Restaurants Archives - Page 9 of 49

Pie Slingers Pizzeria

October 5, 2016

Located in Rock Spring, Georgia, near the Chickamauga Battlefield, Pie Slingers Pizzeria serves hand-tossed pizza and beer brewed in house by Phantom Horse Brewery.

I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that Philip has been working at Sigler’s Craft Beer & Cigars for a while now. Working there, he encounters lots of people who work with beer in lots of different capacities, from vendors to distributors to brewers. Sometimes, it sends us on adventures to restaurants we hadn’t heard of, or at least restaurants that aren’t on our radar. Pie Slingers Pizzeria is one of those spots. There used to be a Pie Slingers Pizzeria on Signal Mountain, but we didn’t make it up there before it closed. I knew there was a location in North Georgia, but I hadn’t even added it to my list until the brewer from Phantom Horse Brewery, which is located inside of Pie Slingers, came into Sigler’s and gave Philip a business card to use for a free flight (sampler, for those of you who aren’t familiar with beer-speak).

Philip couldn’t wait to use it, so we headed down there the next week. It was a bit of a drive – about 45 minutes from our house – but really isn’t that much farther than some of the other North Georgia spots we’ve been to. Just past the Chickamauga Battlefield, it didn’t seem too far out. We got there around 5:00 and it wasn’t too crowded, outside of a large group of people that were there for a birthday party. The place is large and open, decorated with lots of retro radios, eight-tracks, and other retro memorabilia. One side houses some arcade games (which, in the wide open space made the restaurant a little loud – just a warning), and each table is decorated in its own unique way (ours had comic book clippings and miniatures under the glass).

Philip was most excited, of course, about the beer. There’s a tiny little room in one corner of the restaurant where the brews are made. You can order pints, flights (4 4-ounce pours), and crowlers (32-ounce can growlers to take home).

I left the beer perusal up to Philip and focused instead on perusing the menu. I was interested in the house made potato chips ($1.50/$2.95), spiral cut and served with ranch dressing. We ultimately decided to order the beer cheese, made with Ole Green Eyes IPA and Working Girl Blonde Ale ($1.50), and Pretzel Bites ($4.95), made with 1891 Oatmeal Cream Stout. We were expecting teeny little pretzel bites and warm beer cheese dip, but what we got were basically pretzel breadsticks and a cream cheese based beer cheese spread. The pretzel bites were hot, soft, and fresh, and the beer cheese was a little tangy with a little bit of a bitter beer bite. Very tasty!

As for pizza, there were several that sounded delicious. I was interested in the Philly Cheesesteak, with garlic butter base, Philly meat, white American cheese, green peppers, and onions; the Buffalo Chicken, with garlic butter base, house-smoked chicken, blue cheese crumbles, and a Frank’s hot sauce drizzle; and the Nacho Mama, with enchilada sauce base, cheddar cheese, taco beef, and tortilla chips, served with a side of lettuce, sour cream, and salsa. We decided on the Nacho Mama, going for a 12-inch for $15.75 (each pie is also available as a 16-inch and a 28-inch. Yes, you read that right. Twenty-eight inch pizza. We saw one get delivered and it was unbelievably large.)

The pizza took a little bit longer than we were expecting to come out, considering that the place wasn’t very crowded. We did see people come in for take-out orders, so it’s definitely possible that there were a lot of take-out orders that we didn’t see going out. The pizza was hot and fresh, though, so were were really okay. The pizza at Pie Slingers Pizzeria is tossed and formed by hand – no dough sheeter in the place – and it’s thin and a little crispy while still a little chewy. I liked the toppings. The meat was well-seasoned and the cheddar cheese was a nice complement, and I liked that they didn’t skimp on the tortilla chips. The lettuce, sour cream, and salsa were all served in one bowl, and I thought that it would have made more sense if they had been served in separate containers. Actually, I would have liked for the sour cream to have been drizzled over (I often put my sour cream in a plastic bag and pipe it onto my tacos)…but those are just details. The pizza was definitely tasty.

Pie Slingers Pizzeria is a bit too much of a drive to make it a regular spot for us, but if we head down in that direction we would definitely stop in again to try another one of their pies. Philip liked the brews from Phantom Horse a lot and even got a crowler to bring home.

If you’re looking for pizza in the Fort Oglethorpe/Rock Spring area, check out Pie Slingers Pizzeria!

Pie Slingers Pizzeria is located at 56A Fieldstone Village Drive, Rock Spring, GA, 30739. They are open Monday – Tuesday, 11 – 8:30, Wednesday – Thursday, 11 – 9, Friday – Saturday, 11 – 9:30, and Sunday 12 – 9. You can call them at (706) 375-9182. You can find out more on the Pie Slingers Pizzeria website or on the Pie Slingers Facebook page. You can also follow @pieslingers on Twitter and on Instagram.

Armando’s Chester Frost

September 28, 2016

Armando’s Chester Frost is a popular spot in Hixson for burgers, fries, and just about every sort of sandwich you can imagine.

Can you guys believe I’ve been writing this blog for 5 1/2 years now? When you write a blog for that long, sometimes you need to write about things more than once. This is the case particularly when you realize that you wrote some restaurant posts and didn’t even include pictures, like I neglected to do when I wrote my original Armando’s Chester Frost post. So…once a month, I’ll be writing a “revisit” post to update you all on a restaurant that I wrote about many moons ago.

With the “gas shortage” last week, Philip and I were trying to conserve gas and stay in Hixson. I drive a lot for work, and if I ran out of gas and wasn’t able to get more (as most of the gas stations in our area did run out at some point), then I was going to have to stay parked in one spot, which makes being itinerant a bit of a challenge. We decided to head just a few miles down the road and eat at Armando’s Chester Frost – the final decision to go there instead of Biba’s or El Metate being made because of the lack of pictures.

Armando’s Chester Frost has been around for as long as I can remember (my family never went there when I was a kid, but I remember going there with a friend when I was probably 9 or 10). It hasn’t changed much, though – still teeny inside, dark with wood paneling. The menu board is pretty retro with those push-pin black and red letters. I am sure they’ve made additions to their menu over the years, but all the classics are still there.

I’m usually a burger girl when I go to Armando’s Chester Frost, but since I knew that Philip would order a burger I decided to get my second favorite, the deluxe grilled cheese. This is a monster grilled cheese – a triple decker. Between the first two slices of bread are bits of ham, bacon, and roast beef and melty Swiss, American, and Cheddar cheese. Between the middle slice and the top slice lies lettuce, tomato, onion, and mayo. I, of course, opted to forego the onion. The deluxe grilled cheese is not for the faint of heart or the dainty eaters…it’s challenging to take a bite, to say the least. I don’t care about getting a little messy, though, as long as the food is delicious, and this grilled cheese did not disappoint. The bread was crunchy and buttery and all the fillings make a perfect savory, melty, gooey treat. We opted to split an order of onion rings. I’m not convinced that the onion rings at Armando’s Chester Frost are homemade, but they’re good – battered instead of breaded, and a little bit sweet. I do highly recommend the fripps (homemade chips).

As I predicted, Philip went for the cheeseburger all the way. It’s a pretty classic cheeseburger – hand-formed patty with American cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, pickle, ketchup, mayo, and mustard on a soft bun. I have never been disappointed by a burger from Armando’s Chester Frost. This one was no exception – Philip remarked that it was exceptionally juicy. He decided to order a chocolate malt as well. The malts and shakes are handmade by the girls who wait the tables and run the register. The malt was creamy and chocolatey, and personally I thought it was pretty malty, but Philip would have liked to have had more malt.

Armando’s Chester Frost is a neighborhood favorite around here.

I don’t think they’re going anywhere soon – why would they when they’re always overflowing at lunch and dinner with customers dining in or picking up t0-go orders? With their menu of classic homemade fast food favorites and their friendly staff, it’s easy to see why they’re so popular.

Armando’s Chester Frost is located at 7330 Hixson Pike, Hixson, TN 37343, for dine-in and drive-thru. Call in your orders at 423-842-0479. While the Facebook page for Armando’s Chester Frost lists a website, the website is not currently functional.

Original Post:

So, this was the night that I realized that, aside from a Lean Cuisine that I ate alone on my couch one night before logging in for my online class, every meal that I had eaten for a solid week (aside from my yogurt or smoothie breakfasts) had been from a restaurant. Even lunches had been leftovers. I had offered to cook at my parents’ house, but my mom didn’t have anything specific planned to cook, so she suggested Armando’s. I love Armando’s but I actually called her back and asked if she wanted to come to my house….I had all the ingredients to make spaghetti carbonara and thought for sure that I might implode if I ate one more restaurant meal. Alas, she had already asked my brother to meet us….so on I went.

Armando’s at Chester Frost Park has been around for years and years. I can remember the first time I went there with a friend in elementary school. My family lives in deep Soddy, so this wasn’t somewhere we came (we were more JJ’s type people….but JJ’s doesn’t exist anymore!). Interestingly, Philip and I have lived in the Dallas Bay area for nine years now, and I think we have only gone to Armando’s once. Why? Because it’s hit or miss with the crowd. You can go there and get your food immediately, or you can go there when they are packed out with a long line at their drive-thru and wait, wait, wait. This is certainly not a bad reflection on them. They must be doing something right! We just aren’t much on crowds or waiting (Philip especially).

This night, however, I don’t know if we just got there at a good time or if we just got lucky, but there were maybe four or five tables taken in the restaurant (of course, it’s tiny, so there are probably only about 10 tables altogether) and a car or two in the drive-thru. We walked right up and ordered, and our food was out within 10 minutes. My mom and I ordered a cheeseburger and fries to split, and my brother ordered a grilled chicken sandwich and tater tots.

Armando’s food is your basic hamburger stand kind of food….burgers, fries, onion rings, tots, chicken sandwiches, grilled cheese, now salads, and so on. I’m pretty sure they have milkshakes, too. I loved that there was a note on their menu board that said something along the lines of: “Don’t see what you want? Ask us. Maybe we can make it.” Now that’s keeping the people happy! It’s family-owned, and there are several Armando’s locations around the Chattanooga area but they are all owned by different people and have variations on their menus.

The cheeseburger that my mom and I split was huge and half was plenty for me. It was just basic with American cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, mayo, pickle. I, of course, took the onion off because raw onions are the worst in my opinion. The fries….they are probably frozen, I don’t know, but Armando’s doesn’t really claim to be 100% superfresh and I’m not judging. They were hot and pretty tasty, although fries at places like that never seem salty enough to me so I always salt them a little. I also ate a couple of tots out of my brother’s basket, and they were pretty good too, although I’m really not so much of a tots kind of girl. He felt like there was a little too much mayo on his grilled chicken sandwich, but I probably would have been fine with the amount of mayo. That’s just a personal preference kind of thing.

I really like the food at Armando’s. It’s not likely that I’m ever going to become a regular due to the reasons stated above, but it’s definitely a place to go to get a tasty burger or sandwich. They don’t have a website but you can find them at 7330 Hixson Pike, Hixson, TN 37343, for dine-in and drive-thru. Call in your orders at 423-842-0479.

Lakeshore Grille

September 21, 2016

Lakeshore Grille, located near the Chickamauga Dam, is out of the way & easily overlooked, but they serve good food with great views of the Tennessee River!

I love it when you guys suggest recipes for me to make and restaurants for me to check out. Have I mentioned that before? I’m pretty sure I have. Yeah, I’ve definitely mentioned that before.

A few weeks ago a reader emailed me to let me know that her favorite burger in town was at Lakeshore Grille. To be honest, Lakeshore Grille wasn’t even on my list – or even my radar. I knew that it existed, but that’s about it. Tucked away far from any main roads, Lakeshore Grille never even crossed my mind.

As per usual these days, since Philip doesn’t get home from work on Saturdays until 3 or 3:30, we arrived at Lakeshore Grille around 4:00 p.m. on Saturday afternoon. There were a few patrons inside, but it was pretty empty. We contemplated sitting outside (they have ample outdoor seating) but it was pretty hot so we decided to sit inside by one of their huge windows instead. Our water glasses were filled and Philip set to checking out their beer list. He ended up ordering the Sam Adams Octoberfest, which he was pretty happy about.

The happy hour menu was set out on the table and spinach Gouda dip was calling my name. I rarely order it because it’s so easy to make at home for much cheaper than you can get it in a restaurant, but at only $4 for happy hour the price was right. I wouldn’t have ordered it, though, if I’d realized that a complementary basket of house-made potato chips drizzled with a just slightly spicy white sauce and sprinkled with chopped chives would be delivered to our table. We made quick work of the chips (because we hadn’t eaten since breakfast at 8:30). They were warm, crunchy, and well-seasoned, and the creamy sauce was a delicious addition. The spinach Gouda dip was a small portion, served with crisp baguette slices for dipping. It was tasty but not really anything mind-blowing.

Jane and Ken (the readers who emailed me) highly recommended the “Laney” burger ($12), with smoked Gouda cheese, bacon, caramelized onions, and roasted red pepper aioli on a kaiser roll. The burger was well-cooked with a nice grilled flavor. The onions were just a little bit crunchy…I like for my caramelized onions to be super-soft and syrupy, but they still tasted good. Smoked Gouda is always a welcome addition to just about any savory dish. I would have liked for the burger to have more red pepper aioli; I couldn’t really taste it. I thought that the lettuce and tomato on the side were unnecessary – with bacon and caramelized onions, you really don’t need cold toppings. The fries were pretty standard – frozen, good but nothing special.

Philip considered the shrimp and grits ($16), but their shrimp and grits were not the cream-based style that he likes best. He ended up deciding between the sausage and shrimp penne ($14) and the catfish and fries. Eventually, he settled on the catfish and fries ($13). Typically, I think of fried catfish as being breaded in cornmeal before frying, but this was dipped in a peppery batter. It was well-seasoned and crispy, drizzled with a chipotle aioli that made it just a little spicy. Like me, he thought the fries were pretty good.

The decor in Lakeshore Grille was minimal (there was a cute little Chattanooga-specific display right when you walk in) but the place appeared clean and well-kept. The view of the marina and the river was really all we needed to keep us entertained, especially as we watched a family come into the marina with their very excited dog on the boat. The staff was friendly and our service was good. The total pre-tip was $36.05, so comparable to similar restaurants. I would definitely go back.

Lakeshore Grille has good food at decent prices with a great view!

Lakeshore Grille is located at 5600 Lake Resort Terrace, Suite 300, Chattanooga, TN 37415. They are open Tuesday – Thursday 5 p.m. to 11 p.m., Friday 5 p.m. to 12 a.m., Saturday 3 p.m. to 12 a.m., and Sunday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. You can call them at (423) 710-2057. You can read more about them on their website, lakeshoregrille.com and on their Facebook page.

Taco Town (Hixson)

September 14, 2016

Taco Town in Hixson, Tennessee is definitely a “dive”, but it’s clean and friendly and the tacos that they serve are so good you really don’t care anyway.

Choosing a place to eat on Saturdays has become infinitely more complicated now that Philip is working on the weekends. He gets off at 2:30, sometimes a little later. By the time he gets home from his job in East Brainerd, we’re both pretty much ravenous (in fact, sometimes I have to break out a snack). If I don’t already have a place in mind, choosing a restaurant can be pretty stressful, and driving a long distance can cause extreme “hanger” (hunger + anger). Plus, it seems that lately every place I think of closes early on Saturdays. WHY????

Forgive me for my rabbit trail. Last week, Taco Town was on my short list, as was Bob’s Brick Oven (a pizza joint in North Georgia) and Ceniza (I will get to both of those places soon, I promise). We ended up deciding on Taco Town for no other reason than we were hungry and it was close. It was basically dead when we arrived at 4:00 p.m. We chose a seat by the window and were given menus to peruse. We both ordered waters and Philip also ordered a horchata (a spiced and sweetened rice milk drink) which was delicious and made in house, but I didn’t get a photo.

Chips and salsa were delivered to our table, as it should be in a Mexican restaurant. The chips were fresh, thin and crispy and the salsa a little chunkier than typical for a Mexican restaurant and just barely spicy. We also decided to spring for an order of queso. The queso was different than the thin, white cheese sauce with just a hint of pickled jalapeño that is typically served at Mexican restaurants. It had plenty of red and green peppers in it, so it was quite a bit spicier than the typical queso…and quite a bit more flavorful as well.

While the quesadillas, tortas, and other menu items all sounded delicious, the name of the place IS Taco Town so I felt that I had a duty to order tacos, and lot of them. After much deliberation I settled on carnitas (slow cooked shredded pork), barbacoa (slow cooked shredded beef), and al pastor (chunks of pork marinated in chilies, spices, and pineapple). Taco Town tacos are served street taco style, each in two soft flour tortillas with the meat and lots of chopped onion and cilantro – nothing else except a wedge of lime to squeeze over each taco. Somehow, even though I typically hate raw onion, I can eat it in street tacos without giving it a second though (until after we left and I realized that I was out of the mints that I usually carry). Both the carnitas and the barbacoa were unbelievably tender and well-seasoned. The al pastor was cooked perfectly and was very flavorful.

Philip was disappointed that lingua (beef tongue) tacos were not on the menu – he loves them. Don’t judge…as Andrew Zimmern once said on Bizarre Foods, tongue is like the best pot roast you’ve ever had. It’s super tender and beefy flavored. But I digress…we are not talking about tongue today. Philip ended up deciding on tacos as well and ordered one chicharron (fried pork skin), one with chicharron, chorizo, and asada (grilled steak) called campechanos, and one with just chorizo. He loved all three. He noted that the chorizo was not very greasy at all (sometimes they just drip with grease) but that it was not as spicy as the chorizo in some spots around town (he likes the spice). We were a little apprehensive about fried pork skins in tacos, since they tend to be crunchy and we wondered if that would make them difficult to eat. However, the pork skin was not crunchy, just cooked through and delicious. The carne asada was tender to the bite and flavorful.

Taco Town is a bit “dive-y” but not in an unclean or scary way. The staff was friendly (the male server who started us off seemed a little confused, but he was still nice and managed to deliver all the right items to our table). At $18.58 for a specialty drink ($2.00), queso dip $2.99), and 6 tacos ($1.99 each), the price was definitely on the money (ugh, sorry, that was a terrible pun). Since it’s not the closest, we probably won’t make a lot of trips to Taco Town, but we would definitely go back if we were in the area looking for some great tacos!

If you’re in Hixson and craving tacos, give Taco Town a try!

Taco Town is located at 4812 Hixson Pike, Suite 110, Hixson, TN 37343 (in one of the strip malls near Krystal). They are open daily from 10:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. You can call Taco Town at (423) 870-0909. They do not have a website or Facebook page at this time.

BBQ Andy’s (Soddy-Daisy)

September 7, 2016

BBQ Andy’s, located in Soddy-Daisy, Tennessee, has a very small menu that allows them to do barbecue well – including making their own sauce.

When it comes to BBQ in Chattanooga, I feel kind of “meh”. I’ve written about quite a few BBQ places around town and truth be told, most of them are perfectly decent but less than memorable. There’s nothing that I hate more than eating at a barbecue joint and seeing sauce in a package or getting meat that tastes like it was cooked two days ago (I get reducing food waste, but come on…if I want leftover barbecue I’ll make it myself).

BBQ Andy’s has been around in Soddy-Daisy for several years now and I have eaten there once before, but it was an unplanned dinner with my family and I wasn’t really prepared to write about it. Their hours are kind of limited (11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday) and they don’t really have much of a seating area. Not knowing that, Philip and I once tried to go there to find that they were packed out and there was a 20+ minute wait for food, so we went somewhere else and vowed to come back when we could call it in ahead of time, which we have dutifully forgotten to do ever since.

The first few weeks of school give me infinite excuses to dine out on a weeknight, though, and I’m trying to get a week ahead on my dining out experiences, so it finally dawned on me last week to call BBQ Andy’s. So that’s what we did! I pulled up their menu on their Facebook page. It’s a very limited menu – “Killer” potatoes, sandwiches, plates, a handful of sides (like, three – potato salad, baked beans, or coleslaw), and banana pudding. I called at about 5:30 on a Monday night and was told by the friendly girl on the phone that it would be about fifteen minutes. When we arrived, there were no other customers in the store. We paid for our order and headed home to try it out.

As is my Chattanooga BBQ restaurant tradition, I went for the BBQ potato, or, as they call it, the killer potato. Since Philip was ordering pulled pork, I decided to go for the beef on my potato. They cut the potato up into small pieces that they scatter over the bottom of the styrofoam container, then they top it with meat, butter, sour cream, shredded cheddar cheese, and BBQ sauce. I got some extra sauce so I could taste it on its own as well. I was a little surprised when I opened the container and saw this big mess of a potato, but it was quite delicious. Beef barbecue can sometimes be a little dry, but this was tender and moist. The sauce was very tasty – BBQ Andy’s makes their own sauce (hip hip hooray) and it’s the red tomato-based sauce that is common around here, just a little sweet and a little spicy. I ate half that night and put the rest in my Thermos for lunch the next day.

Philip also went for his standard – the BBQ pork plate. He was a little disappointed that they didn’t have fried okra, but settled on the potato salad and the coleslaw. Like the beef, the pork was very tender and moist, well seasoned and lightly sauced. He actually really liked the potato salad, which was your basic mayo-based potato salad with potatoes that were cooked to a nice consistency and not too much dressing. We are picky about coleslaw and found this one to be very nice. We like it chopped up fine, and this was. There was not too much dressing, which makes coleslaw soupy and unpleasant, and it was just a little sweet.

I decided that I wanted to give the banana pudding (or Nanna Pudding, as it’s listed on their menu) a try as well. At $2.50 for a cup that was plenty big enough for me and Philip to share, it was hard to pass up. It was pretty much what you’d expect of banana pudding – creamy sweet vanilla pudding, sliced bananas, and vanilla wafer. Definitely worth $2.50 to have a nice Southern dessert to go along with your BBQ dinner.

BBQ Andy’s is close to home for me and I have to say that I was pretty happy with the food (house made sauce is definitely a plus). At $17.48 for a BBQ potato, a pork plate, and banana pudding (with enough of our entrees left over for dinner the next day), the price was definitely right. The staff was extremely friendly, and you can’t overlook the fact that BBQ Andy’s consistently scores 99-100 on their restaurant inspections.

BBQ Andy’s will definitely be on my “don’t want to cook” weeknight short list! Check them out!

BBQ Andy’s is located at 106 Karen Drive, Soddy-Daisy, TN 37379 (near Merv’s Burgers). They are open Monday-Friday, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. and you can call them at 423-332-2011. They don’t have a website, but you can find BBQ Andy’s on Facebook.

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