Category Archives: American restaurants

Sliding Into Missoula, Montana

Road-trip driving occasionally produces white knuckles

I’m a little jittery to fully enjoy my lunch at Pueblo Lindo, in McCall, Idaho. It’s not the usual three cups of road coffee jangling around an acidic stomach that does it. It’s the two hours of white-knuckle driving to get here in a late October snowstorm, traveling in a 25-mile-per-hour (40 kmh) convoy, hoping we’re going fast enough that I can get up any icy hills in summer tires and using the white van in front of me as a guide to see the road as the “window” created by the slush-encrusted wipers keeps getting smaller and smaller. So by the time I pull up to Pueblo Lindo for a nerve-calming break, it’s all I can do to properly taste the decent chicken burrito with rice and beans, the best part being the accompanying basket of warm tortilla chips with a piquant house-made salsa (all for a bargain $5). By the time I finish, the road’s been plowed, and I can renew the long drive to the next meal. By the way, the McCall public library charges $2 for 15 minutes of Wi-Fi access for non-cardholders. Someone should report them to the Gates Foundation!

Chicken burrito at Pueblo Lindo in McCall, Idaho

Pueblo Lindo
1007 West Lake Street, McCall, Idaho
Daily 11 am-9 pm

Fabulous driving along the Salmon River on Highway 95 north of McCall, Idaho

Missoula is a charming college town (population 68,000) with a foothills backdrop and the Clark Fork River dividing the downtown from the rest of the city. But the University of Montana certainly doesn’t encourage motoring visitors; it’s almost impossible to park within a mile of the place without a university or residential parking permit. And the street-naming system is downright weird; an example from below is South 4th Street West (if you’re going to have a quadrant system, follow Calgary’s lead and go, for instance, with SW). The city’s food scene, though, is lively, with a number of fine places you can drive right up to.

I’ve already heralded Bob Marshall’s Biga Pizza as one of the best pizzerias in the mountain west (241 West Main Street. Weekdays 11 am-3 pm and 5 pm-9:30 pm, Saturday 5 pm-10 pm). It’s here that I first encounter the outstanding *KettleHouse Cold Smoke Scotch Ale, which because of arcane state laws on microbrewery production limits is for now pretty much only available in western Montana. So, of course, I have to visit the character-filled KettleHouse Brewing Company’s taproom, where an afternoon crowd is gathered to sample a pint or fill a larger “growler” to go. Here’s another bit of strange state law: A small brewery taproom can only serve a patron 48 ounces of beer between the hours of 10 am and 8 pm. Other FAQs from the Kettlehouse website: “Can you ship me some beer? No. Sorry. Plan a vacation in beautiful Missoula instead.” “Do you have food in your tap rooms? No. But you can bring in your own.” Note: Their “six-packs” are four, 16-ounce cans.

Funky taproom at KettleHouse Brewing Company in Missoula

KettleHouse Brewing Company
602 Myrtle Street, Missoula
Daily noon to 8 pm

There’s definitely something to be said for keeping things simple and doing one or two things well. Le Petit Outre (“The Little Outrageous”) has that nailed. As a small bakery, it produces a wide variety of excellent handcrafted breads—ryes, baguettes, cocodrillos, ciabattas and the like, some baked in a French hearth oven—as well as pastries and nice buttery, flaky croissants to munch on. It also has fine coffee, whether it’s a nice strong blend from a pump pot or a well-crafted cappuccino from its Synesso espresso machine. In good weather, there are a few tables outside; otherwise, it’s takeout.

Le Petit Outre
129 South 4 Street West
Monday to Friday 7 am-6 pm, Saturday 8 am-3 pm, Sunday 8 am-2 pm

There aren’t many places I’d frequent simply to sit in the space, ordering latte after pour over just so I don’t have to leave. *Caffe Dolce is such a place, with its tile floor, light orange walls and high ceiling reminiscent of a centuries-old Italian building. Actually, owner Peter Lambros had it built only a few years ago, though an Italian artist did spend a Michelangelo-like 750 hours on a scaffold to paint the ceiling (a side room is lined with Italian pottery for sale). One of the baristas says she loves working here, especially on a wintery day, when the high windows make the space feel like a giant snow globe. By the way, they make good coffees here, along with iron-grilled sandwiches, a large selection of gelato and, something of a rarity, a bowl of fresh breakfast fruit. Just order things one at a time, so you can spread your stay out.

Caffe Dolce, a great place to hang out in Missoula

Caffe Dolce
500 Brooks Street (the one described here) and 2901 Brooks Street (Southgate Mall), Missoula
Check the website for hours, which are too confusing to list here

The Montana pasty (paste-ee) is supposed to be the preserve of Butte. It’s where English-born miners carried their Cornish pasties underground in lunch buckets. I guess no one told Lisa she couldn’t take the Butte tradition to Missoula and open Lisa’s Pasty Pantry. Some folks say her version of the meat-filled pastry pocket is better. I can only tell you it’s a mighty tasty pasty: a bunch of hand-cubed beef, potatoes and onions packed into a crimped pastry and then baked till golden. Add a little gravy if you want, and you’ve got a filling lunch for a bargain $6. Though they seemed a little insulted when I don’t finish things off with one of their fruit turnovers.

A hearty pasty quells the lunchtime hunger pangs at Lisa’s Pasty Pantry

Lisa’s Pasties
2004 West Sussex Avenue, Missoula
Monday to Friday 11 am-7 pm, Saturday 10:30 am to close. Closed Sunday

Death by sandwich? There are worse ways to go. In fact, the amount of mortadella and dough I’ve already consumed this trip might cause my porcine valves to seize up. But when I see the Megadeath sandwich on the Tagliare Delicatessen menu board, I’m powerless to resist. Mercifully, I only order the $9 half loaf, er, sandwich. The whole would be enough to choke a horse, if a horse ate ham, finocchiona (whatever that is), hot sopressata, pepperoni, hot capicola and various other things pressed between two hunks of ciabatta and sawn in half. Some of the meats and/or the “feisty” vinaigrette give this sandwich the slight kick of a mule. If that’s insufficient meat for you, consider the Zeppelin, an unholy alliance of roast beef, turkey, salami, ham and pastrami. Way down the menu, there is a vegetarian option, featuring goat cheese and pickled beets. These takeout sandwiches can be messy, so take care how you eat them.

I’m still kicking after finishing the Megadeath half sandwich at Tagliare Delicatessen

Tagliare Delicatessen
1433 South Higgins Avenue, Missoula
Monday 10 am-5 pm, Tuesday to Friday 10 am-7 pm, Saturday 10 am-5 pm. Closed Sunday

Heading From Colorado Into Utah

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Tons of Italian meats on this calzone at Carelli's Pizza & Pasta

Lots of Italian meats on this sandwich at Carelli’s Pizza & Pasta

Hungry? I hope you bring company, or at least a healthy appetite, to Carelli’s Pizza & Pasta in Craig, a short drive west of Steamboat Springs on Highway 40 in northwest Colorado. The calzones are enormous, stretching in a couple of instances to two or three feet. A more reasonable monster is the Carelli Calzone, featuring a liquidy furnace of meatballs, sausage, ricotta and mozzarella. I settle for the merely massive Mancinelli sandwich—layers of mortadella, salami, capicola, ham and lettuce—heated in the oven till the provolone cheese melts and the focaccia is nicely toasted. Attacking with a knife and fork, I put a healthy dent in it but have to box the rest for a later road snack, er, meal. The two young women beside me have a more manageable strategy, ordering big, single slices of pizza.

Carelli’s Pizza & Pasta
465 Yampa Avenue, Craig, Colorado
Monday to Saturday 11 am-9 pm

Farther west on Highway 40, Vernal, Utah is the nearest staging point for Dinosaur National Monument, established to protect an historic dinosaur quarry, which can be viewed by guided tour. If you’d like a quick, authentic Mexican meal in town, stop at Tacos El Gordo (“Never trust a skinny cook”). Behind some non-operating gas pumps, El Gordo retains a faded convenience-store feel, with fridges full of sodas and packaged snacks for sale. Soon after placing my order at a little window, two tacos (pollo/chicken and carnita/pork) arrive—hot, crispy, a little greasy and flavourful, with a little bottled hot sauce added from the drink fridge. It’s a good, light lunch in an unpolished eatery for $4, a few bucks more if I’d gone for a burrito or quesadilla.

Cheap, fresh food at Tacos El Gordo in Vernal, Utah

Tacos El Gordo
395 East Main Street, Vernal, Utah
Monday to Saturday opens at 8 am. Closed Sunday

I guess you could say I hit a double bagel in Park City. The place I want to go to, Nature’s Wraps, is closed, so I head next door to Wasatch Bagel & Grill (1300 Snow Creek Drive), where I have a chicken parmigiano sandwich on a fresh, toasted bagel. It’s decent, but the service is distracted, despite the place being mostly empty. The next morning, I drive a fairly long way to reach a different part of Park City, where I have a pretty good egg bagel sandwich (something I rarely order) at Park City Bread & Bagel (3126 Kilby Road), though the pounding soundtrack is annoying at 7:30. I then navigate through construction in a new mall nearby to have a nice coffee at Park City Roaster (1680 Ute Boulevard), though by this point I just want out of town. I know Park City is a big ski resort town (it has a much bigger tourist than resident population), is the principal location for the Sundance Film Festival and hosted some 2002 Winter Olympic events. But I don’t know if Park City has a historic centre. It doesn’t seem to have any centre, just a bunch of new, disparate developments with little character. It certainly helps to have a GPS to find my way around.

Once you’re safely past the hour-long stress of driving the chock-a-block I-15 past Salt Lake City (it helps to tackle it on a Sunday morning), it’s worth slowing down and getting onto a quieter parallel highway. One such road, Highway 89 to the near east, leads into Brigham City, featuring a large, white Mormon temple, stately and well-tended historic buildings and a wide Main Street flanked by enormous overarching sycamores, their leaves still green in late October.

When you see a sign saying, “Gone fishing,” you just figure you’ll come back another time. But Kathie and Bert, owners of Bert’s Cafe in downtown Brigham City want to go fishing full time… in Oregon. After 30-plus years of running a diner Bert’s parents started in 1929, they’re ready to retire and have put the place up for sale. Their own kids don’t want to run it, and Kathie doesn’t blame them, saying it’s a 24/7 business. Here’s hoping the new owners can somehow carry on the tradition, because this is a real old-fashioned diner, where the cutlery comes in a little paper bag, the waitresses chat leisurely with the customers and the food comes out hot and fast. My omelette special has nice chunks of avocado, the home fries are crispy and the butter melts into the steaming pancake. Lunch items include a sirloin sandwich and an open-face pot roast sandwich with gravy. It’s good, old-fashioned comfort food.

Hey, if anybody knows what’s happened to Bert’s since I passed through last fall, let me know.

The good news: Great homestyle breakfast at Bert’s Cafe in Brigham City

The bad news: the owners want to sell.

Bert’s Café
89 South Main Street, Brigham City, Utah
Monday to Saturday 7 am-7 pm, Sunday 7 am-2 pm

It’s hardly a news flash to say interstate highways have helped shut down many restaurants in the small towns they’ve bypassed. But some manage to persist, such as Mollie’s Cafe in tiny Snowville, just off I-84 near the Utah-Idaho border. Located in a century-old building and owned by Mollie for more than 30 years, it’s the kind of run-down-looking place many travellers might hesitate to enter. But once you walk past walls of old ranching photos, sink into a red-cushioned booth and watch heaping plates of eggs and cheese burgers go past, you know you’re in good hands. Indeed, the cook looks over the counter and asks me if I want the onions atop my little bowl of chili grilled (all of $2.15, including tax). After I’ve licked my bowl clean, she wishes me safe travels. It’s not the kind of treatment you normally get in places on the beaten path.

A true, old-fashioned diner, off the interstate in Snowville, Utah

Mollie’s Cafe
15 East Main Street, Snowville, Utah
Daily 6 am-10 pm

Best Sandwiches in the U.S. Mountain States

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Honking big, glorious sandwiches at Sedona Memories Bakery & Cafe in Sedona, Arizona

I don’t often get excited about sandwiches on road trips. That’s because they’re often, well, boring. But occasionally, some place bowls me over with a sandwich that’s incredibly fresh, creative and served, of course, between two pieces of great bread that definitely weren’t pulled from a bag. Here, then, are the top sandwiches I feasted on during a recent trip through the U.S. mountain states.

Creative chandeliers at 626 on Rood in Grand Junction, Colorado

If you’re craving some excellence on a long road trip, please, please take a short detour off the dreary I-70 in southwest Colorado and navigate your way through Grand Junction to its historic downtown and 626 on Rood. Yes, it’s a more upscale place, where you’ll pay a pittance for street-front parking, get linen napkins and heavy utensils and have your water glass filled from a long-necked wine bottle. None of this matters, nor does the menu, frankly. Just order the smoked duck breast club sandwich, and you’ll never be able to look at an ordinary club the same way again. It’s that oh-my-God good. Besides the incredibly succulent and plentiful slices of apple-wood-smoked duck (adequate adjectives fail me) there’s pepper bacon, Napa cabbage and roasted garlic mayo, all squeezed between two delightful pieces of challah bread.

This duck club, at 626 on Rood, may be the best sandwich I’ve ever had

Oh, and get some fantastic sweet potato fries as your side, and start things off with a complimentary plate of French baguette slathered in house-made herbed butter. It might be the best $12 you’ll ever spend on lunch. The duck club isn’t listed on the dinner menu, but just ask and they will deliver: They promised me.

626 on Rood
626 Rood Avenue, Grand Junction, Colorado
Monday to Saturday 11 am-11 pm, Sunday 4 pm-10 pm

I’m taking a two-hour detour for lunch, one that carries me steeply up through dense pine forests and around 15 mph-switchbacks en route to Silver City, in the southwest corner of New Mexico. The Curious Kumquat is just one of those nationally-recognized, destination restaurants you go out of your way for; they’re even sponsoring an NPR program I’m listening to on the tortuous approach.

What makes the Kumquat special? Consider that chef-owner Rob Connoley likes to forage for wild edibles—like cattails, forest moss and crawfish for today’s evening menu. For a relative bargain of about $40, I can enjoy a five-course tasting dinner featuring jerk rabbit, Catalan duck and smoked roots.

Fabulous mole-chicken sandwich at Curious Kumquat in Silver City, New Mexico

But I’m here for a real lunch deal ($7.50), a fantastic Oaxacan sandwich, with plentiful, moist pieces of shredded mole chicken, avocado, goat cheese and apple, served on lovely, seed-crusted ciabatta. The included side salad is no afterthought but a carefully constructed mix of quinoa, grape and sliced vegetables. The server brings around a couple of spectacular-looking desserts, but there’s no room, even for a jelly-filled sandwich cookie. It’s too bad I have to drive, otherwise I’d sample one of their 70 listed international beers.

Curious Kumquat
111 East College Avenue, Silver City, New Mexico
Tuesday to Saturday, lunch 11 am-5 pm, dinner 5:30-8:30 pm (final seating)

“You been on Man Vs. Food?” a customer asks the server as he soldiers through his sandwich at Sedona Memories Bakery & Café, in Sedona, Arizona. “You serve halves?” I add, eying the monsters anchoring tables in the gusty winds. “No, just entire sandwiches,” she replies. “You’ve got to eat the whole thing. We tie you to the chair till you’re finished.”

Sedona Memories doesn’t seem much concerned about aesthetics. Faded red-and-white checked plastic tablecloths cover scuffed beige plastic tables, with chairs to match, and the patio area overlooks a dusty gravel parking lot. This means all the energy goes into producing wonderful, thick, thick sandwiches, all for a bargain $7.25 in tourist-choked Sedona. Eschewing standards like egg and tuna salad or roast beef, I opt for one piled with veggies, cream cheese, avocado and sunflower seeds. What brings it all together is the house-made bread, especially the moist, dense whole wheat or seven grain. Forget getting my mouth around it; I have to stretch my hand just to contain it.

This bad boy holds down the tablecloth at Sedona Memories Bakery & Cafe

Sedona Memories Bakery & Cafe
321 Jordan Road, Sedona, Arizona
Monday to Friday 10 am-2 pm. Closed Saturday and Sunday

“Many have eaten here… few have died,” declares a sign in Big D’s Downtown Dive, a colourful Roswell diner featuring a collage of New Mexico license plates and tables covered in laminated maps. The Dive is known for its hamburgers and my choice of a cheesesteak sandwich, which seems a bit steep at $8.99 till it lands with a shudder on the table. If they hadn’t cut it in half, it would have measured at least 16 inches of soft roll absolutely stuffed with grilled steak, onions, peppers, mushrooms, green chiles and melted Swiss (my only quibble is it’s a tad salty, for me). This quivering mass is still steaming as I struggle onto the second half, with enough spillage to soak three napkins. It’s a good thing I don’t opt for the double meat (an added $3). That may have been sufficient to trigger my premature demise. One nice detail here is the cucumber-flavoured tank of water.

Hearty cheesesteak sandwich at Big D’s Downtown Dive in Roswell, New Mexico

Big D’s Downtown Dive
505 North Main Street, Roswell, New Mexico
Monday to Friday 11 am-9 pm

It takes a while for my lunch-hour order to be taken at *Guava Tree Café in Albuquerque, New Mexico, but I don’t mind. It lets me peer into the kitchen and watch the fastest-moving cook I’ve ever seen. She’s a literal whirling dervish, assembling Cuban-style sandwiches and Venezuelan arepas, featuring unleavened corn-meal bread. The guy behind the counter isn’t much slower—taking orders, delivering food and whipping up delicious fresh tropical juices. After agonizing deliberation (I really want to order an arepa pocket stuffed with shredded beef, plantains and black beans), I opt instead for a larger Pernil sandwich ($7.50). It’s a fantastic mix of slow-roasted pork, sweet caramelized onion, Swiss cheese and garlic sauce, warm pressed on Cuban bread. Add a side of yuca crisps and a coconut flan for dessert, and I’ve got a full Caribbean dining experience. My only advice: Don’t be in a hurry. The staff’s got that covered for you.

Savoury Cuban-style sandwiches at Guava Tree Cafe in Albuquerque, New Mexico

Guava Tree Cafe
216 Yale Boulevard SE, Albuquerque, New Mexico
Weekdays 9 am-4 pm, weekends 11 am-3 pm

Honourable Mentions for a couple of great places where I tried something other than their most famous sandwiches.

Tony Caputo’s Market & Deli (Salt Lake City, Utah) is one of America’s top delis and renowned for its Caputo sandwich, loaded with prosciutto, mortadella, salami, provolone, olive oil and balsamic ($8.25 for a monster whole, $4.85 for a half).

Check out the cheeses, meats and great sandwiches at Tony Caputo’s Market & Deli in Salt Lake City

Verde Lea Market Deli & Grill (Cottonwood, Arizona) makes grilled-steak tortas (big, $7 Mexican sandwiches) that are “three-quarters-of-a-pound of heaven in your mouth,” a server tells me. I do try the toasted telera, far superior to any of the round torta breads I’ve had elsewhere on this trip.

Try a great torta at Verde Lea Market Deli & Grill in Cottonwood, Arizona

American Versus Canadian Restaurants

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Americans wear their colours more proudly than Canadians

What distinguishes American from Canadian restaurants? That is, besides the lower prices in the former, a lot of the time.

Aside from Canadian, or back, bacon—which you don’t actually see that much in Canadian restaurants—we Canucks don’t have much to offer in distinct regional cuisine. Even with the one solid entry of poutine, many Canadians outside Quebec used to look aghast at this artery-choking combination of fries, gravy and cheese curds before it became trendy.

Americans, particularly in the south, can counter with grits, collards, beignets, biscuits and gravy, barbecue, pulled pork, chicken-fried steak, Philly cheesesteak and that odd combination of fried chicken and waffles. Indeed, Mexican cuisine, or its Tex-Mex or New Mexican offshoots, has made far greater inroads on restaurant menus than anything Canada has to offer.

At a lot of U.S. diners and cafes, I’ve noticed, the bill is presented almost as soon as you’ve told the server you don’t want anything else. It’s done in a matter-of-fact way that I don’t mind, sometimes with the comment “Pay whenever you’re ready.” I prefer this casual efficiency to the more common situation in Canada of having to catch the server’s eye and ask for the bill. Speaking of this, I’ve heard a number of U.S. servers use the term “ticket” instead of “bill” or “check” (“cheque” if you’re Canadian).

It seems odd to me that Canada is ahead of the U.S. in anything regarding technology. But so it is with credit cards. We have followed the European example of using credit (and debit) cards with embedded chips, whereby you punch a four-digit code into a portable machine instead of signing a slip of paper. But in the U.S., using this same chip credit card, I’m never asked for anything more than a signature.

In the U.S., signs always direct you to the “restroom”. In Canada, it’s more commonly called “bathroom” or “washroom”.

At U.S. places where you order at the counter, I’m often asked “Here or to go?” My intuitive response is to say, “to stay” instead of “here.”

Canadians say “cinnamon bun”, Americans almost invariably “cinnamon roll.”

Finally, we Canadians don’t say “eh” nearly as much as is rumoured (“rumored” for you American spellers). Just like y’all don’t say “uh-huh”.

Any other dining Americanisms or Canadianisms I’m missing?

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Marathon Mouth

Great road trip eats in western U.S. and Canada

Category Archives: American restaurants

Sliding Into Missoula, Montana

Heading From Colorado Into Utah

Best Sandwiches in the U.S. Mountain States

American Versus Canadian Restaurants

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