I’m a sucker for attention and personalized service from owners of good restaurants. Chef Henry Chandler either saw me walking along Acworth’s main street, looking in windows and snapping photos of the beautiful old buildings and figured me for some loudmouth with a web page, or he treats everybody who comes into his place as a valuable guest, because I hadn’t been in his restaurant for fifteen seconds before he took me by the hand, welcomed me with a roar and thanked me for coming. Continue reading “Henry’s Louisiana Grill, Acworth GA”
Tag: atlanta
Beetles BBQ, Woodstock GA (CLOSED)
A local blogger who goes by the handle Maple Lane dropped me a line, noting that Beetles BBQ in Woodstock had not made its way onto our pages. This wasn’t entirely an oversight; I visited once, many years ago, when Bill Beadle still owned it, and didn’t have a really great experience, but, in fairness, that was more to do with a personal disagreement at the time than with the food. I’ve mentioned here before that it’s never, ever, ever a good idea to try a new place when you’re not happy about something or with somebody. It overpowers your memory of the food. So, hearing that Beadle had sold his business to a fellow named Satterfield, who’s lowered the prices, and remembering that it’s only fair to give places another try, I agreed that I should get back over here. Continue reading “Beetles BBQ, Woodstock GA (CLOSED)”
How Goldberg’s Derailed My Potato Salad Willpower
Goldberg’s flies under a lot of people’s radars, but they really are a special little place. The business is celebrating its fortieth anniversary this year, with half of that time under the ownership of Wayne Saxe and Howard Aaron, who purchased it from the Goldberg family in 1992 and began growing it to six locations in Atlanta. I think that their Toco Hills store is the most recent. It is not, to my surprise, related to a larger chain called Momma Goldberg’s, which is based in Auburn and has sixteen stores in Alabama and west Georgia. No, this place is a little older and hasn’t left its home city yet. Continue reading “How Goldberg’s Derailed My Potato Salad Willpower”
The Hickory Hut and Rodney’s Bar-B-Que, Dallas GA
A few weeks ago, I started wondering again about Hudson’s Hickory House in Douglasville, and their buckets of thin, red, barbecue “juice” sauce that have found considerable popularity at about a half-dozen restaurants in the region. I wondered whether more barbecue joints in the western suburbs follow this path, and I also noticed that Paulding County is shockingly underrepresented among the area’s bloggers. So, a couple of Saturday evenings ago, Marie and the children and I went out to Dallas to try a place, and stumbled past another on the way home. We found some pretty good food, albeit nothing really extraordinary and nothing that follows the Hudson’s template, and, as far as our health goes, pushed ourselves just a little too far, leading to some unhappy and grouchy folk who just wanted to go home. Continue reading “The Hickory Hut and Rodney’s Bar-B-Que, Dallas GA”
Bell Street Burritos, Atlanta GA (CLOSED)
Every once in a while, objectivity flies right out the window here at our blog in favor of wild, emphatic gushing. This is one of those chapters.
When I was living in Athens, and waxing eloquent about the amazing Mean Bean to anybody who would listen, I would occasionally get reports back from Atlanta about a place called Tortillas. They predated the Mean Bean by a few years, long enough to already have an imitator, Frijoleros, that I tried once in the late eighties. Somehow, though, possibly because high schoolers have far less of an awareness of the world around them than they would like to think, I never heard of Tortillas, or it never registered, until the early nineties, when I started reading papers like Creative Loafing and hearing every one of the burrito joints in Atlanta compared, unfavorably, to the mighty Tortillas. In time, there was a craze that started. Raging Burrito, Z-Teca (which became Qdoba), Chipotle, Willy’s, Moe’s and plenty of others started up, and, in time, Tortillas started feeling the effects. They shuttered in the spring of 2003, after a 19-year run. Continue reading “Bell Street Burritos, Atlanta GA (CLOSED)”
Falafel King, Decatur GA
A couple of Fridays ago, my plans got changed. There’s a restaurant – it would be churlish to name them before I give them another try, so let their identity slide – that I had hoped to visit some time ago. Now, I knew that I wanted to go get some lunch on Friday, but not where. On Thursday evening, I opened the brand new issue of Southern Living that had arrived in our mailbox, and wowed at the description of an item that this place makes. It isn’t on their menu; you have to know to ask for it. So at eleven sharp, I arrived, ready to eat, and grumbled that they didn’t open for another half hour. I sat in Starbuck’s with a mediocre doughnut and read for a bit. Eventually, I walked over, placed my order, paid my money, and was then told that, oh, me oh my, they weren’t going to have this interesting item today after all. I got my money back and looked for something else to eat. Continue reading “Falafel King, Decatur GA”
J. Christopher’s, Kennesaw GA
This is Marie, contributing an article about breakfast. Recently, my brother came for a visit. He is more of a hearty eater than I am. For one thing, he likes bacon. Although we have a number of excellent breakfast places, my current dietary limitations mean it’s not quite as much fun to go to places like the delightful Stilesboro Biscuits. On his first day here, we went to a national chain restaurant. I decided that for his second day here that an alternate had to be found. Which is ironic, because we wound up going to a chain after all – the difference being that it was a local chain that started right here in Marietta. Karl suggested J. Christopher’s, and I am glad he pointed it out because otherwise I might not have known it was that local. They currently have 22 stores in Georgia and Tennessee. Continue reading “J. Christopher’s, Kennesaw GA”
Marie, Let's Eat! 