Mount Airy NC and the Mayberry Days Festival

nocarolina


I enjoyed my breakfast here very much, despite the fact that it came from a multi-state franchised operation. IMHO, good food is where you find it. I probably should mention that I got well into the meal before I remembered to get out my camera; don't want you to think that WH serves measly portions.  

NC,

I had breakfast at a waffle house a couple of days ago.  The country ham was better than the the dried out junk I had in Cherokee NC a few days earlier.  I hate to even say that.  But I have had some bad breakfasts at waffle house as well.  But at least when eating at Waffle house, you don't feel so bad because it does not break the bank.  I have had bad food at places the claimed to have great food only to find that I could have had much better food at half the price somewhere else. It's hard to screw up eggs but its funny how many places can.

You are right though, its fun to watch your food being prepared right in front of you. Reminds me of the chain in the Milwaukee area called "George Webb."  The king of great cheap eats....    

http://www.georgewebb.com/

I guess I've been pretty lucky. In almost three decades of Waffle House breakfasts during my southern roadtrips, I can't remember ever having a disappointing one. Some have been better than others, of course, but never a bad one. I had breakfast at the George Webb in Burlington WI this past summer. It was pretty good, but not Waffle House-good ( George ain't got no country ham! ) 

nocarolina


I guess I've been pretty lucky. In almost three decades of Waffle House breakfasts during my southern roadtrips, I can't remember ever having a disappointing one. Some have been better than others, of course, but never a bad one. I had breakfast at the George Webb in Burlington WI this past summer. It was pretty good, but not Waffle House-good ( George ain't got no country ham! ) 

 

The Waffle House is the one place to go when you want breakfast for dinner. Usually its one of the local diners for breakfast when I want to eat out in the morning. But when I want eggs, bacon and hashbrowns for dinner its time for the twenty minute drive to the Waffle House. 

George Webb's looks like a fun place. The founder seems like a real neat guy. I found this article about them:
http://www.onmilwaukee.com/market/articles/askomcwebb.html

Here at OnMilwaukee.com, we pride ourselves on being Milwaukee experts. Since it's literally our job to eat, sleep and breathe Brew City, naturally we get lots of questions from our readers.

In this new series of articles called "Ask OMC" we take your questions, big or small, and track down the answers. So ask us anything about Milwaukee, and we'll hunt it down, track it down and find out the skinny. That's what we do.

Q: Why are there two clocks on the wall, right next to each other, at George Webb? 

A: This simple query has confounded customers at counters and in booths for decades. (It's particularly confusing for those patrons already seeing double after bar closing time). 

There are many theories as to how the two clock tradition began. The most common, and the one offered by a patient waitress during a recent visit, goes like this...

Years ago, local law prohibited business from being open 24 hours a day. George Webb (yes, there really was a George Webb), announced that his restaurants were open "23 hours, 59 minutes and 59 seconds, seven days a week and on Sundays!"

In order to avoid closing at all, the restaurants had two clocks installed with the time set one minute apart. Technically, the restaurant was closed one minute per day on one clock, but open on the other.

The founder also loved baseball and the Brewers and they have a promotion during the season where you can get 6 hamburgers for $5 every game that the Brewers score 5 or more points, win or lose, home or away!

nocarolina


I guess I've been pretty lucky. In almost three decades of Waffle House breakfasts during my southern roadtrips, I can't remember ever having a disappointing one. Some have been better than others, of course, but never a bad one. I had breakfast at the George Webb in Burlington WI this past summer. It was pretty good, but not Waffle House-good ( George ain't got no country ham! ) 

Yep, George aint got the country ham.  I wish it had in the past  based on the fact that I have had tons of it since moving down here to your old stomping ground!  Read it and weep my buddy because I am now where you grew up and you are now in the area where I grew up!!!   I love the country ham here!  But it is an aquired taste for us yankees.  Quite a bit salty.  Had some from the store the other day.  Loved it but a bit salty.  I grew up on sausage in the Milwaukee area.  Ham to us was one of those big ones with a bone in you would get at your local grocery store from a local purveyor.  Country ham is a whole new animal to me.  But I love it. 

nocarolina


I guess I've been pretty lucky. In almost three decades of Waffle House breakfasts during my southern roadtrips, I can't remember ever having a disappointing one. Some have been better than others, of course, but never a bad one. I had breakfast at the George Webb in Burlington WI this past summer. It was pretty good, but not Waffle House-good ( George ain't got no country ham! ) 

Thanks for the update NC....Keep the reports coming. If we could ever meet up in the Milwaukee area, I could show you some incredible cheap but good places to eat.  You will not get Carolina BBQ type places though.  I have plenty of them here.

And when I say cheap, I do not mean poor quality by any means.  Just good value.

Cheesehead, I dearly wish that I was from North Carolina, but I'm a lifelong Chicagoan. It was my late father who was born and raised in Mount Airy, where he went to grade school with Andy Griffith. He came up to Chicago job-hunting after getting out of the army in 1949, and it was here that he met my mother, who was raised on a farm near West Liberty KY and had just arrived in Chicago herself. One thing led to another, and the results were wedding bells and yerz trooly.

After breakfast, I decided to take advantage of the nice weather and do some more picture-taking around town. Just about a block or so from the playhouse and museum is a short stretch of street named after Andy Griffith's father.

Mount Airy is the corporate home of Spencer's Inc., a longtime manufacturer of infants and childrens clothing. The company is one of the larger employers in Surry County.

This giant milk carton has stood alongside the Andy Griffith Parkway ( US 52 ) ever since the 1960s. Originally it bore the "Coble" brand name.

After about three hours of doing my photography thing, I was hungry again, so I started looking for a non-chain place for lunch. As a number of roadfooders have found out the hard way, finding an independent restaurant in the southern states that's open on Sunday can qualify as an episode of Mission Impossible. My first attempt at finding lunch took me to Odell's Sandwich Shop on W. Pine Street. Odell's is an old-fashioned drive-in, complete with carhops, that probably dates back to the fifties.                    

When I arrived at Odell's, I found exactly what I expected to find: I'd been travelin-manned. Immediately, visions of a lukewarm, overcooked burger from Sonic started dancing in my head. No, no, no... there's gotta be something better in town that's open today. And then it hit me...

Shoulda just called 786-4246 for convenient carry out service

Too bad they were closed, it looks like a good spot...and those prices can't be beat...burger, fries and shake for under $4!!!

The Dairy Center has been on W. Lebanon St. since dinosaurs roamed the Earth, or at least it seems like it. I didn't really expect it to be open on a Sunday, but I lucked out with this place. The only time that I'd ever been here before was an ice cream stop years ago, so I wasn't sure what to expect food-wise.   www.choppedonion.com/id9.html

Dairy Center's menu lists an item called a ground steak sandwich. Over the years I've heard a number of references to this sandwich when visiting Mount Airy, but I've always assumed that it was just local jargon for a hamburger. This place, however, lists the ground steak sandwich separately from the burgers, so of course I just had to find out what this was all about.

Here's the ground steak sandwich, and it wasn't what I was expecting at all ( actually I'm not sure what I was expecting. ) It's similar to the loose meat sandwiches sold all over Iowa by Maid-Rite in that it's ground beef... excuse me, steak, that is not in a solid pattie form, but unlike a loose meat sandwich, the crumbled meat has such a high moisture content ( grease? ) that it clings together instead of spilling all over. It's certainly different but I did enjoy it and would order it again.

Bob, you directed me to a Maid-Rite in DeKalb, Illinois earlier this summer.  It wasn't a bad burger, but it wasn't all that tasty, either.  I gave it another name: a crumbleburger.  I hope the ground steak sandwich was better.  It looks it!

nocarolina

Wow, hard to beat those prices!  That "ground steak" sandwich looks good and at $2.05, how could you go wrong?

nocarolina


Here's the ground steak sandwich, and it wasn't what I was expecting at all ( actually I'm not sure what I was expecting. ) It's similar to the loose meat sandwiches sold all over Iowa by Maid-Rite in that it's ground beef... excuse me, steak, that is not in a solid pattie form, but unlike a loose meat sandwich, the crumbled meat has such a high moisture content ( grease? ) that it clings together instead of spilling all over. It's certainly different but I did enjoy it and would order it again. 

Mmmm that looks tasty! Did it have mustard mixed into the meat or is that cheese?

I ordered it with mustard and dill pickles, which, by coincidence, is the same way that I order my Maid-Rites. No cheese.    

After lunch, I picked up my aunt and we headed down to the city of Winston-Salem to visit our family members there. From Mount Airy to Pilot Mountain, it's necessary to take "new" four-lane US 52, but at PM you can get onto old two-lane 52 which passes through the towns of Pinnacle, King and Rural Hall on its way to Winston-Salem ( Winston and Salem were neighboring towns until their merger in the late 1890s. ) The highway parallels the track of the Yadkin Valley Railroad along much of this route. The YVRR is a shortline railroad that has two lines, one of which runs from Mount Airy to Rural Hall, which is where I photographed this locomotive...

nocarolina


I ordered it with mustard and dill pickles, which, by coincidence, is the same way that I order my Maid-Rites. No cheese.    

So they mix it into the meat when they cook it as it looks to be interspersed with the meat.

Curious:-)

ALRUI

nocarolina


I ordered it with mustard and dill pickles, which, by coincidence, is the same way that I order my Maid-Rites. No cheese.    

So they mix it into the meat when they cook it as it looks to be interspersed with the meat.

Curious:-)

The mustard wasn't mixed into the meat. It just looks that way.

My aunt and I spent a few hours visiting with our relatives, and then we made the trek over to the Healy Drive location of the K&W cafeteria chain, which is based in Winston-Salem. This is another long-time tradition of ours, and one that I always look forward to.

Since I was only moderately hungry at dinnertime, I was able to resist the temptation to grab additional sides, so I settled for mashed potatoes ( real ) and cole slaw to accompany my fried chicken. Of course I also had to have a piece of their great chocolate cream pie. I love K&W's fried chicken; IMO, it's just as good if not better than the bird at Indiana's famed Gray Brothers and Jonathan Byrd cafeterias.

nocarolina


Since I was only moderately hungry at dinnertime, I was able to resist the temptation to grab additional sides, so I settled for mashed potatoes ( real ) and cole slaw to accompany my fried chicken. Of course I also had to have a piece of their great chocolate cream pie. I love K&W's fried chicken; IMO, it's just as good if not better than the bird at Indiana's famed Gray Brothers and Jonathan Byrd cafeterias.

NC,

That picture just made me rethink my stand on cafeteria food.  My posts in the past here on this site were always negative towards buffets and cafeterias because I always assumed the food sat around too long and just got bad/soggy or whatever.  That food looks very good.

I am going to give them a shot based on the pictures you just posted.  I will keep you posted.

Cheesehead, at lunch and dinnertimes, the food at K&W doesn't get a chance to sit around and get cold or soggy. The line of hungry patrons stretches through the building, and the food has a rapid turnover. I highly recommend this great little regional chain. Buffets are another matter though; I don't care for them at all.
  
                                           www.kwcafeterias.com

The next morning, Monday the 28th, I cleared out of my motel room as it was time to head home. Usually I don't look forward to saying goodbye to North Carolina, but I had been away from home for all but one of the previous eleven days, and I was eager to get back. Breakfast this morning was another quick and inexpensive one from Biscuitville. 

After making a few final stops in Mount Airy ( gas station, car wash, my aunt's place ), I headed north on US 52 into Virginia and the community of Cana. Along this stretch, 52 is known as Fancy Gap Highway. Just a few miles north of the state line I arrived at the amazing roadside stand called Mountain Man...
                                          www.mountainmaninc.biz

Mountain Man is really too large to be called just a stand, and it's a pretty impressive operation. The place is obviously tourist-oriented, and rather self-consciously "old timey", but the two-story cabin in this photo is the real thing; it dates back to 1881.

nocarolina


Cheesehead, at lunch and dinnertimes, the food at K&W doesn't get a chance to sit around and get cold or soggy. The line of hungry patrons stretches through the building, and the food has a rapid turnover. I highly recommend this great little regional chain. Buffets are another matter though; I don't care for them at all.
  
                                           www.kwcafeterias.com

I totally agree on the buffets but K&W looks good and reminds me of a place I love to go to in the SF Bay Area called Harry's Hofbrau, excellent food served in the same manner as K&W where you line up the tell them what you want. The sandwiches are superb:-)

http://www.harryshofbrau.com/

The sign said that I could pet this little fellow, but ol' Porky wasn't having any part of it. 

The sign said that I could pet this little fellow, but ol' Porky wasn't having any part of it.

I'd be a bit ornery if I were that close to my cooked kin too

NC,
Thanks so much for the good tips.  I will try out  KW.  I just need to convince the Mrs. that KW is the way to go.  I will show her the pics.  She loves southern food.  She grew up in southern MO and her mother was from TN. 

Good thing you aren't here right now....4 inches of rain because of the remnants of hurricane Ida.  Back yard is a bit wet now with some standing water. 

I should not complain. This will be my first winter in the Carolina's.  Snow from Wisconsin will not be missed.

The selection of homemade jams, jellies, apple butter, etc. sold here is quite impressive. I brought home a jar of the Mountain Man's blackberry preserves, along with a jar of his Lexington-style barbecue sauce ( or "dip" as they call it hereabouts. ) The preserves were very good, but it's MM's sauce that really impressed me. It's one of the best that I've ever tasted. I also bought a package of "Junior Johnson's" country ham, packaged by Suncrest Farms of Wilkesboro NC. This is probably the best supermarket brand of country ham that I've found; very salty with an intense flavor. If you look at Mountain Man's website, you'll see all kinds of edible goodies available by mail.    

nocarolina


The selection of homemade jams, jellies, apple butter, etc. sold here is quite impressive. I brought home a jar of the Mountain Man's blackberry preserves, along with a jar of his Lexington-style barbecue sauce ( or "dip" as they call it hereabouts. ) The preserves were very good, but it's MM's sauce that really impressed me. It's one of the best that I've ever tasted. I also bought a package of "Junior Johnson's" country ham, packaged by Suncrest Farms of Wilkesboro NC. This is probably the best supermarket brand of country ham that I've found; very salty with an intense flavor. If you look at Mountain Man's website, you'll see all kinds of edible goodies available by mail.    

WOW - Lots of canned goods thats for sure! My mouth is watering thinking about some of those pickled peppers and the like:-) I've used the "Bone Suckin Sauce" several times as a butcher shop b me carries it, the "hot" definitely has a bite to it.

nocarolina

I love the sign on the door: "No Smoking in Ham House".  I think I might have asked them, "If you don't smoke the hams, how do you cure them?" 

From the Mountain Man's place, I made my way northward to the mountaintop community of Fancy Gap, where 52 passes under the Blue Ridge Parkway.

As I got close to Hillsville, I decided to make another stop at the Hillsville Diner, have a light "pre-lunch", and hopefully this time get to visit with Mac, the owner.  
 
 
 

When I entered the diner, I was glad to see Mac behind the counter. We gabbed for a few minutes while I downed an order of pintos n' cornbread ( with sweet tea of course. )

Here's the bridge that carries Hwy. 52 over the historic New River... 

As much as I dislike interstate highways, occasionally time considerations make it necessary to use them for short stretches, which is why I jumped on I-77 at Wytheville and took it up to Bluefield. If it appears that I took the same route home that I took down to NC... well, looks can be deceiving.  

Arriving in Bluefield, I was ready for lunch. Years of disappointing experience had taught me that there are no good roadfood-type places in Bluefield, but fortunately the only K&W cafeteria in West Virginia is located in Mercer Mall on Bluefield's east side.

Small local and regional chains that serve good food, such as K&W, can be a real lifesaver when traveling through roadfood-deprived areas like southern West Virginia. Since I had already dined on beans n' bread back in Hillsville, I wasn't too hungry, so I just had the chopped steak and mashed potatoes, along with, predictably, the chocolate cream pie. A very satisfying meal.

Leaving Bluefield, I parted company with US 52 and headed west on US 460, which immediately took me back into Virginia. This highway traverses the far western region of the state before crossing into eastern Kentucky.  

One state closer to home!... 

nocarolina


Arriving in Bluefield, I was ready for lunch. Years of disappointing experience had taught me that there are no good roadfood-type places in Bluefield, but fortunately the only K&W cafeteria in West Virginia is located in Mercer Mall on Bluefield's east side. 

Now you're in MY neighborhood... I've been here since the early 90s, but never have eaten out at K&W.

The only place we've eaten at out at the mall is Macado's... but I haven't been there in a long long time.   The chinese place across the hall from K&W has a bad reputation... I haven't eaten there in about 15 years.  I don't see how they are still open.  Chick Fil A is in the small food court, and it seems to do well.

Being from the north, there aren't many good places in our area as far as I'm concerned. 

nocarolina


Leaving Bluefield, I parted company with US 52 and headed west on US 460, which immediately took me back into Virginia. This highway traverses the far western region of the state before crossing into southeastern Kentucky.  

I haven't been that far out on 460 in a long long time.  Is the road any better west of Grundy into KY?  The last time I took it (about 15 years ago) it was a windy 2 lane and one got stuck behind coal trucks.  Same question about 52 between Bluefield and Huntington... I've never taken that way because I was afraid it would take forever... much easier to take the turnpike up to Charleston and west of I-64.

Jim, you're right, southern West Virginia is certainly no roadfood mecca. It's really a pity that people in the Princeton/Bluefield area have to go to a chain restaurant like K&W in order to find good food. Of course there's always Omelet Shoppe in Princeton.   Is that place still in business? If it is, it's probably the last outlet left of what was a decent-sized chain back in the 1960s. US 460 is still pretty windy west of Grundy, but it has been improved somewhat over the years. If you or anyone else is considering driving US 52 between Huntington and Bluefield, I recommend that you allow at least six hours for the trip and be prepared to dine on some very mediocre food. It's a very scenic drive, though, and I always look forward to it.