Canyons Burger Company, Woodstock GA

(Grant here to start this one off. For a tragically short few months, the town of Woodstock was home to a really superb burger joint that I don’t think anybody else but us ever visited. It was called Bob-O’s Burgers and Chili and it was in that same little strip mall as the Play & Trade and the ’50s-style diner and the Summit Tavern, and it was amazing. They served up Vortex-quality hamburgers made from all sorts of meat, including a cajun burger made from beef mixed with andouille sausage quite unlike anything else in the area, and chili so good you’d slap your mother for another bowl. We then tried Canyons, found it quite good but nowhere close to the greatness of Bob-O’s, and didn’t return until our hearts were broken by the better joint’s closure. That’s not to take away from all that’s good and tasty about the justifiably popular Canyons, but it is evidence that once in a while, the foodie network in Atlanta really does get hold of the wrong stick. In a fair and just world, both restaurants would thrive.)

This is Marie, contributing an entry entirely devoid of desserts, for once. This time I am talking about Canyons, one of the places we occasionally visit instead of a quick trip to Cheeseburger Bobby’s. Canyons, which has two locations, one in Woodstock and one in Atlanta’s Brookhaven neighborhood, apparently used to be independent but was acquired by Baja Fresh something like a year ago. They’ve just started the franchising process and have opened a third Canyons, co-branded with the burrito place, out in Montana.

As you can tell, we’re rather fond of sandwich and burger joints. A place has to have a little something extra in order to bring us back on a regular basis, though, and what brings me back is the sweet potato fries. The burgers are definitely tasty, but this is one of the few places where I actually finish my portion of fries and wistfully think about ordering another. That is, if we are doing the very sensible 50/50 order, which is half regular and half sweet potato. This is the only place I’ve seen to offer that option and I wish more places would offer it because really, who needs a bucket of fries the size of your head as a single portion? These are clearly intended to be shared. They shamelessly put “great” next to the sweet potato fries on their online menu, and I can’t blame them a bit.

There is regrettably no photo of the burgers from this visit, but honestly there’s nothing to pick them out of a crowd visually. It’s all in the taste. The owners talk a good game about quality Angus beef and never freezing their meat and so forth, and we’ve heard those tales from other places that weren’t exactly thrilling, but so far Canyons has come through on every meal we’ve eaten there. They offer the usual toppings plus a few extra oddities like chipotle mayonnaise. Ivy got their chicken once and although it’s a tad pricier than usual, that seems to be because they have good quality meat there too. She really enjoyed dipping the strips into the house BBQ sauce.

The decor of the place is very much reminiscent of a sports bar, although they always seem to keep the volume muted. The place has a number of flat screens usually tuned to various sporting events, though there’s generally at least one screen devoted to some popular show or other. Occasionally they remember to put the captions on. Aside from that, the pictures on the wall are all good-quality poster-size photos of people doing active things like mountain climbing. (Grant adds: That seems to be an odd shtick, but they’re consistent with it. Canyons tries to sell itself as the treat you can enjoy after a hard day climbing up and down the Adirondacks or something. Suffice it to say that a fellow could get a little self-conscious looking at giant pictures of fit, smiling runners while trying to enjoy a juicy burger.)

We would probably eat here a little more often if it were more convenient to get to, and if the bar next door, Pure Taquiera, had a slightly better taste in music. The live band last Saturday night was particularly awful! Strangely, although they offer milkshakes we haven’t actually tried one. Probably on our next visit.

Barkers Red Hots, Marietta GA (CLOSED)

We learned a valuable lesson when we made our first visit to Barkers Red Hots about eighteen months ago: when a restaurant gets a glowing review and is featured in the pages of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, wait a couple of weeks to swing by. That first trip to the venerable hot dog stand on Windy Hill saw us in a line an hour deep full of drooling weekenders savoring the smell of charcoal-cooked hot dogs. It wasn’t a wait I’d want to make regularly, but we were rewarded with some excellent dogs.

Everything on Barkers’ menu is fairly terrific, and they feature quite a few sausage options along with their original red hots and jumbo all-beef dogs, all “grilled to perfection” over charcoal. Marie and I each prefer ours grilled pretty lightly, but if you’re among the large crowd who enjoys a nicely charred skin, they’ll gladly accommodate you here. They really are among the best in the metro area; until I discovered Brandi’s, they were my favorite, hands-down. Usually, I like their signature red hot, served with onions, pickles and their not-lethal spicy sauce. My son and Marie prefer their Italian sausages; our daughter likes a simple dog covered with melted cheese and some fries.

It’s all the little extras that elevate Barkers into a place that everybody should visit. For starters, they serve what are arguably the best onion rings and the best French fries in the area. I particularly love the fries, which are precisely as vinegary and salty as I would wish them to be. They also offer an unexpected treat in a loganberry punch, which I’m pretty sure that nobody else in town sells. Add in the genuinely spectacular service of the staff, who are just about the best in the city, especially the fellow who’s often on the register and remembered my daughter’s name after just one visit, and you’ve got a restaurant worth many visits.

For many years, Barkers was a must-visit cart in downtown Atlanta’s Woodruff Park, but the owner, Glenn Robins, sold the business in 1995 rather than continue dealing with the city’s labyrinthine rules and regulations for street vendors. Those owners had to change the name once they found a new meat supplier, and Robins returned to the business in 2007, taking back his old name and painting a storefront on Windy Hill in bright blues and greens. The location is just about a stone’s throw from what I thought you’d still call Smyrna, but it’s apparently in the Marietta 30062 ZIP code. It’s very convenient to enter from the interstate exit, but an absolute bear to get back.

Unfortunately, shrinking summer hours have meant we weren’t able to get over there for a while. Our Saturdays were mostly booked and they’ve decided to close for dinner for the time being. This actually proved to be a real annoyance when Tom Maicon over at Atlanta Cuisine (recently relabeled Food & Beer Atlanta) raved about Barker’s beef on weck and I wanted to get over and try one, post haste.

This had been one of those sandwiches that had always gone in one eye and out the other. Apparently a regional specialty from Buffalo, a good beef on weck should serve up some sliced roast beef or flank steak on a thick and chewy “Hummerweck” bun that is topped with sea salt and caraway seeds, and given a dense enough smear of horseradish on the bun’s heel to almost soak straight through it. I’m sure this is a pretty tasty enough treat in any competent grill cook’s hands, but over the charcoal at Barkers, it’s a can’t miss.

We stopped there this past Saturday afternoon and while Marie and the girlchild enjoyed their usual hot dogs, I had the first of what I hope will be many beefs on weck. It’s a little pricy for a sandwich without a side when there are much less expensive dogs and sausages available, but I’m really keen to try one again with a smear of their signature red sauce. I bet that’s really good. And so getting one with rings and a loganberry punch will run me eleven bucks or so. I’ve been good; I can splurge every once in a while, right?

Old South Bar-B-Q, Smyrna GA

The last time I wrote, I was talking about Alpharetta’s oldest surviving restaurant. This time, it’s Old South Bar-B-Q, which, since the closure of Fat Boy a couple of years back, has become the longest-lasting place in Smyrna to get something to eat. It’s managed this through three generations of family ownership by creating some remarkable loyalty in their customer base.

Honestly, Old South is about the living definition of hit and miss. You never know what you’re going to get here. I’ve had some very good meals, and I’ve always enjoyed their really, really thick original sauce, but man, can you ever tell when somebody new is in the kitchen chopping, pulling or slicing the meat. Unfortunately, everybody’s meat was a little disappointing this time out. There was just too much fat and gristle on display.

Normally, I get chopped pork whenever I have barbecue, but I guess I was feeling a little contrary and, this past Friday night, asked for pulled pork instead. Marie and I were visiting my folks with my daughter in tow and Old South was my bright idea. My dad didn’t really feel like going out, so I phoned in an order of quite unreasonable complexity – my brother, God bless him, has really specific requirements about how he wants his grub – and they got it exactly right.

The sides here are pretty inconsistent. While I never cared for their potato salad or slaw, their Brunswick stew is among the best around. It’s an almost black brew with lots of stringy meat and corn. Some years back, I took three of my friends from Nashville, Brooke, Dash and Tory, here. None of them had tried Brunswick stew before, and I was glad to set ’em straight with the good stuff first.

Their rings and beans are certainly just fine, but I knew that my dad, who likes their onion rings better than anybody else’s, would have more than enough to share. Dad loves these, especially dipped in Heinz 57 sauce. He has been doing this for better than twenty years and still asks whether I want some, because I “really need to try this.” Overall, this meal was just “okay,” let down by the inconsistent meat. I’ve certainly had considerably better meals here, but I think the next time the road takes us to Old South, I’ll stick to having my pork chopped. It is, nevertheless, better than many of their competitors in this part of Cobb, although I can name two within a hop, skip and a jump that I have not yet tried. There’s something else I need to get on with.

Pig in a Pit, Macon GA (CLOSED)

This is Marie, contributing a little story about a barbecue place that Grant hasn’t visited. The review is for the Macon branch of the Pig In A Pit Bar-B-Que restaurant. Their branch in Milledgeville is the original one, and maybe we’ll make our way there eventually. Continue reading “Pig in a Pit, Macon GA (CLOSED)” →

Alpha Soda, Alpharetta GA

Alpha Soda is the oldest surviving restaurant still doing business in the northern suburb of Alpharetta, and is celebrating its ninetieth birthday this year. That’s pretty amazing, and it’s a good place to eat, but I somehow wonder whether the place’s glory days are many years behind it, back before they moved to their current location and changed their format somewhat.

When it opened, it was what we’d call today an olde-fashioned soda counter and sandwich shop, although in 1920, such things were hip and modern. It has moved at least five times over the years. I heard that the original location on Main Street was later the site of another long-lived restaurant, the Dixie Diner, which closed in 2002 after several decades, but I wouldn’t swear to it. After all, the first I heard of Alpha Soda was that it wasn’t worth visiting, and that proved not to be true at all.

Well, I should have known better than to take the word of a teenager. Ten years ago, I was tutoring high school kids prepping for the SAT and considering moving to their community in north Fulton County. I once asked one of my students where to get something to eat and he replied “Anywhere but Alpha Soda” and went on to describe everything that the wrong-headed fellow didn’t like about the place. He was mistaken on every front; years later, I gave it a try, enjoyed it thoroughly, and longed to give that kid a kick in the hindquarters for costing me several decent meals here.

When Alpha Soda moved to their present location in 1995, the latest owners elected to spruce it up a bit and transform it into a somewhat upscale family restaurant, with an inspired interior design that evokes the fashionable Art Deco style of the 1920s. The menu apparently more than tripled in size, with several additions from the Greek-American school of dining that serves many of the region’s large family diners well. A meal here is quite similar to what you can receive at the famous Marietta Diner, only I find Alpha Soda much quieter and laid-back.

This past week, it was our friend Matt’s turn to pick some socializin’ activity for us to enjoy, and he suggested we get a small group together here, as it’s a little closer to his place in Gainesville than the rest of us in Cobb County. Illness and work prevented a very large crowd, but Kimberly came by to eat before heading back into Atlanta to teach a class at Oglethorpe, and Marie came straight up 400 from work, and my daughter and I made the fun overland trek across Post Oak Tritt Road.

Everybody seemed to enjoy their meals, although I was left with a little menu envy yet again. I had the pecan-encrusted tilapia, which was okay. The beets and the cucumber and tomato salad that I had as side dishes were more tasty, and the great big order of homemade potato chips sprinkled with Old Bay seasoning were even better. Matt had a terrific-looking London broil and Marie enjoyed an ugly-but-delicious meatloaf sandwich served with a very good, thick marinara sauce. Heck, even Kimberly’s big chicken caesar salad was better than my tilapia. Now what’s fair about that?

Fortunately, my comparatively disappointing meal was more than made up for by the dessert. We don’t often have a dessert when we go out, but, in deference to Alpha Soda’s fountain origins, I felt it appropriate to have some ice cream. They don’t mess around with these treats.

This was one heck of a good banana split. Marie and Ivy and I, combined, couldn’t quite finish it, but we enjoyed every second of the trying. It makes me wonder what the original, olde-timey 1920s version of Alpha Soda was like, and whether it wasn’t a more consistently fun and delightful experience.

Big City Bread Cafe, Athens GA

Now that I’ve got close to a hundred chapters of this story under my belt, I am making a more conscious effort to balance eating at old favorites with trying new places. Big City Bread Cafe is far from new – they seem to have opened their first storefront around the time my daughter was born – but they’re new to me. I try to get to Athens once a month, unless circumstances call me more frequently, and maybe I can continue having a small meal at someplace that I do not know well, before going to play and then grabbing a small meal at an old favorite before coming back to town. Or does that sound too much like I’m setting a schedule? That way lies complacency, doesn’t it? Continue reading “Big City Bread Cafe, Athens GA” →

Wallace Barbecue, Austell GA

Many things cross my mind about what to talk about when Wallace comes up, but first and foremost is their sauce. They have two. One is a hot mustard-based sauce that’s bottled and on the table already. It’s terrific, and as promised, it goes very well with the restaurant’s Brunswick stew.

The other sauce is served with your order. I’d advise diners to ask for their pork dry, like David did when he and I went to supper Saturday night and ended up here. David’s on a pretty strict diet for blood sugar problems and needs to take it easy with the greasy fries and sweet sauces. I probably should have done it that way myself, because I like the way that Wallace serves their sauce on the side, piping hot, in a bowl.

The only other place that I’m aware of that does this is Sprayberry’s Barbecue down in Newnan, which is worth revisiting one day very soon, but possibly not this calendar year. The datebook is sort of packed. Now, the makeup of the sauce is quite baffling. I have heard that in Owensboro, Kentucky, they serve up a Worcestershire-based sauce, and kind of got a roundabout confirmation of that from the fifteen-sauce selection at Asheville’s Ed Boudreaux’s BBQ last month. I wonder whether Wallace might be using that as well. It’s certainly very thin and pleasantly vinegary, with pepper, but I couldn’t say beyond that. Our server, and you simply could not ask for a better one, politely declined to assist in identifying it. She explained that there’s one fellow “locked in the back” mixing up their sauces and that nobody but him knows the recipe. I just love that.

I first visited Wallace in 2002. Back then, I was working on a well-intentioned guide to barbecue restaurants here in Georgia that I had hosted on Geocities and waiting for tips on new, or old, places to try. Creative Loafing, the largest and best-known of Atlanta’s alt-weeklies, gave Wallace a good review, so I trekked down to Austell from my old apartment in Alpharetta one Saturday. That really was a haul when there’s nothing at your destination but one barbecue place and a thousand traffic lights and miles of abandoned, low-rent suburban blight along the way. Driving through the community of Mableton along what used to be called Bankhead Highway and is now Veterans’ Memorial Parkway has been one of the region’s most cringeworthy exercises for more than a quarter of a century. There’s really nothing wrong with this agonizing shithole of a road that a really powerful tornado wouldn’t fix.

Sadly, I haven’t found the chance to go back nearly often enough. I know that I’ve tried convincing my folks to have dinner out here instead of their usual barbecue haunts, but for some insane reason, my mom doesn’t like the place. Really, the only thing I have against them is the extremely greasy fries, which I had completely forgotten about. They’re really tasty, but I’m getting awfully close to forty and shouldn’t have fries twice in one day anyhow, particularly if the second meal’s fries are as greasy as this. I should have gone with the slaw.

Wallace is a pretty big place and it’s extremely popular in the area. Saturday nights, the place is packed with folks having a great time. I definitely need to find reason to head out this way again before long.