One of my favorite musicians is a guy named David Sylvian, who’s recorded dozens of weird and wonderful boundary-stretching albums, often in the company of similarly innovative egghead musicians like Mark Isham and Robert Fripp. I figured that Steven Chan, owner of the small, local chain of Tin Drum Asia Cafes, might be a fan when I thought about the name of his restaurant. Tin Drum was the name of the last studio album by Sylvian’s first group, Japan, who were on Hansa and then Virgin Records in the late seventies and early eighties. Chan also used to have a second pair of restaurants called Wonderful World. Sylvian had a beautiful song by that name, too. Then I walked past the downtown location of Tin Drum last year and saw a huge mockup of that album’s front cover staring back at me from the front hallway. That settled it. Inside, there are a few more bits of Sylvian paraphernalia, including posters from his 1988 tour, and some installation or public art project from his brother, Steve Jansen. Continue reading “Tin Drum Asiacafe, Atlanta GA”
Category: regional chains
Bahama Breeze Launches “Legendary Island Cocktails”
To show off their new line of drinks, the people behind the Bahama Breeze chain threw a series of parties at several of their locations around the country. Malika from Atlanta Restaurant Blog hosted the event at their Kennesaw location, one of three in the Ettalanna suburbs, and one of only thirty nationwide. The only other Bahama Breeze stores in our travel area are in Jacksonville and Memphis; about a third are in central and south Florida. Like Seasons 52, this is one of Darden’s smaller chains, without the omnipresent, mediocre footprint of their Red Lobster or Olive Garden brands. They use coupon promotions all the time; we seem to get a $10 off a $20 meal voucher in the mail every three weeks. We haven’t redeemed one in years. It’s a big barn of a place, with sprawling patios and the omnipresent sounds of steel pan drums piped in everywhere. Continue reading “Bahama Breeze Launches “Legendary Island Cocktails””
Season 52’s Summer Menu
This is Marie, contributing an article about a media event at Seasons 52 for the summer menu launch.
Seasons 52, as you may know, showed up in a prior chapter. They deserve another mention, however, as they work really hard to have a varying menu based on the freshest food available. Their original concept of having whatever was freshest and best on any particular week ran aground on the shoals of frustrated recommendations (“But my friend said you had the absolute best [whatever] and I should have it too!” “So sorry, that was last week. This week we have [new special] would you like to try that?”). Continue reading “Season 52’s Summer Menu”
Mellow Mushroom, Marietta GA
In the late 1980s, when I thought that I liked hippie music – turns out I don’t; go figure – I became aware of the small Mellow Mushroom chain. Fueled not just by Jefferson Airplane records, but by the character of “neil” – always lower case – in TV’s The Young Ones, I probably talked about having a pizza here for years before I actually did. I always said the name in an approximation of neil’s voice. “Mellaww Mushroooooom,” usually with a slight nod and two fingers for peace. Ah, teenagers. The restaurant was started here in Atlanta in 1974. I think that the second store didn’t open for another eight years. They’ve had a presence in downtown Athens since 1986. While still mostly in the southeast, the chain now has a presence in seventeen states. Continue reading “Mellow Mushroom, Marietta GA”
Del Taco, Kennesaw GA
Meanwhile, back in Atlanta…
Earlier this month, Del Taco finally opened their second Atlanta-area store. Previously, you may recall, the chain, with something like 500 stores in twenty states – California home to about 320 of them – targeted Atlanta for a major expansion. They are still talking about a five-year plan that will bring sixty stores to our market, but right now that’s still a big flaming pie in the sky. They’re moving quite slowly, building on the success of their store in Snellville with a second up here in Cobb, across I-75 from Kennesaw State University. We visited on their grand opening day for my daughter to suck down helium from balloons, and to have some tacos, of course. Continue reading “Del Taco, Kennesaw GA”
Seasons 52, Atlanta GA
A couple of weeks ago, Marie and I were invited to join other local media at the Buckhead location of Seasons 52 to sample their spring menu. We were not familiar with this restaurant before. It’s a reasonably new “concept,” as it is termed in this business, from Darden, the corporation that owns such excessive-consumption chains as Red Lobster and Olive Garden. The first Seasons 52 opened in Orlando in 2003 and this store, one of two in Atlanta, opened in 2006. They have 27 locations in thirteen states. Continue reading “Seasons 52, Atlanta GA”
Circumnavigating Alabama – Part 1
Back before Christmas, Marie mentioned that she’d be taking the baby for a trip to visit her family in early February, just the two of them. I realized that we could each have road trips. Sadly, the interference of the real world meant that we did this on different weekends, but she got her trip and I got mine, and we are quite satisfied with the results. Continue reading “Circumnavigating Alabama – Part 1”
Marie, Let's Eat! 