12 MAY 06: GRILL WORKS
It's estimated more than half of all U.S. families will eat out Sunday, on Mother's Day. Could any day be more revealing of a family's income level? If Mom gets a big meal at Krystal, that will be a clue....
We'll be offering our view of a couple of Mother's Day contenders over the next few days. We start with a restaurant one recent e-mailer declared the best place to eat in Columbus [2 Apr]. What makes this remarkable is that the place does NOT feature barbecue.
I've dined at the Buckhead Grill on Armour Road a few times over the years. The latest came with a group dinner a few weeks ago. The first bit of good news is that we all left unscathed -- considering The Fire House was still open down the street at the time.
Our group ate at several tables on the south side of the Buckhead Grill. Another group was dining outside on the lawn, on a comfortable spring evening. Does this mean the restaurant inspector has to check for ants crawling on the grass as well?
The area of our tables had a fireplace (not working), a very lifelike faux bird in a cage (also not working) -- and to my surprise, an overhead TV set tuned to pro basketball (working, but at least turned down). I didn't recall the TV being there on past visits. Do couples have THAT much trouble conversing these days?
(If Buckhead Grill really does attract an educated crowd, as that e-mailer suggested, you'd think that TV set would be tuned to something besides pro basketball. Switch it to C-SPAN, with captioning....)
Buckhead Grill clearly is a "take your time" restaurant. Even though it was midweek, our group had a bit of a wait before the server took our orders. Perhaps the chef wants a warning before an incoming massive attack.
The Buckhead Grill menu had a "Kansas City Sirloin" steak on it for $12.99. Being a native of Kansas City, Kansas, I could not resist. But hold on here -- back home, they're called "Kansas City Strip" steaks. Anything to avoid being lumped with The Fire House, I guess....
And on top of that, the Kansas City Sirloin was topped with mushrooms in a wine sauce. Back home, you wouldn't find this on a Kansas City steak -- unless perhaps it had a fancy French name put on it.
To be fair, the Kansas City Sirloin was tasty, well cut and tender. With a baked potato and vegetables on the side, it was a good value at $12.99. But a "side salad" cost me $2.99 extra - so Buckhead Grill DOES have a touch of Morton's of Chicago to it....
With a beverage added and an automatic 20-percent gratuity for our big group, I dined at Buckhead Grill for less than 23 dollars. Some people have a hard time partying in Atlanta's Buckhead neighborhood for that little.
A quick check at other tables found other diners in the group really liked the Chicken Marsala at Buckhead Grill. But I did NOT really tell them I was working on a blog restaurant review. This was a church group - so it's more likely to pick apart other preachers' wrong teachings.
SPAM-A-RAMA: Thursday's e-mail spam collection brought an item with the title: "WEATHER UNPRINTABLE." That's probably what some Columbus residents said, when the thunderstorms knocked down trees the other night.
Other than the storm cleanup, here's what made news Thursday:
+ Former Muscogee County School Board member Owen Ditchfield was named "Educator of the Year" at the Keep Columbus Beautiful Commission's annual luncheon. Ditchfield teaches these days at White Elementary School on Fort Benning - so he didn't go away mad, he simply went away.
+ The Columbus Delta Sigma Theta chapter promoted reading by holding "Delta Day" at the Mildred Terry Library. So which member marked Delta Day by reading to children from the bankruptcy code?
+ A funeral service was held in Americus for local civil rights leader and minister James Campbell. When a street was named in Campbell's honor in 2003, he told the Americus Times-Recorder: "As far as I'm concerned, it should have
happened a long time ago...." Don't you appreciate ministers with humility?
+ USA Today reported BellSouth has passed customers' phone records to the National Security Administration for several years. Now I know the government has a big deficit - because it's probably selling my number to telemarketers.
(Should we trust BellSouth, after learning it's handed personal phone records to the federal government? They keep offering "Fast Access DSL," but never told us about "Immediate Access NSA.")
+ WRBL presented a special 90-minute phone-in feature called "Sound Off on 3." Huh?! Didn't the Ledger-Enquirer take the name "Sound Off" first? Will the newspaper respond with an editorial saying, "Ticked Off at 3?"
+ The RiverCenter presented two performances of "Clifford the Big Red Dog." That had to annoy some University of Georgia fans - because for years, the only man worthy of that title was Vince Dooley.
+ Columbus State's softball team opened regional play at South Commons by quieting Queens College of North Carolina 8-0. The game ended after five innings due to the "mercy rule." When I was in junior high school, we called this "skunk rules" - but then, junior high school students aren't known for showing mercy.
+ Instant Message to the Georgia Republican Party: About your ad claiming "no one wanted to make tough decisions" years ago - really?! I thought Roy Barnes ran for Governor against Sonny Perdue....
COMING THIS WEEKEND: Wow, someone actually likes Mayor Poydasheff....
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