Adam & Eats: A House Divided — Part two

 

Editor’s note: Adam Brandt is a graduate from the Cobra Kai School of Culinary Callousness, where he received their highest award, the Red Apron of Merciless Eating. Aside from eating and talking about eating, he makes pots, paintings, prints, books, photographs, and generally, a big mess. He has been the studio assistant at Mudpuppy Pottery for almost nine years and is attending a local university in a desperate attempt to earn a biology degree. Feel free to give him a hard time.

For the longest time, in many people’s minds, Fort Smith has been a one-horse town when it comes to diner food. Sure there are lots of diners in Fort Smith, a frightening number according to the yellow pages, but the one that most people think of is Benson’s Grill.

If you recall from last week’s lesson, Benson “Ben’ Canoy, founder of Benson’s Grill, started a new diner last summer which he named after his mother. Well, his mother’s nickname anyway. As soon as Lucy’s diner opened, the grapevine was abuzz to the point of catching fire and for good reason. Lucy’s is exceptional. Don’t believe me? Try and eat there. You will probably have to wait for a table. Not that that is a bad thing. Good things come to people who wait. Looks like this town has two horses now.

Once inside you can take a trip down memory lane and reminisce about all the times that you ate there back, a million years ago or so, when it used to be the Taco Mayo. The décor inside is no longer anything remotely Tex-Mex, but instead it has a really crazy 50’s diner vibe going. You dig, Daddy-O? Although the seating is a little uncomfortable, the overall feel of the place is quite cozy. It makes you want to order your food the way people did back in days gone by.

“Yeah, I’ll take a ‘put out the lights and cry’ and a ‘shingles with a shimmy’ and my friend here will have ‘zeppelins in a fog’ and two eggs. Wreck ‘em. And can we get a couple of ‘Adam’s ales’ and couple cups of ‘joe’? Thanks Flo.” (According to Schott’s Original Miscellany “put the lights out and cry” is liver and onions, “shingles with a shimmy” is toast and jam, “zeppelins in a fog” is link sausages in mashed potatoes, to “wreck ‘em” means to scramble eggs, “Adam’s ale” is water, and, of course, “joe” is coffee.)

As far as the food goes, Lucy’s has your standard diner fare with a little southern flair added for good measure. I am typically not considered a lover of meatloaf, but their recipe is pretty awesome.

The beans and cornbread are just like Mama used to make. You can very rarely go wrong with biscuits and gravy, and Lucy’s does not disappoint. The cheeseburger is good, but it came up a little short compared to Benson’s. But, since it has taken the cooks at Benson’s almost 20 years to knock it out of the park, it can slide for now.

Also, for those of you in charge of food at Lucy’s, two words: tater tots. When Lucy’s Diner first opened, there was something weird going on with the sweet tea, but that issue has been resolved, thankfully. The coffee on the other hand might have beaten Benson’s java hands down. The prices are very reasonable and if you don’t go wild, like a kid in a candy store, you can easily get out of there under the $10 mark.

Now we come to the question on everyone’s mind. Which is better, Benson’s or Lucy’s? Well, like a kid having to pick between parents in a messy divorce, I don’t wanna. I will however offer a compromise instead. They are both great, but just in different ways. Rather than picking one or the other, we get both and win doubly. Both of these joints are gems in Fort Smith’s food crown and I, for one, am very thankful to all the men and women who work so diligently to make them great, charming, and endearing dining experiences.

I am also thankful for Ben Canoy and Don Tate who continue to comfort our troubled little hearts by serving up battered up, deep fried, covered with gravy golden nuggets of pure Fort Smith charm.

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When he’s not beating his eggs, Adam makes time to respond to e-mails that get past his hard-ass spam filter. You can try to reach him at [email protected]

Adam also has this thing called Sandwich Control.