It was a very silly set of circumstances that led us to Puckett’s. Tory first suggested it when my daughter asked whether we could get some fried chicken in Nashville, only not, she underlined, the crazy hot lava death kind that I enjoy so much. I mentioned that to Tory and she said that Puckett’s would work for us. Unfortunately, they were closed for a private party on Friday evening, which is how we ended up at Tazza instead. Then at some point, my daughter, mercurial as ever, decided that she didn’t want fried, or any kind of chicken whatever, at any time in her life ever again. She lasted about a week; Marie’s chicken alfredo pasta was enough to shake the girlchild out of her reverie. Continue reading “Puckett’s Grocery & Restaurant, Nashville TN”
Category: chili
Ted’s Montana Grill, Atlanta GA
A couple of Fridays ago, I got an incredible treat. I had been inspired, earlier that week, to start doing a much better job simply photographing old buildings. Start following Roadside Rustic and you might be similarly moved. Maybe, every once in a while, I might come up with something a little better to share with you good readers, or maybe I’d just find a few good things for the old hard drive, or perhaps even something worth printing out one day. (Wouldn’t that be novel?) Continue reading “Ted’s Montana Grill, Atlanta GA”
America’s Top Dog, Chamblee GA (CLOSED)
(I’ll apologize in advance for the darker-than-normal tone and sad nature of this and the following entry, but new readers and Google surfers might not be aware that the chapters of this blog are fragments of the story of our life based around memorable meals rather than a conventional series of restaurant reviews. I do wish that our very nice trip to the awesome America’s Top Dog could have come at a brighter point in our life, but it worked out that it didn’t. Life’s like that.)
We started the new year with my father in hospice. We didn’t know how long we would be there, and my mother held onto the hope that we would rally back home. Personally, I was telling myself that we would have a week – it turned out to be just over 36 hours – and that our work schedules would not be disrupted quite yet. I don’t know why; I knew that Dad was not coming home, and, as dark as this may seem, I concluded that we were simply going to move operations to the Emory / Oglethorpe University neighborhood for six or seven days. We were going to have to get food somewhere, and that would give us the opportunity to have some more meals in these communities than we normally enjoy. Going out to eat would also bring some welcome breaks into the children’s routines, and the sadness of the hospice and the farewell visits from longtime family friends.
In fact, the last bit of terrific news before my dad went into hospice on the 31st was that my son had decided to move back home and resume school down here with us. While the first couple of weeks of the year have been very sad and awful, I am very glad that we were able to get Dad that one last bit of welcome news before he lost coherence and consciousness. Having my son back has been at least three-quarters fantastic. He’s squabbling with his sister all the time and he’s having difficulty with the concept of keeping his bedroom clean – must have been fairly lax up in Kentucky, I figure – and the teenage stinker has figured that he’s shoehorning his way into a looping day trip through the Carolinas in a few weeks that Marie and I thought that we would be enjoying by ourselves, but my son’s home, and the boy likes to eat.
So giving the family breaks with distracting meals around or on the way to the North Druid Hills corridor were on the agenda. Unfortunately, the first of these, to a faux-Mexican sports bar, was too mediocre to pass muster here. So yes, our last meal of 2010 – otherwise such a good year – was one not worth the effort of recounting, and not merely because the Georgia Bulldogs looked like they wanted to get beat by a high school team playing its first game ever. We would have a much, much better experience at our first meal out in 2011.
In November, I noticed a writeup for a hot dog place in Chamblee that sounded very interesting. It might not have been the best business decision by America’s Top Dog’s owner to open on a very rainy New Year’s Day – for the forty or so minutes we were there, there were no other guests – but I am certainly glad that he did, because a very filling and wonderful meal was exactly what we needed to distract us from going back to the hospice for another day. And this place? Friends, it is a terrific and wonderful treat. It is perhaps not quite the same “local” experience as some of Atlanta’s other hot dog shops – Barker’s and Brandi’s in Cobb County set the standard in the region – but this place sets guests up with the amazing, authentic taste of hot dogs from around the country.
Just six days earlier, I tried onion sauce for the first time down at Orange Tree in Jacksonville. They serve onion sauce here at America’s Top Dogs, along with 39 other options on an unbelievable toppings bar. Incidentally, speaking of Orange Tree in the same sentence as onion sauce, proving that there’s no such thing as a recurring joke so lousy that it can’t recur in the real world, I found myself unwittingly ordering “orange rings” at America’s Top Dog. Hi-hat!
This topping bar will blow your mind. The goal here is to give guests the option of recreating any regional specialty here in Atlanta. If there’s something he’s missed, I can’t think what. The real humdinger, I say, is the presence of proper Cincinnati-style chili that is every bit the equal and equivalent of Gold Star and Skyline. I haven’t tried Gold Star since I was last in Lexington in the spring of 2008, and am no expert in the variation, but it tastes exactly as I remember and occasionally crave the stuff. They do Texas-styled chili as well, of course, but having the milder, cinnamon-and-chocolate-tinged Cincinnati take as well is a really unexpected treat. I’m not aware of any place anywhere around Atlanta that offers this. I had a small bowl of it, rather than dressing my dog with it. Honestly, I kind of missed the pasta that it is traditionally served over, but it was so nice to have another taste of it after more than two years.
As for my dog, I dressed it somewhat traditionally, with mustard – it looks like they have four different ones – and onions, slaw and pickled relish. My daughter surprised me by having two dogs with Texas chili, which she does not normally order on dogs, along with nacho cheese, pickles and, oddly, potato chip crumbs, which was new to me. My son had the most adventurous palate of the table, and made his with Cincy chili, pickled cucumber relish, cole slaw and shredded cheddar cheese. Both kids also had barbecue sauce on their dogs.
Poor Marie, still on a no-nitrate diet, was stuck again with a hamburger, but she didn’t mind as she says that the burger was fantastic. And we were very pleased with the sides. We ordered both a basket of rings and a large order of fries. This was far more than a table of four needed. Both were really excellent – these are surely among the best rings and fries in the Atlanta area – but we were stuck with an awful lot of excellent fries that didn’t keep well and should have been eaten. Bear that in mind as you consider an order for your own party.
We obviously came at an awful time, but it did allow us the chance to hear the owner brag about his hamburgers and his Cincinnati chili, which, he tells us, even Cincy residents proclaim both authentic and superior to some from back home. Eating out on New Year’s Day didn’t give us a feel for what the place should be like, and what the foot traffic should normally be. I kind of had to work to accept the reality that most people don’t go out in the rain on January 1 for a hot dog in a pedestrian-unfriendly location – it’s in the Big Lots strip mall on Chamblee-Tucker Road inside I-285 – and not just think that Saturday at 1 pm, there should be many more people eating lunch out. I choose to imagine that any other Saturday, this place is nice and busy. It certainly should be, and I look forward to seeing the place packed the next time we are back out that way.
(Update 11/17/11): Since writing the above entry, Marie and I went over to America’s Top Dog several times and enjoyed it greatly, especially the Washington, DC-styled half-smokes. Sadly, I went to their second store, in Duluth, earlier today and they no longer carry half-smokes, as their supplier changed their minimum monthly ordering requirements to a number too huge to store, much less sell in a month. Nevertheless, their basic dogs remain one of the city’s best treasures, especially paired with a small order of onion rings.
(Update 11/25/11): Strangely and sadly, just eight days after visiting the Duluth store, I can confirm that the original, in Chamblee, has shuttered. Duluth is still going and still awesome, so go check them out!
(Update 1/6/12): Even more sadly, it would now appear that Duluth has closed as well. That’s just awful news. I will miss these guys.
Other blog posts about America’s Top Dog:
Food Near Snellville (Feb. 16 2011)
The Blissful Glutton (Apr. 6 2011)
Allen’s, Athens GA (CLOSED)
Last week, I went down to Allen’s for a twenty-five cent beer. I didn’t get one. Honestly, you’d think, having been immortalized in song thusly, a place would keep its drink specials. Even if the song was twenty years old and reflected on a scene that was a decade and change in the past already. Continue reading “Allen’s, Athens GA (CLOSED)”
Steak ‘n Shake, Kennesaw GA
A few years ago, the Steak ‘n Shake chain, which has 500 stores in 22 states in the southeast and midwest and is, by my definition, large enough to be called national, decided to introduce a terrific promotion which my daughter and I used to enjoy greatly. They have a “happy hour” with half-price milkshakes from 2 to 4 every weekday afternoon, and again from 2 to 4 am overnight. When I took a job that left me with a couple of weekday afternoons free, and my daughter was in elementary school, this meant that I could take her by the Steak ‘n Shake nearest us on Barrett Parkway – said to be the busiest and most profitable in the whole chain – and join the mob for a daddy-daughter milkshake treat.
Those days are actually gone for us, since she started middle school and no longer gets home until close enough to suppertime to make a milkshake “ruin yer dinner” impractical. I slightly resent the loss of quality time, but then again, that’s just one of the many downsides to having your kids grow up.
The milkshakes here are terrific – my particular poison is a mix of their banana and orange cream – but the food is only slightly on the preferable side of average. The beef is okay, albeit pressed into sadly small and weedy patties, and the fries are thin enough to make you wonder whether there’s any potato in there, but the chain does offer a dish which is actually worth a second look. It’s not the same as what you can find in Cincinnati’s chili parlors, but Steak ‘n Shake does offer their version of a 5-way.
I’ve only been through northeastern Kentucky four times, but on each of those occasions, I’ve made it a point to stop at either a Skyline Chili or a Gold Star. I imagine that people more familiar with Cincinnati would be pleased to tell me about a better, more humble, non-chain restaurant to get chili made in that city’s style, and perhaps the next time I’m in that region, I’ll give that a try. In these restaurants, you get the area’s particular chili recipe – very finely chopped ground beef served in a light stew containing (as Wikipedia terms it) “unusual ingredients such as cinnamon, cloves, allspice or chocolate,” but without the traditional chili peppers or chili powder like you would expect from other regions.
This chili is intended to be eaten over noodles or on a hot dog, and not in a bowl on its own. Over time, some traditions developed about how to order this dish in area restaurants. A two-way is simply the chili poured over spaghetti noodles, and a three-way adds a giant mound of shredded cheese. A four-way adds either beans or diced onions, and a five-way contains the lot.
Steak ‘n Shake’s version can’t be characterized as a proper Cincinnati 5-way, because the beef is not spiced the same way, nor is it chopped as finely as what you would see in a Skyline. It’s just average canned chili beef in a “special” sauce of ketchup and Worcestershire. At any rate, I got to thinking about it after reading an amusing thread about the chain’s chili over at Roadfood.com, and it made me peckish enough to want to get back over there. In a bit of nice timing, my daughter had early release last week for parent-teacher conferences and so we had an early supper together. With milkshakes, of course. It wasn’t bad at all. It was no Gold Star, but it will do until the next time I can get to Cincinnati, anyway.
The Great Miller Lite Chili Cookoff, Stone Mountain GA
One of the many high points on the local food calendar is a wonderful chili cookoff, sponsored by Miller Lite and benefiting Camp Twin Lakes, that is held every September at Stone Mountain. Randy first told me about it three years ago. He was staying in Dacula at the time; the kids and I went and got him, learned that there is nothing that resembles a simple path to get from Dacula to Stone Mountain, marveled at the spectacle and the festival atmosphere and ate our weight in chili.
The following year, Marie had moved in, and the two of us took the kids for another afternoon of overeating. There were 300 vendors; to sample one ounce from each of them would mean 2.34 gallons of chili, and that’s before you consider that a little over half the vendors also cook up some stew, and some of them cook up more than a single variety of chili. There are also food tents, evidently because some people really want to pay ten dollars to have all the chili they can eat and also buy a catered barbecue sandwich from Sonny’s. Three bucks for some roasted corn, now that I can get behind, but not a big paper plate of enchiladas and rice. I understand this place is a lot like a carnival, but there’s common sense involved.
We didn’t go in 2009, because they forecast rain and I didn’t want to risk it. I spent that whole weekend being grouchy since the metro area might have received sixteen raindrops that day. This past weekend, I was bound and determined to make it back. The weather cooperated, but Marie’s job didn’t. She got called in for a Saturday morning meeting. The vendors and contestants start serving at 11, but Marie and our friend Samantha and I didn’t make it into the park until almost one, by which time the parking nearest the meadow where it is held was completely full, and so were a good half of the 15,000 people who came to eat hearty.
I have to say that this was the first year that I was a little disappointed in the experience, although I did enjoy some really good tastes along the way. There were notably fewer contestants this time out. One vendor told us that he heard that there were only 250, down from 300 the last several years. This was borne out by the results, which indeed showed 249 entrants. Unfortunately, the organizers did not use the full space available – a “back row” on the far side of the shady meadow lanes was simply not occupied – and so this meant that more of the 15,000 visitors – that number up a little from previous years – were pressed into a smaller space. Plus, with more guests jockeying for chili from fewer vendors, plenty of people ran out quickly. We got our first taste about ten minutes after 1 pm, by which time a good quarter of the contestants had already ran out of the four to six gallons of chili that they’d each prepared. The lesson learned here is to make damn sure you arrive early. The event opens at 10, and the vendors are told to be ready to serve at 11. If we make it back next year, we will have spoons in hand at five till.
Ever since I started telling people about this event, I have been asked the most remarkably idiotic questions about it. My favorite has been “What kind of chili do they have?” At least four people have asked me that. Well, “they” are, this year, 249 different people or groups offering up 249 different recipes for chili, using every ingredient from celery to venison. It’s a cookoff, not a restaurant. I didn’t think that was very complicated, but you never know about people.
Each guest gets the opportunity to vote for their favorite chili. We all agreed that this year, Mike & Terry Metzler’s Grateful Red Chili was our favorite. They placed # 35 out of the 249 entrants. The winner was the Howard Crew’s Chili and Stew, which I recall also enjoying. Another one that I really liked, and which almost stole my vote from Grateful Red, was Cousins Chili, which placed # 17.
In the Brunswick stew category, my favorite was The Hall Brothers, who placed # 55 out of 152 entrants. The overall winner was Bob Sims of Dos Gringos.
There are several vendors who come every year, and I suppose, now that I’m looking back on this, I might have done a considerably better job of reporting on this escapade had I actually acted like a reporter and interviewed one or two of them. Some of the regulars, like Pirates of the Chili Bean and Trailer Trash Chili, go all out with elaborate booths and costumes and play to the crowd with several friends in character participating in the madness. Most of the others, it must be said, prefer to kick back on lawn chairs and watch the football games and socialize while members of their group take turns greeting the public and passing out the little one-ounce chili cups. Still, with all the garish booths and hoopla, the overall effect is somewhere between a state fair and Dragon*Con.
Within two hours, we were spent and the vendors were wiped out. Only a very few still had any food left, although there was still music to enjoy. The event books four bands for each shindig, each of which are cover bands that specialize in classic rock recreations. To my mind, this is not an event where you wish to be booked last on the bill, by which time the chili is gone and the visitors are departing. Two years ago, I was curious to see a Paul McCartney “tribute” called Band on the Run, but they weren’t going to take the stage for almost three hours after we finished eating. This time out, we arrived while an Eric Clapton “tribute” called Slowhand was playing, and left as The Alabama Blues Brothers were finishing their set.
I mention this because one of the vendors, and, confirming my slack job at reporting, I didn’t note which of them, really got into Slowhand’s set. I enjoyed some wonderful chili and stew and love spending time with Samantha and with my gorgeous wife, but I think the memory I’ll take most from this cookoff was this one guy singing along to “I Shot the Sheriff” with his own take on the lyrics… “I cooked the chili / But I did not cook the Brunswick stew!” Fellow almost got my vote over Grateful Red for that line alone.
Dinglewood Pharmacy, Columbus GA
Did I ever tell you about the time that I drove two hours for a chili dog? It was 2002 and I was living in Alpharetta and woke up one Saturday morning in the summer with no particular plans but an insatiable craving for a scrambled dog from Dinglewood Pharmacy, about two hours’ south of me in the middle Georgia city of Columbus. Continue reading “Dinglewood Pharmacy, Columbus GA”
Marie, Let's Eat! 