Offbeat Eats

Back in January, right before we left for our winter vacation, we met up with friends of ours from the FOM for an outing to a place that’s long been on my radar, Dragon 88 in Boylston, MA. As you can read in my older review of House of Wu in Road Island, I’ve got a soft spot for old-school, New England-style Chinese food, which has had a good century of divergence from the food eaten in China, and even had a fair bit of divergence from West Coast Chinese places as well. Dragon 88 in Boylston is one of the better-regarded “old school” Chinese places, known for good, classic “New England Chinese” food, a reasonably good modern “authentic” menu, and, perhaps most importantly, particularly good (and strong) house Mai Tais. So we decided to meet up and give the place a try.

(Closed) A recent trip to Montpelier to visit Barr Hill to have some cocktails with friends ended up with our taking the back way through Barre, VT to get home, and hoping to pick up some dinner while in town. When we first moved here, Barre was a bit of a food desert, but over the years it’s sprouted more than a few decent eateries like Cornerstone Pub and Kitchen. But this time, I figured it was finally a chance to check out a rarity in the region: a ramen joint, Si Aku Ramen.

As I mentioned a few months ago in my review of the Community Supper at the Union Episcopal Church in Claremont, NH, I’ve been trying to make it to more of the various community meals that spring up around the area. Harvest suppers. Fire department fund raisers. Non-profit fundraisers. That sort of thing. And that brings me to an event I had seen advertised a handful of times, a monthly community breakfast run by the Independent Order of Odd Fellows Forest Lodge #69 Breakfast. Held the third Sunday of each month from 8:00 to 11:00 am, the breakfast is served buffet-style, with scrambled eggs, eggs and omelettes to order, blueberry and plain pancakes, biscuits and sausage gravy, corned beef hash, homemade brown beans, homefries, bacon, sausage, fresh-carved ham, and various beverages. Oh, and they use real maple syrup.

As our regular readers know, we’re often (although not as often as pre-Pandemic) darting off to destinations both exotic and prosaic, and most of the time that means grabbing the occasional airport meal. As you can read in my many airport dining reviews, dining in airports is pretty much never ideal. You’re dealing with higher prices, service challenges, tight timelines, and often poor ambiance. But every once in a while I find a case where an airport managed to scare up an actually good option, such as our stop at Tony Luke’s at Philadelphia International Airport.

With all of the recent travel between Saratoga Springs and our home in NH, I got to tweak the routes a few times so I wasn’t driving past the same places all the time, and one of our returns trips had us taking State Highway 11 across the state instead of our more usual US-4 route. This took us right through Chester, VT right around a “late lunch” hour, which finally gave me an opportunity to stop and check out another perennial establishment on our “should visit sometime” list: Southern Pie Café.

On our last full day visiting with our friends in Saratoga Springs, we decided to drive down to nearby Ballston Spa in order to do some thrift store shopping. Oh, I’m already well-stocked, but our friends managed to score quite a few items for their new condo, including a most-awesome, mint-condition vintage 1960s waffle iron from ReShop, identical to the one that my parents still use to this day (“don’t try to clean that, the seasoning is over 50 years old!”). After a few other choice finds, including some vintage FiestaWare, we retired to the nearby Speckled Pig Brewing Company for some lunch.

In late September, I ended up having my third trip to the Adirondack region, this time with Carol and the dogs accompanying me, which really opened up a lot of options when it came to dining since we didn’t have to race anywhere to take care of the doggos. My previous trips had focused primarily on breakfast joints, local watering holes, and smaller dinner spots, and this time, we decided it was a good excuse to go with our hosts Liz and Wesley to one of the better high-end dining options in Saratoga Springs, Hamlet & Ghost.

My third weekend in Saratoga Springs was supposed to be dedicated to helping re-supply the Northville-Placid Trail thru-hikers at their halfway point, but multiple complications ended up with everyone on the trip leaving the trail that week, so my schedule instead shifted to getting up a bit early on Saturday, having breakfast in Saratoga Springs, and heading up to Lake George to transfer some of the leftover gear from the trip. I’d already experienced Country Corner Café the previous weekend, so I decided to check out the other breakfast diner near my friends’ condo: Shirley’s Diner.

When I was staying with my friends in Saratoga Springs, I had asked them for local restaurant recommendations, and while most of their recommendations where either on Broadway or Putnam Street downtown, they mentioned that one place in particular was worth checking out due to it’s proximity: Eddie F’s Lobster Roll & Seafood House. Located in a residential neighborhood on Saratoga Springs’ west side, it was less than 100 feet from where I was staying, ideal for ducking out during a quick lunch (since I was working remotely).

Like my previous review of Big Apple Diner, driving between Saratoga Springs and New Hampshire four different times in September also had me passing by another entry on my perennial “I should check that place out” list. In this case, it was a place in Hudson Falls on US-4 as you are heading from Fort Ann into Glens Falls/Queensbury, Sally’s Hen House.