship.  Hudson Marina does pirate ship cruises twice a day for families and groups paying homage to the 18th century pirates who hid out on Perdido Bay. 

Our server that day was a young guy by the name of Kevin.  He was laid back and very casual in his demeanor.  My wife decided she wanted a piña colada while I wanted to know if they had an IPA or a hazy IPA.  "Uh, yeah, I'm sure we have something like that," Kevin said.  "Let me go look."  

Moments later, he brought out my wife's piña colada and brought me a can of the New Belgium Voodoo Ranger V2K.  It was already opened.  I thought that was pretty presumptuous of him as I don't really care for New Belgium beers.  I thought he would have just come back and tell me what they had and I certainly wouldn't have ordered The Voodoo Ranger V2K.  But it was a hazy IPA, however it was a little too syrupy and citrusy for me.  I went ahead and drank it, and didn't complain to him about it. 

Kevin had dropped off a couple menus for us to go through.  While we were there for the burgers, they had some other interesting things on the menu.  The Philly cheesesteak sandwich wasn't on the menu, but the Cuban sandwich was.  The whiskey brisket tater tots were also on the menu.  Their rendition of wings that day were tossed in a candied jalapeño sauce.  They also had yellowfin tuna poké with avocado, tamari-pickled mustard seed and a chopped sweet onion.  And they had Gulf fish tacos - fresh caught gulf coast whitefish that was pan-seared and topped with a Cajun crawfish salsa, cilantro-puffed rice, and refried butterbeans and finished with an avocado créma.  Now THAT got my attention.

Despite the other temptations on the menu, we stayed true to our quest for a big, greasy cheeseburger.  And the one at the Anchor Bar didn't disappoint.  This is called the "More In than Out Burger" - Jonathan Kastner's version of the west coast classic In-N-Out Burger.  It consists of two mustard-seared Louisiana wagyu beef patties both of which were topped with American cheese.  Iceberg lettuce, caramelized onions and a house-made tomato jam were added on top.  The bottom bun was splashed with spicy mayo sauce.  I got tots as my side and had Kevin bring me a bottle of Louisiana hot sauce to add to the tots.  My wife got a side of their house-made cole slaw made with tzatziki sauce.  

From the first bite, we knew we had made the right choice.  The burger was juicy, flavorful and just outstanding.  We were using multiple napkins (the used ones we were having trouble with staying on the table with the brisk wind coming in over the bay) as the juicy goodness along with the gooey American cheese was dripping on our hands.  This was exactly what the doctor ordered after our bouts with the stomach flu.  

The only problem is that Kevin just disappeared.  He sort of copped an attitude about halfway through our visit and I would have like to have gotten another beer while my wife wanted some water after her drink was finished.  But he was nowhere in sight.  We flagged down one of the female servers to get us our drinks and, later, our bill.  (We did see him later on when we were leaving.  He was evidently on break having food at the counter in the kitchen area.  We walked past him and he didn't say a word.  We are still trying to figure out why he started to cop an attitude with us.  Or maybe he was pissed off at something else.)  

The burger we both had at the Anchor Bar and Grill was simply outstanding.  But, as I said, with the changeover to the Avenue Pub just a month after we were there, the More In than Out Burger is no longer available.  And that's a shame because it was simply one of the best burgers I've ever had.  And you can go through the Burger category on Road Tips and read about some truly great burgers I've had over the years.  Our server's demeanor went from laidback to cold to non-existent.  But the views of the bay and the harbor were great for Midwesterners like us.  Even though they don't have quite the eclectic menu at the Avenue Pub as they did when it was the Anchor Bar and Grill, just being able to have a meal on the water would be worth the trip there.  

Double D Diner - Davenport, IA

My wife and I like to go out on Sunday's from time to time to get a burger and a bloody mary.  There are a few locally-owned places that have that combination and we were telling a friend about looking for places that have good burgers and bloody mary's.  She told us, "Have you guys tried the Double D Diner yet?"  Then she raved about the burgers they had there.  We had heard about the place, knew its location in northwest Davenport, but we had not been there.  We've been there twice now - once for dinner and once for breakfast.  We've had the burger and the bloody mary separately and this Road Tips entry is the combination of our two visits.  

Double D Diner owner Dusti Reese has been in the concessions business for a number of years.  She founded Sunshine Concessions in 2000 and went to local fairs and events selling everything from grilled tenderloins to corn dogs to funnel cakes to fruit shake-up drinks.  For over 15 years, Dusti worked the local circuit with her crew and even did catering work for businesses in the area.  In 2019, she did a complete 180 degree change by opening a small women's clothing store - LillyPad Boutique - later that year.  She was located next door to a small diner by the name of The Kitchen that we had heard was sort of spotty with their food and service.  When The Kitchen closed in late 2019, Reese saw an opportunity as there were very few dining options on Davenport's northwest side.  

Reese opened the Double D Diner on February 29, 2020.  Two weeks later, she was forced to shut her doors to dine-in business due to the pandemic.  Reese thinks of herself as a pretty creative person, so she was one of the first to offer to-go dining for her restaurant and relied upon social media to let people know.  That kept her going up to the time that limited in-person dining was re-established last summer.  

Last August, a derecho hit the Quad Cities and left thousands of people without power for days and a number of restaurants were forced to close until power was restored.  Once again, Reese's creative side showed through as she rolled out one of her gas grills that she used for her concession business onto the lot in front of the restaurant and started to make burgers, ribeyes, brats, grilled chicken, and pork tenderloin sandwiches for people who were looking for something to eat.  It was a hit and by the early afternoon on some days while waiting for the power to go back on, Reese would sell out of some meat items.  Friends and family members helped out by running for more buns and supplies while Reese kept the grill smoking feeding a large number of people who saw that she was open.  

Picture at right courtesy Double D Diner Facebook page.

Cedar Rapids was hard-hit by the derecho and Reese ended up taking her outdoor grill up to that city a couple weekends later to make food for people who still had no power in their neighborhoods.  From time to time on nice days, she'll put the outdoor grill up on weekends in front of her restaurant to sells brats, burgers and grilled sandwiches. 

The Double D Diner grew in popularity due in part to the positive reactions Reese received in the local press and on social media after the derecho.  Wait times going into the fall and into the winter on some weekend days were reaching 30 to 45 minutes for a table.  While the diner was going gangbusters, her boutique was bobbing along on its own.  Reese decided in March of this year to close the boutique and use the space as a combination extra dining overflow/reception/private dining room.  By the end of April of this year, the boutique space had been transformed into part of the Double D Diner.  

One recent evening, my wife and I weren't in the mood to cook and we decided to head over to the Double D Diner to get one of their burgers our friend had told us about.  It was just after 7 p.m. when we got there and we pretty much had the place to ourselves. (see map) Dusti Reese was behind the front counter at the grill and we sat in a booth along the wall opposite the bar.  The bar was sort of a catch-all for the kitchen staff and you couldn't have sat there if you wanted to.  The main dining area - sans the bar - sits around 36 people.  

Marissa was our server that evening and she dropped off a couple menus to look over.  They do have a full bar at Double D Diner and I wanted a beer.  I saw that they had the Easy Eddy hazy IPA from the Big Grove Brewery on the menu and I ordered one of those.  Marissa came back and said that they were unfortunately out of the Easy Eddy.  I went with a safe pick after that and ordered a Bud Light.  She came back moments later and said they were out of Bud Light.  "Do you have Budweiser," I asked.  She said she did and went to fetch me one.  It was in a can and I was given a glass to pour it in.  The beer, however, was not as cold as I would have liked - probably in the 55 to 60 degree temperature range - and it didn't go down all that well.  

For a diner, it's a pretty short menu.  They serve breakfast all day - 7:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. (they close at 9 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, and at 3 p.m. on Sunday) - and about 2/3rds of the menu on one side is devoted to breakfast items.  Double D Diner specializes in omelettes, French toast, pancakes, biscuits and gravy, and also has Mexican-style items such as eggs and chorizo, as well as a breakfast burrito.  

The lunch and dinner part of the menu features sandwiches, salads, and burgers, while full dinner entrees such as a bruschetta chicken breast, an 8-ounce Iowa pork chop, and a 10-ounce ribeye are available.  Double D Diner features daily lunch and dinner specials such as meatloaf, tacos and special pricing on pork tenderloin sandwiches.  Appetizers such as chicken wings, fried pickles, and sirloin steak bites served with a blue cheese fondue were also on the menu.  

We were there for the burgers and they have a "build-your-own-burger" part of the menu.  I went with my standard burger of Swiss cheese and sautéed mushrooms.  I could have gotten bacon on it, but I decided against it on my first visit.  I had my choice of a brioche or a pretzel bun and I went with the brioche.  I got a side of the fries to go along with the burger. 

In addition to the cheese and mushrooms, I got lettuce, a tomato slice, some red onions and dill pickles for the burger.  All together, the burger was stacked high when I went to take my first bite.

Now, I grew up in Newton, IA and there was a place there called the Cardinal Lunch that was a 24-hour place in its day.  They had burgers there where they used some sort of a butter sauce or batter that they would put on the bun and then grill the buns face down on a flat-top grill.  The taste was one of those things I cherished in my youth.  The burgers - especially the buns - tasted exactly like that at the Double D Diner.  In fact, Dusti Reese came over to talk to us after we finished and I asked her if she did anything special with the buns to get that taste.  "Oh, no.  Nothing special at all," she said.  "We just put butter on them, then put them on the grill to toast them."  I was hoping she would give me an insight to something really special about the type of butter or if she mixed anything with it, but she said it was just straight butter.  In any event, this was an outstanding burger.

My wife went the burger route, as well, getting a cheddar cheese burger with sautéed onions along with chipotle mayo and a garlic aioli sauce on the side.  For her side, she got Double D Diner's creamy cole slaw.  She also got lettuce, fresh onion, pickles and tomato with her burger.  

Each burger starts as a 1/2 pound patty and is flat-grilled in its own juices.  It has a crispy outer shell and both of our burgers were cooked perfectly inside to a medium with a hint of pink.  The brioche buns that we both got were light, but held up very well with the juiciness of the burger combined with the veggies, cheese and condiments that we put on them.  The garlic aioli that my wife got was especially pungent and forward in taste.  I dipped some of my fries into the garlic aioli because I knew that I wouldn't want to be around her later that evening if I didn't eat some of the aioli to counter what she had eaten.  I also dipped some of my fries - which were also very good, by the way - into the chipotle mayo.  It had a nice little spiciness to it, but wasn't overpowering in taste.  

Over the 4th of July weekend, we went back to the Double D Diner for breakfast.  This time, the place was packed and we had to wait a short while for a booth to open up.  This time, I got a bloody mary and it was pretty underwhelming.  They use Jimmy Luv's Bloody Mary Mix, a mix from a small company out of Milwaukee.  I've had the Jimmy Luv's before, but wasn't all that impressed with it.  (For a bloody mary at home, I prefer the Zing Zang mix for a number of reasons.  Then I usually doctor it up with ground horseradish, Tabasco, Worcestershire sauce, juice from a real lime and a lot of cracked black pepper.  Plus Zing Zang has the lowest amount of sodium compared to other mixes on the market.)  

For breakfast that day, I got a sausage, mushroom and Swiss cheese omelet.  It featured three eggs in the omelet and it was paper thin - the way I like my omelets.  Hash browns came on the side.  I asked our server that day for some Cholula hot sauce to go on to the omelet and hash browns to zip up the taste a bit.  On their own without any hot sauce, both the hash browns and omelet were good.  Not outstanding, but good.    

My wife went with the two eggs, bacon, hashbrowns with toast breakfast.  And as she usually does when she checks out a new breakfast place, she got a single pancake to try.  The pancake was a little more fluffy than she prefers, but it had sort of a crusty edge that she likes.  The eggs were ordered as scrambled, but they came out sort of like an omelet.  She just cut up the eggs like they were scrambled. 

My wife was happy with her breakfast.  She ate all her eggs, gave me a piece of bacon, and had a bit of the hash browns.  But she must have liked the pancake as she ate about half of it.  I tried a bite of the pancake and I thought it was fine.  

Our friend definitely did not steer us wrong on the burgers at the Double D Diner.  I will say it is one of the best ones I've had around the Quad Cities.  The breakfast at Double D Diner is also good - nothing special, but dependably good.  I wasn't too whippy on the their bloody mary, so that may take them out of our Sunday burger and bloody mary rotation.  But the service was efficient and friendly.  The Double D Diner isn't anything fancy, but it's far from a greasy spoon restaurant.  We would recommend giving it a try if you're in the area.

Grill 211 - Paducah, KY

On our way home from our vacation along the Gulf Coast of Alabama, we decided to do our best to make it as far as we could so we wouldn't have such a long drive home on Sunday.  We made it up to Paducah, KY - a nine hour drive from the Gulf coast - and stopped for the evening.  After checking into the hotel, we looked up some places to eat in the downtown area.  I found a place that sounded like it was somewhat upscale and had interesting choices of food.  We took off from the hotel to go to Grill 211 in downtown Paducah.

George Manganaro grew up in Florida and started to work in restaurants at a very early age.  Tired of working for other people, Manganaro and his wife, Joan, opened a pizza restaurant in Pigeon Forge, TN.  Not happy with the tourist scene in Pigeon Forge, the Manganaro's looked for a more quiet and laid-back place to live.  They found a farm located outside of Marion, KY for sale on the internet.  They thought, "What the heck?  We can move to small town Kentucky and open a restaurant there!" 

One day, a high school student by the name of Lauren Hunt walked into their restaurant - Main Street Italian Grill - to sell yearbook ads.  Joan Manganaro was impressed with the girls confidence and ended up buying an ad.  A few weeks later, Lauren Hunt came back to Main Street Italian Grill and asked Joan Manganaro for a job.  She was hired on the spot and did a little bit of everything for the restaurant over time - cashier, server, bussing tables, tending the salad bar - and the Manganaro's treated Lauren like their daughter.  

In 2013, an opportunity arose for the Mangararo's to take over a restaurant in downtown Paducah - about an hours drive away.  They sold their Italian restaurant in Marion and made Lauren a partial owner of the new restaurant in Paducah to entice her to come with them.  The Italian Grill on Broadway opened in downtown Paducah in March of 2014.  

Even though they served pizzas at the Italian Grill on Broadway, George Manganaro felt that Paducah could use a good pizza-centric/sports bar restaurant.  As the Italian Grill was clicking on all cylinders after being open for three years, the Manganaro's and Hunt opened Pizza Warehouse in March of 2017.  And while that was all going on, the Manganaro's and Hunt were working on an even bigger concept - an upscale, yet laid-back restaurant that featured prime cuts of beef and fresh seafood.  In late 2016, they had taken over the old Ristorante Di Fratelli at 211 Broadway which had closed at the end of 2015 and transformed it into their new restaurant - Grill 211.  Manganaro decreed that there would be no pasta served at Grill 211 as they already had an Italian restaurant just a block away.  Grill 211 opened in November of 2017.  

The Manganaro's and Hunt continued to run all three places until they decided to close down the Italian Grill on Broadway in early 2019 and move much of their Italian specialties out to the Pizza Warehouse.  Grill 211 had only been open five days a week, but they decided to open seven days a week using staff from the Italian Grill to help out at both the Pizza Warehouse and Grill 211.  

2020 was a challenging year for the Manganaro's and Hunt.  In the fall of 2019, the group opened a Tex-Mex/Barbecue restaurant out near Interstate 24 on Paducah's west side.  That restaurant - Warehouse 11 - lasted less than a year and was forced to close permanently when the pandemic hit.  

As the pandemic continued on, it turned out to be very taxing for George Manganaro who was looking to slow down a bit.  They decided to sell Grill 211 and were looking for someone locally who would be interested in continuing the restaurant.  Jo Tang and Freddie Chaeh, the husband-and-wife team who owned the popular Blue Ginger Asian restaurant in Paducah, were friends with the Manganaro's and they agreed to take over the business in January of this year.  They changed a few things in the restaurant, but kept most of same concepts that made Grill 211 so popular. 

Now, we really like Paducah.  We've spent some time there in the past and it has always been a good place to visit.  It was around 8:30 p.m. when we pulled into downtown Paducah and drove past Grill 211.  (see map)  We parked at a city lot near the Ohio River and walked back up to Broadway to go to the restaurant.  It was pretty dead in the dining room when we got there and we asked the hostess if they closed at 9.  (We hate to be THOSE people who walk in 20 minutes before closing.)  The young lady said, "No, no!  We're open until 10!"  She took us to a table across from a glass-enclosed wine room in the long narrow brick-walled dining room and gave us our menus.  

The bar area was sort of interesting with sort of a purple hue casting down along the walls and the front of the bar.  The panels under the front of the bar looked like they were a chrome diamond plating.  They were still in COVID-19 restrictions for bars in Kentucky, so they had tables up next to the bar to space out seating.  We were told that it would be another week before the restrictions would be lifted.

Now, on the way up from the Gulf Coast, we stopped at a Whataburger on the north side of Birmingham to get something to eat.  It was a big mistake all the way around.  Now, I love Whataburger and my wife will indulge me when I see one and will eat there, too.  But this Whataburger location was suffering from a number of problems.  We ordered and waited and waited and waited to get our meal.  And when it finally did show up, it just looked horrible.  And it tasted horrible. I ate maybe half of it and I shouldn't have eaten that much. 

Pictured at right - the offending Double Meat with Cheese.

It was the worst Whataburger experience I have ever encountered in the long history of my love for Whataburger.  And on top of that, the burger gave me a bad stomachache.  Not quite as bad as I felt when my wife and I were sick during our vacation along the Gulf Coast, but it lingered and lingered, even after I had taken some Tums to try and soothe my stomach.  By the time I got to Paducah, I just wasn't hungry.  I knew my wife would be, so I went into Grill 211 thinking that I could maybe nibble on whatever she got.  

Our server for the evening was a young lady by the name of Liz.  I told her that I had a bad lunch earlier in the day and I thought maybe a lighter beer would get me unhinged in the stomach.  I ordered a Bud Light and it didn't help.  My stomach was still knotted up after the one beer.  

I sort of wish I didn't feel bad because there were some things on the menu that I really wanted to try.  They had a sushi grade ahi tuna with a wasabi cream sauce as an appetizer.  They also had an appetizer of Italian-style mussels served in a white wine sauce with capers.  For seafood that evening, they had a Chilean sea bass on the menu, as well as chargrilled scallops on skewers.  

For meats, they had a ribeye that they age for 28 days before they smoke it in-house, then finish it off on the grill.  Now, THAT sounded really interesting.  They had a grilled chicken breast in a saffron marsala sauce that sounded good to me, too.   But what REALLY caught my eye was the smoked meatloaf - a combination of ground beef brisket and pork belly that is also smoked in-house, then finished on the grill like the smoked ribeye.  But my stomach was still so upset that I knew it would go to waste if I ordered it.  

Since the Manganaro's and Laura Hunt no longer owned Grill 211, the new owners put a couple pasta dishes on the menu.  One was the creamy margarita - gemelli pasta noodles in a creamy white wine/butter sauce with a house-made basil pesto.  Protein choices were available and my wife got the grilled chicken.  She also got a glass of a house red wine.  (She misread the menu and thought it was in a red sauce.)    

When Liz brought the bowl of pasta and grilled chicken out to the table, my wife's eyes grew huge.  "That's a lot of food," she exclaimed.  And it was.  I wish there was something I could have put next to the bowl to compare in size, but this would have been more than enough food for two people.  

My wife thought it was very good.  And very rich.  She said, "Are you sure you can't eat any of this?  It's going to go to waste."  

I did have a couple bites and it was very good.  The creamy white wine/butter sauce was heavenly in taste.  The basil pesto was a wonderful complement to the sauce.  But I could only have a couple bites as my stomach still felt like it had a bowling ball sitting in it.  

My wife was able to finish about a quarter of it.  It was just a huge portion of food.  They could have easily cut the serving in half and it would have been perfect.  But there was going to be a lot of food leftover that my wife could leave and be embarrassed about it, or take with us and probably throw out later.  She chose the latter - better to be embarrassed in private rather than in public, I guess.  And she felt so bad in doing so because the creamy margarita pasta was excellent in her eyes.  It just wouldn't have traveled well even if we would have been able to keep it in a cooler.   

It's too bad for me that I wasn't hungry when we visited Grill 211.  They had some interesting menu items to choose from including fresh seafood, steaks, pasta dishes, and a smoked meatloaf that really had me intrigued.  My wife was very happy with her selection - the gemelli pasta in a creamy white wine/butter sauce with basil pesto.  The grilled chicken breast that she got to go on top of the pasta was cooked perfectly to her liking.  As I said, we like going to Paducah and the next time we go back I want to try Grill 211.  Hopefully the smoked meatloaf is still on the menu.  

Acme Oyster House - Gulf Shores, AL

While getting acclimated to the Gulf Shores/Orange Beach area one day, we drove past a restaurant that looked sort of interesting - Acme Oyster House.  My wife was getting hungry a day or two later while we were out and about and I decided to head over to the Acme Oyster House to give it a try for lunch.  What I didn't know is that Acme Oyster House is a chain and I probably wouldn't have considered it in the first place.  But we went and here's what we experienced.  

The original Acme Cafe was established in New Orleans 1910 by John Gentilich.  The original location was on Royal Street on the west end of the French Quarter near Canal Street.  A fire in 1924 caused Gentilich to move the restaurant around the corner to its present day location on Iberville Street.  After the move, Gentilich renamed the restaurant Acme Oyster House.  It was a popular place to sneak a drink during Prohibition and because oysters were so plentiful and cheap, it was a popular place to eat during the Great Depression.  

After going through a handful of owners over the years, and a decentralization of businesses and offices from the heart of New Orleans, Acme Oyster House found itself in trouble by the early 1980's.  They were having staffing issues (sort of like a lot of restaurants today) and many times they had to close early.  The owner at the time put up a neon sign that said, "Waitress Available Sometimes".  As Acme Oyster House was slowly dying on the vine, a local man saw the potential in the place and stepped in to buy the place. 

Mike Rodrigue grew up near the shores of Lake Pontchartrain and got his start in the seafood industry working with his father as they tendered crab traps along the seawalls in New Orleans.  Rodrigue knew the key to great seafood restaurants was the fresher the catch, the better the food.  

In 1985, Rodrigue bought the Acme Oyster House and set out to transform the tired old place into something new and exciting.  When he bought the restaurant, they had just one waitress, a lady named Vi who - depending on her mood - may or may not have been willing to wait on tables.   The now famous "Waitress Available Sometimes" sign was completely apropos for the restaurant.  Rodrigue served 250,000 raw and charred oysters in his first year of business.  Over 20 years later - and a few more locations - Acme Oyster House was shucking about 3.8 million oysters annually.  

Pictured at right - Mike Rodrigue.  Photo courtesy Rotary of Metarie, LA.  

In 1997, Rodrigue began to expand the business.  He put in a location in the New Orleans suburb of Covington on the north side of Lake Pontchartrain and another one opened in Metairie in 1998.  A third one was opened in the suburb of Kenner near the airport.  (Both the Covington and Kenner locations closed about 10 years ago.)  In 2002, another Acme Oyster House location - the first one outside of the greater New Orleans area - opened in the Sandestin Resort in Destin, Florida.

With all the expansion going on, Rodrigue recognized that he needed to have some help with his restaurants. He reached out to two industry veterans - Lucien Gunter and Paul Rotger - for that help.  Gunter had worked with the Hard Rock Cafe restaurants for a number of years, as had Rotger who was responsible for the Pink Taco restaurants that were in various Hard Rock Hotels around the nation.  Rodrigue installed Gunter as the CEO of the Acme Oyster House and Rotger as the Chief Operating Officer.  

Another Acme Oyster House was opened in Baton Rouge in 2008 and the Gulf Shores location opened in 2014.  A sixth Acme Oyster House opened in May of this year in Houston, TX.  When the Gulf Shores location opened, Lucien Gunter left his post as CEO of Acme Oyster House to run the operation there.  Paul Rotger took over as the CEO of the Acme Oyster House after Gunter left.  

It was after the noon rush when we pulled up to Acme Oyster House which is part of the Waterway Village mixed-use development located on both sides of the Intercoastal Waterway on the north side of Gulf Shores.  (see map)  The Gulf Shores location is the largest of the six Acme Oyster House locations with over 8,000 square feet of space along with a good sized back deck that overlooks the waterway.  There was plenty of parking in the lot in front of the building.  

There's no reservations taken at any of the Acme Oyster House locations and the hostess stand is outside the front door on the porch of the large, stately building that housed the restaurant.  As we waited outside in the spitting rain and cool wind, someone finally came out to greet us.  It turned out that person - Jessica - would also be our server that day.  She took us to a table with a checkerboard table covering in the center of the main dining room and had us upload the menu to our phones via a QR Code that was on the table.  She asked us if we wanted anything to drink and they had the Sweetwater IPA available in bottles.  I ordered one of those and my wife was good with water.  

It took Jessica another 10 minutes to get my beer to me.  I noticed that a replica of the famous "Waitress Available Sometimes" signs was on a wall above the doors that went out to the deck in back.  That was certainly the case that day.  But they were obviously short-staffed and even though it was after the lunch rush, there were still a lot of people in the place.  

The main dining room featured high ceilings with a hardwood floor meaning that the place was probably very loud when it was full.  Neon signage was prevalent throughout the room.  A raw bar came out from a shucking station into the dining area.  Acme Oyster House has a "15 Dozen Club" that recognizes people who have eaten at least 15 dozen oysters - 180 total - in a sitting.  (I have trouble with a dozen.)  The most in one sitting at any of the Acme Oyster House locations was achieved at the Metairie location where an Alexandria, VA lady by the name of Sonya Thomas - A.K.A. "The Black Widow" - ate 52 dozen oysters in one sitting in March of 2005.  Now, I was sick the day we had math in high school, but a quick reckoning puts that at over 600 oysters downed in one sitting!  Only one person had achieved the "15 Dozen Club" at the Gulf Shores location - it was also a woman.  A local Gulf Shores woman by the name of Mary "Whoopsie" Schoenhoff downed right at 15 dozen in December of 2018.  

By the time Jessica got back to me with my beer, I was ready to order some chargrilled oysters.  We ordered them up and waited.  Jessica came back 10 minutes later - without the oysters - and asked if we wanted to order any appetizers.  I had to remind her that we ordered a half-dozen of the chargrilled oysters previously.  "Oh god, you're right," she said with a pained look on her face and then she ran off to check on those.  We knew she was overwhelmed at this point and my wife was trying to be patient.  But we had been there for nearly 20 minutes and still hadn't ordered lunch.  And at this point my wife was getting "hangry".  

It wasn't long after that Jessica brought us the chargrilled oysters.  And they were worth the wait.  They were swimming in garlic butter and had a cheese blend mixed in.  They were great.  But the only quibble I had was that they only gave us a couple pieces of bread to sop up the creamy garlic butter/cheese under the oyster shells when we finished eating the oysters.  They were excellent, but - oh! - so rich.

We both got a cup of their gumbo after we ordered our lunch.  The gumbo was somewhat underwhelming and even putting Tabasco in with it didn't help it out the flavor.  My wife remarked that she thought my gumbo that I make back in Iowa was better.  (I do make a pretty mean gumbo.  You can click here to see how I make mine.)

I was pretty intrigued by the menu.  They had an appetizer called "Boo Fries" that were basically the same thing as the poutine (French fries covered with beef gravy and cheese curds) that I get when I'm up in Montreal.  (Then again, the original Cajuns were French colonists who initially settled in what are known today as the Canadian maritime provinces.  Many of them wanted to get away from British rule and made their way to Louisiana to settle in what was then French-owned land in the 1700's.)  They also had Natchitoches on the appetizer menu.  Pronounced "NACK-id-dush", they're a meat pie that is filled with beef, pork, onions, peppers and celery all folded into a pastry shell and deep fried.  They can be eaten as a hand-held food, but most people like using a fork.  

They had a lot of fried food on the menu - of course.  Fried shrimp platter, fried oyster platter, fried fish platter, fried soft shell crab platter - the deep-fried foods that they have in the south would have been great for me 30 years ago.  Even though fried oysters or friend shrimp sound good - and they probably are good - after losing over 60 pounds three years ago and doing a pretty good job of keeping it off, fried foods like that are a hard pass for me.  

But they also had Po' Boy sandwiches on the menu.  Once again, they were made with fried oysters, fried shrimp, etc., etc.  But one Po' Boy on the menu brought back memories of the one and only time I went to New Orleans.  It was for a trade show in 1998 and our hotel was right across the street from the famous Mother's Restaurant.  I must have eaten there four or five times and each time I got the roast beef Po' Boy - thin sliced roast beef with "debris" (the tender parts of the roast beef that falls off into the liquid in the pan during the cooking process) and topped with a beef au jus.  The beef, debris and au jus are placed on French bread with a crispy crust.  I have not been able to find one like it - until I went to the Acme Oyster House in Gulf Shores.

Billed as the "Acme 10 Napkin Roast Beef" Po' Boy, I had to have one of those.  It came on a large piece of French bread cut in two.  It had shredded lettuce, dill pickles and banana peppers on the sandwich.  The juice from the au jus was literally dripping down off my hand and onto the plate as I ate the sandwich.  I had asked Jessica for more napkins when she brought the sandwich, but she forgot.  In fact, she never came back to check on us while we were eating.  I know that she was overwhelmed, but in my book it is still a cardinal sin for any server to not check back at some point to see if we needed anything.  The sandwich was great and the Sweetwater IPA was a great compliment, so good that I needed another one about halfway through.  But Jessica was nowhere to be found.  (I never did get my extra napkins and had to go to the restroom to wash up and bring back some paper towels to use.)  

My wife went with the grilled shrimp Caesars salad.  They marinate the shrimp beforehand (they never did say what they were marinated in) and then peeled and grilled.  When the bowl was set down in front of her, my wife said, "Holy crap!  That's a lot of shrimp!"  And it was.  There were easily a dozen grilled shrimp - if not more - on top of her Caesars salad.  "We could have split this," my wife exclaimed.  She did let me have a couple shrimp to try and the chargrilled taste of the shrimp was wonderful.  

Well, my sandwich was a lot, too.  We could have easily split that.  There was no way that I was going to be able to finish the whole thing.  I ate one side of the sandwich and sort of picked at the beef on the other side.  I really did want another beer, but we had lost Jessica.  Well, we had pretty much lost sight of ANY server in the place by the time we were done.  

We sat and sat and sat waiting for our bill to show up.  My wife looked at the clock on her phone and said, "We've been here over an hour.  At this point, I don't care if they're understaffed or overwhelmed here.  I'm sorry, but this is ridiculous."   

Jessica finally did show up and I told her that I needed to get our bill.  It was another five minutes before she came back with one.  I didn't even peruse the bill like I normally do.  I just threw down my charge card and she took that and the bill back with her.  She came back with the copies and my credit card and she said, "Thank you guys for hanging in there with me.  I'm sorry things seemed a little disjointed.  We're just so understaffed here that I haven't had much of a chance to catch my breath today."  I did cut her some slack and gave her the usual 20% tip I give for good - but not exceptional - service in a restaurant.  

Had I known beforehand that Acme Oyster House was a chain - albeit just a six location chain - I probably would have passed on going in there for a meal.  But sometimes ignorance is bliss as other than the slow and somewhat spotty service we experienced, I'd have to give two thumbs up for my roast beef Po' Boy at Acme Oyster House.  My wife thought her grilled shrimp Caesars salad was very good, as well.  The chargrilled oysters with a butter and cheese sauce we had as an appetizer were sinfully great.  About the only thing other than the service we were underwhelmed about was the gumbo we both tried before we got our lunches.  But we were able to work around those problems.  I will be happy when service issues at many restaurants are solved and the experience of having any problems during a good meal will be behind us.  

Joe's Pizza - Chicago, IL

A large number of months ago, I got an e-mail from a Road Tips reader in Chicago that said, "I saw your blog post about Dino's Pizza.  That's one of my favorites, too.  But if you like Dino's, I'm sure you'll like Joe's which is just down the street."  The reader was referring to Joe's Pizza, located about a mile and a half east of Dino's on Higgins.  I filed Joe's away in my "Restaurants to Visit" list.  But with the pandemic raging and my travel shut down, I wasn't able to get there until Chicago opened up to vaccinated travelers in early June.  Thinking pizza would be good for a meal one evening, I started out thinking about heading to Dino's.  But then I remembered about the one place down the road.  I looked it up on my saved places on my Google Maps application and decided to head over to Joe's Pizza to give it a try.

Giuseppe "Joe" Pollini was a sailor in the Italian navy during World War II.  However, his ship and fellow crew mates were captured and taken via ship to the United States to be interned in a prison camp.  (My dad was stationed in Texas during World War II and the base he was at held a number of Italian prisoners of war.)  During the trip to the U.S., Joe was one of the cooks who made meals for the crew of the American ship.

Once he got to New York, the war was coming to an end and many of the Italians on the ship just stayed in the U.S.  By the mid-50's, Joe Pollini had made it to the south side of Chicago and worked at a tavern-style pizza place in the Evergreen Park neighborhood.  There were others in the neighborhood who either owned or worked at pizza places and even though they were in competition, the families co-mingled at church and at school.  The pizza restaurants would even share ingredients with one another if one was running low on something.  

Joe's Pizza moved to their present day location on W. Higgins in the late-60's.  Joe Pollini was later joined by his son-in-law Mario Demonte, an Italian immigrant who grew up in a small village in southern Italy.  Mario Demonte was a culinary specialist in Italian cuisine and he expanded the menu to include pasta dishes, deep pan pizza and seafood.  Mario eventually took over the business and he was eventually joined in the business by Joe Pollini's grandson Frankie Pollini - the third generation family member to run Joe's Pizza.

I pulled up to Joe's Pizza just before 6 p.m.  It's situated in a small store front near the corner of W. Higgins and N. Mango Ave.  (see map)  Parking was available on the street in front of the business.  

I went inside and was met by none other than Vicki Demonte, Joe's daughter and the wife of Mario Demonte.  I was the only patron in the place.  I asked if they were open for dine-in and she said, "Yes, we are!  Come on in!"  She told me that I could sit anywhere.  I took a booth along one of the walls of the establishment and she dropped off a menu for me to look through.  I knew that a number of restaurants in Chicago had to close for dine-in services during the height of the pandemic, so I asked Vicki when they reopened for dining-in.  "Early March," she said.  "And it didn't come any time too soon!"   She asked if she could get me something to drink and I saw that they had a handful of local craft beers and a couple imports.  I ended up getting a bottle of the Peroni beer from Italy.  

The inside of Joe's Pizza is pretty small.  There was a small bar and a few tables and chairs in the middle of the floor with four or five booths on the side wall.  While I was there, they had a couple delivery guys hanging out waiting to do their runs.  They also had a pretty brisk take-out business during the time I was there.  It was a nice clean and cozy little restaurant.

The menu at Joe's Pizza is pretty deep.  In addition to tavern-style, stuffed and deep-dish pizza, Joe's features a number of pasta dishes including basked mostaccioli, gnocchi in a vodka sauce, fettuccine alfredo, and linguine in a clam sauce.  They also had entrees such as chicken parmigiana, lemon pepper tilapia, barbecued ribs, and roasted or fried chicken dinners.  Joe's also featured a number of sandwiches and burgers, as well as appetizers and salads.  I wondered how big their kitchen was with all the foods they offered on their menu.  

But I was there for the pizza and that's exactly what I got.  I got a small tavern-style pizza with my standard toppings - sausage, pepperoni and mushrooms.  Vicki brought out the trio of parmesan cheese, red pepper flakes and Italian seasonings in shaker jars.  The Italian seasonings were heavy on the oregano - exactly how I like it.  The 10" pizza was topped with bubbly caramelized mozzarella cheese.  

I always like to take a square or corner triangle of a tavern-style pizza to try before I put any seasonings or cheese on the piece.  From the first bite, I knew I had a winner.  The sauce was sweet and tangy; the cheese was plentiful and smooth in taste with a hint of that burnt taste that really can give mozzarella a good kick in flavor; and the crust was crisp, but not hard to chew.  This was an outstanding pizza.  

I love finding great tavern-style pizza places in Chicago and Joe's Pizza will definitely become part of my rotation.  I loved everything about Joe's - the small, intimate setting, the great service from Vicki and her crew, and the pizza itself.  Joe's is a great little neighborhood pizza place and I'm sort of jealous that I don't have anything like it near me at my home.  I'll certainly look forward to getting back to Joe's at some point during my travels to Chicago.