The Frisco Nighthawk

A Facelift, New Digs, Still a Place You Should Go

linq: The Frisco

My first experience with the Frisco was several years ago. I was involved in a theater production at a little theater place next door, and between acts we would sneak over and buy sodas, and sneak them backstage. The Frisco’s building is now yet another pharmacy, of the type found by the dozens in almost every city across the country. When I saw that the place was closing, I was glad that I had started attending semi-irregularly, and had wrung as much joy out of it as I had. Naturally, there are those who have derived decades more than I had, but I did not feel cheated, just that I wished they would open up in a larger place, maybe a mile up the road.

Imagine my surprise, then, when they filled the hole that Curras left, right up the street.

The place is the same, relatively, although they had a little rough patch just after they opened. The fare is fine, and they will bring you chopped steak and boiled vegetables on a plate. I mean, that’s why you go there, right? You want chopped steak or a fine burger, or, if you’re awake early, something to break fast, you head on in and enjoy the comfort of the new place.

No, to be honest. That’s not why you go, and we both know it. Do I have to enumerate the wonders? Let me name just two. They are Strawberry and Icebox Chocolate. The whipped cream is an inch thick and the filling is creamy and wonderful. Words being worth, as they are, one one-thousandth of a picture, I will save you the trouble and let James (of whom I am the Dad, as per my nom de écran) explain.

The point, as it so often is, is pie.

One daily vegetable special that we’re out of, of eight daily vegetable specials.

Blue Star Cafeteria

Blue Stars Fell on Allandale

linq: Blue Star

It is difficult in life, being as I am a product of the American Public School System, not to be put off by eating houses who choose to self-identify as ‘cafeteria.’ It is a challenge to walk through the doors of such places, much less to sit and order, and to enjoy whatever fare is provided. Whether you are a fan or foe, apologist or apothecary, feelings and opinions on cafeterias run strong and deep.

The Blue Star Cafeteria on Burnet is reminiscent of the extinct kind of cafeteria, a pleasant place where dwells a druggist and a jerk, and where one would not be surprised to learn could be obtained a passable Grilled Cheese on White. The Blue Star’s grilled cheese is, unsurprisingly, passable, even to the point of being enjoyable, and warrants a mention in a paragraph below, one about warm Family memories. Their meatloaf sandwich is downright good. Their cornflake chicken is crunchy and fresh and served with the right kind of mustard with the right kind of heat behind it. You won’t get a weaselly mustard here, unless you ask for it by name, and demand that they cut your mustard with something blasé and watery. But here I digress.

And again.

In my house, “Growing Up,” there existed a sandwich which bore a name. In most houses, sandwiches, I am lead to believe, are known by their ingredients rather than their status. In my house, this sandwich was called The Usual. The Usual, properly constructed, is a toasted cheese sandwich with mayonnaise and tomato on flatbread which is grilled. This is to be said in a single breath without pause. Flatbread, in this case, does not mean some Fern pita-type bread, but bread which came from a store and is sliced, flat and even. Flatbread is meant to differentiate between this and Home Made bread. I know, and before you raise a great hew and cry, we have, most of us, learned our lesson, those who used to specify Flatbread, and almost to a man, have learned the gentle art of creating the Staff of Life. It is this sandwich which, admittedly with the odd refinement, Blue Star does well.

On the occasion of our visit to the Blue Star, I chose not to partake in any of the above mentioned choices, instead sampling from the Brunch Menu, it being Saturday between about 10 and 4. The Marbled Rye with bacon, spinach and egg, topped with a Goat Cheese which may well have been Chèvre, and served with aged Gouda Grits were easily enjoyed and, if this is the most important thing to you, ample. The Open Faced Egg Sandwich, as it is called, does not come close to replacing The Usual in our hearts and minds, but I enjoyed it thoroughly in any case.

But all this, of course, is dross. As I have said before and shall undoubtedly say again, the food is but a prelude to the actual, wonderful symphony which follows. And what follows is a Toccata and Fugue known by the one, true name of God.

Pie.

So I inflate the value of pie. For this, you pay nothing, and so you receive my digressions on the favorite of all deserts. Need I say more? Certainly I do.

Pie.

My original brush with the Blue Star was because of the direction of a culinarily-minded friend’s suggestion that pie might there be found, and indeed it was, and still is. Their selection is not staggering. Their choices of flavor are not bizarre. Their pie is simple and wonderful, and I don’t doubt that you could get ice cream or something on it, if you roll like that.

Remember. Blue Star: A Source of Fine Pie in a Town where Pie is Valuable.

Two pantsless History tests out of ten.

Genuine Joe’s Coffeehouse

Rollin’ down the street, smokin’ Endust, sippin’ on Genuine Joe’s.

Linq: Joe’s

My experience at Genuine Joe’s is ruined. It will never be the same. If I were one of those sappy types who sighs in text, I might very well insert one here. You’ll have to imagine it, though, because I’m not one of them.

The building is a converted house. It runs very long, and seats plenty, which is a pleasant change. Parking is ample. The patio is well-appointed and open. Even when the place is full of children, as today, the noise level is not overpowering. Their physical plant is absolutely acceptable.

The iced black tea is fresh, today, with a floral aroma that speaks to proper brewing. The flavor of the tea is allowed to exist, in spite of its handling by humans. It is a frankly delicate affair, and it holds up to slow sipping. I’m not an adorner of beverages, but my palate suggests that it might benefit from the judicious application of honey or sugar, and even stand up to their artificial cousins.

The coffee is Austin coffee. This is a tetchy subject, and I don’t want to get deeply into it here, but it’s what you get when you order coffee here in town. It’s black as hell and brewed too strong and too hot, and it comes out tasting like Austin coffee. My theory is that, in Austin, we do not like coffee, we like coffee beverages with cream and sugar. I have yet to be proven decisively wrong by a coffee shop or restaurant experience. Take it for what it is: a snobbish opinion from a budding coffee snob.

Their selection of baked goods is external and unremarkable. It’s fresh, or it has been every time I’ve been here, and that is several times. Will this be the final time? Maybe.

Because, my experience here has become polluted, as experiences inevitably do. By a plate.

I tried to take a picture, but it does not appear in photographs. I tried to reassemble it in a popular photo program, but the horror does not, as horror so often does not, translate. It is a plate, depicting a cartoony coffee pot. In no fewer than seven different fonts is the phrase (the quotation marks are on the plate) “The PERKS are BEST here”

I shudder at the thought. Each word, and the quotation marks in an additional two. Yick.

The rest of the wall hangings, although often puzzling, are not so troubling to the soul. The half board game on the wall of the sitting room, off the main, is nifty but useless, hanging as it does cockeyed on the wall. The Gulf G in the main room over the fireplace is a fine touch, hanging as it does, in the classic pose, rampant over three green frogs bearing the same initial.

But that plate, it ruins the whole experience for me. I hate to be in the room with it, and now that I’ve seen it, I can’t remove it from the edge of my vision, following and taunting me throughout my experience. Ah, well.

24% “Apple’s”, 36% “Orange’s”