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Silver Grill, Mmm mmm good
Sep. 24th, 2005 04:53 pmSo on Tuesday after my massage appointment - sorry ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
madame_foo! I hadda pay da billz! Hope your meeting went well! - I was stahvin' so I stopped in for lunch at the Silver Grill on Monroe. It's a shabby lil mom-and-pop hole-in-the-wall greasy spoon insert-cliche-here diner, but OMG do they make some good authentic Southern comfort food - and their recipes are so close to my Mom's and my Maw-Maw's that it's like a family reunion without the cousins whose names I can't remember. Mmmmmmm, yummy!
Lt.J.G. McQmdmcquaig introduced me to it a while back when he was still in town. The sign says they have been “Serving Midtown for over 60 years” which is even longer than McQ did. *snerk* I think 60 years predates the entire gaying of the area, in fact. If they’d only known in 1945 that they’d be across the street from a gay bar for cowgurls…even so, in spite of the mostly white and older/mainstream looking lunch crowd, I overheard nothing that smacked of any form of prejudice, so even if it’s there, it must be politely kept under wraps (that’s another Southern tradition, I’m afraid).
The sign over the register says “Absolutely no checks!” I guess they’ve had trouble with bad ones. In the restroom (a single room but the sign on the door indicates restroom(s) plural) there was a cute little framed cartoon of fat old lady with a cigarette in hand exhorting me to “be a sweetie and wipe the seatie” if I “sprinkle when I tinkle.”
You know its a real Southern place when the "vegetable" choices include things like dressing, baked mac & cheese, or pear salad (a peeled, cooked and chilled pear half with a spoon of mayo on it, topped with shredded cheddar) - many of which are not even remotely vegetables. Now that's authentic southern food (and idiosyncratic use of language)!
There was a matronly yet petite black woman running the fryer (think Sipsie from “Fried Green Tomatoes”) so I had a chicken breast cooked to perfection (i.e., flour battered and fried), cole slaw (grated fine, with onion and not too sweet), and potato salad (nice mix of mayo and mustard base (That "Southern-style" crap with the red peppers and sweet pickles they sell at grocery store delis? No.) followed up with of course, the Pear Salad (hmmm, can I just have a jar of "monezz" and a straw, please?)!
I remarked about how good it was and about the authenticity thing to one of the waitresses - a 50's woman in heavy makeup ala Flo from "Alice." She said she'd had the pear salad too - that one could eat it for dessert and "don’t have to count calories." Yeah. Counting calories at this place would just make you cry.
But I got my excellent comfort food served with quirky southern charm – seasoned with lots of “honey”, “sweetie”, and “y'all.” My waitress (who looked eerily like the “wipe the seatie” woman) answered every thank you with a drawly yet robotic “Yer WELcome.”
On my way out, the manager - a guy that looked suspiciously like Ted Turner in a ball cap - bid me farewell with a “thank you friend, good to see you bud” even though he’s never seen me.
Now try getting all that at Folks!
madame_foo! I hadda pay da billz! Hope your meeting went well! - I was stahvin' so I stopped in for lunch at the Silver Grill on Monroe. It's a shabby lil mom-and-pop hole-in-the-wall greasy spoon insert-cliche-here diner, but OMG do they make some good authentic Southern comfort food - and their recipes are so close to my Mom's and my Maw-Maw's that it's like a family reunion without the cousins whose names I can't remember. Mmmmmmm, yummy!Lt.J.G. McQ
mdmcquaig introduced me to it a while back when he was still in town. The sign says they have been “Serving Midtown for over 60 years” which is even longer than McQ did. *snerk* I think 60 years predates the entire gaying of the area, in fact. If they’d only known in 1945 that they’d be across the street from a gay bar for cowgurls…even so, in spite of the mostly white and older/mainstream looking lunch crowd, I overheard nothing that smacked of any form of prejudice, so even if it’s there, it must be politely kept under wraps (that’s another Southern tradition, I’m afraid).The sign over the register says “Absolutely no checks!” I guess they’ve had trouble with bad ones. In the restroom (a single room but the sign on the door indicates restroom(s) plural) there was a cute little framed cartoon of fat old lady with a cigarette in hand exhorting me to “be a sweetie and wipe the seatie” if I “sprinkle when I tinkle.”
You know its a real Southern place when the "vegetable" choices include things like dressing, baked mac & cheese, or pear salad (a peeled, cooked and chilled pear half with a spoon of mayo on it, topped with shredded cheddar) - many of which are not even remotely vegetables. Now that's authentic southern food (and idiosyncratic use of language)!
There was a matronly yet petite black woman running the fryer (think Sipsie from “Fried Green Tomatoes”) so I had a chicken breast cooked to perfection (i.e., flour battered and fried), cole slaw (grated fine, with onion and not too sweet), and potato salad (nice mix of mayo and mustard base (That "Southern-style" crap with the red peppers and sweet pickles they sell at grocery store delis? No.) followed up with of course, the Pear Salad (hmmm, can I just have a jar of "monezz" and a straw, please?)!
I remarked about how good it was and about the authenticity thing to one of the waitresses - a 50's woman in heavy makeup ala Flo from "Alice." She said she'd had the pear salad too - that one could eat it for dessert and "don’t have to count calories." Yeah. Counting calories at this place would just make you cry.
But I got my excellent comfort food served with quirky southern charm – seasoned with lots of “honey”, “sweetie”, and “y'all.” My waitress (who looked eerily like the “wipe the seatie” woman) answered every thank you with a drawly yet robotic “Yer WELcome.”
On my way out, the manager - a guy that looked suspiciously like Ted Turner in a ball cap - bid me farewell with a “thank you friend, good to see you bud” even though he’s never seen me.
Now try getting all that at Folks!
