Contrabulous Fabtraption

Last fall, I visited a few Dog ‘n Suds locations toward the end of their operating seasons to mark the beginning of the colder months. After a brief, but very angry winter, the seasonal outdoor food stands are beginning to open for business again. The spring bloom of these perennial businesses coincided with my recent trip across Indiana. I took this as a sign that it was time for me to see what the Hoosier remnants of the Zesto chain had to offer.

In the optimistic postwar environment of 1945, inventor and entrepreneur Louis Austin Merritt “LAM” Phelan, whom I can only picture as a living, breathing, wacky cartoon inventor, was in charge of the Taylor Freezer company and looking to create a market for his latest creation, the Zest-O-Mat frozen custard machine. Zesto, a chain of franchised frozen custard stands which had the exclusive, and mandatory rights to use Zest-O-Mat machines was the result. The chain expanded nationally during those prosperous years. Following a tumultuous decade, however, Taylor Freezer management, unaccustomed to retail businesses, and ill-equipped to deal with an ever-expanding base of franchisees with their own concerns and complaints, abandoned the Zesto brand, forcing franchisees to operate independently.

LAM Phelan, probably

Many newly-independent Zesto owners kept the Zesto name, and many surviving Zesto operators began offering hot food in addition to ice cream, including Ernie Hernandez, who sold pasta and made from scratch sauces from his Central California stand. He even published a proclamation regarding his method for success in the pasta sauce business. He called it Ernesto’s Modesto Zesto Pesto Manifesto.

Okay, I made that up, but a good many Zesto franchisees started selling burgers and hot dogs after Taylor Freezer and LAM Phelan walked away from the business. The Zesto name would end up under the control of the Wahoo, Nebraska-based TJ Investments who sells the rights to the Zesto name and logos, though the food offered at the original and new Zesto locations open for business in Indiana, Georgia, Missouri, South Carolina, and South Dakota seems to have a high degree of variation between locations. (Wahoo, Nebraska sounds like it’s probably populated entirely by cartoonish LAM Phelan types.)

My travels through Indiana would take me through two Zesto towns, Fort Wayne (also Home of the last Azar’s Big Boy) and Evansville, whose G.D. Ritzy’s locations I try to visit quarterly. Both towns are home to both original, and later post-Taylor Freezer era Zesto locations. I approached Zesto as a purist. I visited two locations that opened between 1945 and 1955, and ordered only ice cream items at both places. Newer locations and hot food were of little interest to me, at least on this trip. 

Fort Wayne Zesto

Fort Wayne’s original Zesto location is situated near the center of the city at a quiet corner on the edge of an old residential neighborhood. I visited on a rainy weekday evening, but there were still a few people ahead of me at the order window. While I waited, I took the time to appreciate the distinctive old stand’s architecture. The blue and white stripes and giant sideways teardrop shaped neon sign on the roof made the little building stand out, even among other old buildings nearby. The brickwork on the front of the building was notable as well, with the front wall being constructed of flat red bricks and curved glass brick that flanked a central window containing the menu. The building and its surroundings appeared impeccably clean and well maintained, and the staff other customers appeared generally happy to be there, despite the unfriendly weather. 

When my turn to order came, I asked for a small turtle sundae, because ever since I visited a Stuckey’s, I’ve been a sucker for anything with pecans. When the cashier asked if I preferred caramel or butterscotch, I opted for the latter. The sundae I got from the order window a couple minutes later was notable for a few reasons, not the least of which was the unique butterscotch sauce, whose flavor profile not only contained butter, cream, and caramelized sugar, but perhaps some nut extracts as well. I suspect it was made from scratch. 

This sundae was sufficiently turtley for the Turtle Club. 

The ice cream it rested upon was decidedly not frozen custard. In order to be considered frozen custard, a product must contain a certain percentage of milkfat, egg yolks, and a 15 to 30% overrun, an increase in overall volume due to aeration during the churning process. Ice cream contains less fat and more air than frozen custard, and the eggs are optional. The ice cream in my sundae lacked the telltale yellow tint and dense, smooth texture of frozen custard. It was simply soft serve ice cream, much lighter and airier than what one would receive at Culver’s or Freddy’s, but it was of good quality, much richer and smoother than what you’d find at Dairy Queen or McDonald’s. While I suspect there are Zesto locations out there still selling frozen custard, I doubt any are still using Zest-O-Mat machines.

For one thing, I doubt it’s feasible for a small business to operate and maintain a frozen custard machine that could be well over 70 years old with components that aren’t readily available. I also suspect there’s a dark unspoken history surrounding the Zest-O-Mat machine. LAM Phelan’s Wikipedia page says he died in 1971 at the age of 87, but it doesn’t say how. In my mind, it seems likely as not that he was murdered by a Zest-O-Mat machine that he had bestowed with sentience during a misguided experiment in the secret underground laboratory that he probably had. Perhaps that’s also why I can’t find a picture of a Zest-O-Mat machine anywhere on the Internet. Maybe they were all destroyed for fear of an uprising leading frozen custard machines ruling humans as slaves, at least, that's the theory that I'm going with.

I pondered all of this the next day on my way from Fort Wayne to Evansville, where in between Ritzy’s and Grandy’s stops, I found my way to Evansville’s original Zesto. The building was a near twin to the one in Fort Wayne in terms of design, but it was clear that it had endured a harder life than its sibling. The building’s surroundings were rougher. This Zesto was seemingly surrounded on all sides by old gas stations now operating as loan sharky buy here pay here used car lots. The building was in poor cosmetic shape as well. While the aesthetic of the Fort Wayne Zesto was retro, funky, and clean, its counterpart in Evansville felt run down and grimy. A vending machine was blocking the central window and a motley collection of signs formed the menu in the remaining window openings. Even one of the the curved glass bricks at this location had been broken and was being used as a makeshift ashtray. 

In spite of the dilapidated appearance of the building, I ordered a strawberry shake, paid, and waited by the pickup window. The weather was fairly nice that day, and the place was busy serving several other customers. The menu was much larger at this location with extensive hot food offerings in addition to ice cream. People who were sitting at picnic tables on either side of the building were being called up to get their food orders. No one outside seemed to be ordering ice cream, and no one inside seemed to be making any. I stood around for a good ten minutes waiting for my shake before I gave up and walked away. 

Decidedly busy menu. 

This appears to be a newspaper clipping from the grand opening, or more likely a reasonable facsimile thereof. 

Understand that I didn't leave due to impatience. I realize the place was busy, and there were orders in front of me. I would have waited longer, but I noticed employees were placing unwrapped straws in customers’ cups with their meaty, sweaty, bare human hands. This, coupled with the less than immaculate building led me to the decision to leave empty handed without bothering to get a refund on my three bucks and change. Since none of the locals were ordering ice cream, I took it as a sign that I should probably steer clear myself. I didn’t want a repeat of my experience at Sirloin Stockade. 

It was the contrast of this Zesto compared to the one I had experienced in Fort Wayne the day previous that first caused me to question the quality of non-G.D. Ritzy’s businesses in Evansville. Later, a miserable, David Lynchian night at the local Howard Johnson, and a laughably bad breakfast the next day at Evansville’s Grandy’s location that led me to conclude the only reason I’ll travel to Evansville in the future is to eat at the three local G.D. Ritzy’s locations, that in my mind, represent the pinnacle of the brand.

Zesto, like many brands that have survived decades with no corporate support, is a mixed bag, it seems. Just as with Frostop, locations sharing the same brand offer little in terms of consistency. I’d love to see a better operator take over and clean up the Evansville Zesto and start using wrapped straws, or a perhaps a vintage LAM Phelan-designed kerosene-powered, self-sterilizing, straw-placing automaton to put straws in customers’ drinks. You know, whichever is more cost effective.


For decidedly less silly and more factual documentation of Zesto locations, check out Roadarch and these two posts from my friends at Marie, Let’s Eat!

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Nervous About Staying With J Tonight

Diane, 3:30 PM, March 29th. Entering the town of Evansville, less than a mile north of the Kentucky state line, twenty miles east of Illinois. I’ve never seen so many traffic lights in my life. As G.D. Ritzy would say, this town’s full of pop, sizzle, and bebop. Forty-four degrees on a rainy day. My weather app said warm and partly cloudy. If you could sell an app a million times for 99 cents and have it be wrong 60 percent of the time, it’d beat working. Mileage is 69,420. Gauge is on full because I filled up in Kentucky where gas was cheaper. Remind me to brag around the office about saving a nickel per gallon. Lunch was nine dollars and forty-two cents at Grandy’s. That’s on Highway 41 in Henderson. That was fried chicken, baked beans, coleslaw, and some allegedly sweet tea. Damn mediocre food. Diane, if you ever get down this way, eat at the Taco John’s next door instead. Okay. Looks like I’ll be staying at a hotel named for Howard D. Johnson. Shouldn’t be too hard to remember that. I thought I’d get a room there so I could take a look at the building that used to be a Signature Inn. I hope that it’s a clean place, reasonably priced. That’s what I need, a clean place, reasonably priced. Oh Diane, I almost forgot. I’ve got to find out why this town has so many traffic lights. They’re really annoying.

Loyal Broken Chains readers have probably deduced that I spend a lot of time on the road and quite a few nights away from home. Following a series of increasingly poor experiences, I largely gave up on staying in chain hotels, instead opting for Airbnb properties, which more often than not offer an excellent experience, and are more comfortable than the average chain hotel for around half of the price per night, but recently, I developed a curiosity about one hotel in particular.

Thanks to the impressively comprehensive blog, The History of Signature Inn, I’ve developed an interest in the essentially defunct Signature Inn brand. While no original locations remain in the chain today, a good many of their distinctive buildings remain standing particularly in Indiana and Ohio, states I visit often. The majority of these buildings are still open for business under different hotel brands. I’ve also long had an interest in the diminished Howard Johnson brand, that led me to spending the night in an Econo Lodge that had originally been a classic, 1965 vintage Howard Johnson. The point at which these two interests converge is in Evansville, Indiana, home to Howard Johnson-branded hotel, operating out of a structure that was originally a Signature Inn.

Howard Deering Johnson got his start running a pharmacy and ice cream shop in Quincy, Massachusetts in the 1920s, slowly expanding first into seaside concession stands and then a restaurant chain. The first Howard Johnson Motor Lodge opened in Savannah, Georgia in 1954, and they quickly popped up all over the US in the 1950s and 1960s. Locations had iconic architecture, featuring an A-frame lobby structure known as a gate lodge out front with a bright orange roof, and a distinctive finned cupola, usually not far from a similarly roofed Howard Johnson restaurant. Rooms offered innovative amenities like silent-flush toilets, dual shower heads, bedside light switches, and a patio for every guest room. As automobile travel declined as a result of fuel shortages in the 1970’s, Howard Johnson's like many chains set up to catered to travelers, struggled. The restaurant and hotel divisions would eventually be split and sold off to new corporate parents. The restaurant brand is essentially dead today, though one restaurant in upstate New York uses the Howard Johnson name and erroneously claims to be the "Last one standing." Meanwhile, the hotel brand has bounced between numerous owners since 1979, each of whom neglected the brand to varying extents as its value slowly diminished. Wyndham owns the brand today. There were once around 500 Howard Johnson motor lodges in and around the US, while the brand was controlled by Howard D. Johnson, and later his son Howard B. Johnson, (It’s too bad he didn’t go by Howard Johnson Junior. They kids could have called him HoJoJu!) but following a series of ownership changes, the count of Howard Johnson Hotel locations today is around 331, few of which were originally built as Howard Johnson properties, not a major contrast from the 500 that once were in operation, but if you compare their location count to that of Holiday Inn, their largest competitor in the early days of motel chains the contrast is much greater, as there are nearly 1,200 Holiday Inn hotels open around the world today.

Signature Inn came on the scene just as Howard Johnson was beginning to fade. John Bontreger opened the first one in Indianapolis in 1981, and the chain grew throughout Indiana and surrounding states through the ‘80s and ‘90s. Signature Inns had distinctive architecture of their own, with a tall canopy leading to the main entrance to a lobby with a small atrium. The peaked roofs had a prominent rib running along the top throughout the building. Signs would be mounted on the outside of the rib and the top would house skylights. Many locations also featured an S-shaped pool. The chain fell on hard times not long after merging with Jameson Inns in 1999. Bankruptcy came in 2011, and by the close of 2012, the last of the Signature Inns had closed. The brand ended up in the hands of America’s Best Franchising, and they would go on to use the Signature Inn name on a few different hotels, but none are housed in purpose-built Signature Inn structures.

The Evansville Signature Inn was built in 1986, and became a Jameson Inn twenty years later. It was among the last of the chain to carry the Jameson brand when it became a Howard Johnson in 2012. It was one of a few businesses in Evansville I wanted to check out on my trip there a couple weeks ago, so I eschewed my normal Airbnb, and spent $79 plus tax for a room at the Howard Johnson instead. I had long been curious about the current brand image Wyndham is trying to cultivate for Howard Johnson, as it seems to lean heavily on the history of the brand, perhaps to attract nostalgic baby boomers who grew up dining and sleeping under the orange roof on family vacations. Marketing emphasizes rooms decorated with the classic orange and turquoise Howard Johnson color scheme with Midcentury Modern touches. This new nostalgic aesthetic Wyndham is trying to cultivate for the Howard Johnson brand, plus the prospect of visiting a former Signature Inn was simply too much for me to resist. 

There's no mistaking that roofline and canopy. This is an old Signature Inn.  

The outside of the building is still striking today, if a bit dated. 

From the outside, the Evansville Howard Johnson still looks much like it did in its Signature Inn days. The prominent roof, faded green in color is still there. The fact that it wasn’t painted orange during the Howard Johnson conversion felt like a missed opportunity. It was late afternoon when I checked in, slightly unnerved that the process involved signing a waiver absolving the hotel from responsibility should my belongings or vehicle be stolen or damaged on their property. Once I had my room key, I took a few minutes to appreciate the lobby, noting that minimal changes had been made. 

A group of Norwegian businessmen abruptly got up and left these tables shortly before I took this picture. 

The furniture, tile floors, and exposed wood ceilings all seemed to date back to the Jameson/Signature era. The skylight and vaulted ceiling extending from the canopy outside to the lobby atrium inside was a striking bit of vintage Signature Inn architecture. Only signage and a few strategically places swaths of orange and turquoise paint indicated the place was a Howard Johnson property now. The dining chairs in the breakfast area had been adorned with stretchy orange cloth covers in a hasty attempt to incorporate the corporate color scheme. On one wall, an enlarged Howard Johnson print ad from the 1950’s showed a family relaxing in a hotel room with a view of the pool and a Howard Johnson restaurant out the window, as if Wyndham is begging customers to remember what the brand used to be. 

 ˙ǝlʎʇs uᴉ ʞɔɐq ǝɯoɔ oʇ ƃuᴉoƃ sᴉ ǝʞᴉl noʎ uᴉɐɥɔ lǝʇoɥ ʇɐɥ┴ ˙sʍǝu pooƃ ʇoƃ ǝʌ,I

The ancient carpet looks especially out of place against the colorful door frames. 

I proceeded down the hallway toward my room, and noted that the guest room door frames had been painted in alternating shades of turquoise and orange. The funky color palette was incongruous with the surroundings however. The door frames seemed to clash with the blond wood of the doors themselves, and the busy baroque pattern on the carpet, both of which likely dated back to the Signature/Jameson days. Incongruous was a word that kept occurring to me once I was in my room as well. While the beds were against a turquoise accent wall, and were trimmed with matching turquoise runners, and there were some similarly funky lamps, mirrors, and artwork, all the furniture in the room seemed to be leftovers from the Jameson/Signature days. Their neoclassical aesthetic clashed with the newer furnishings in the room, and served to highlight how cheaply the rooms had been updated. During the conversion, a single wall had been painted, a few things were hung on the wall, some colorful cloth was thrown on the bed, and some lamps were replaced. Anything heavy or expensive was left where it was. I was disappointed, but not surprised. Hotels at this price point rarely invest significantly in the rooms beyond basic upkeep, if that. It was clear the room was meant to look good when photographed from one specific angle, which was the angle used for room pictures on the booking websites. Once in the room, it was obvious that it was a thrown-together mess. 

The room looks fun, fresh, and funky from this angle...

...but rotate 90 degrees, and you'll find some tired furniture...

...and old carpet that doesn't match the rest of the room. 

I had the strangest urge to headbutt this mirror. 

For all its aesthetic faults, the room did manage to tick many modern hotel boxes. The bed was comfortable. The TV was modern with more than enough channels, and the WiFi worked well. My main complaint about the place is with the staff. My room was across the hall from the laundry room where the housekeeping staff washes the linens, and they were at work, playing loud music and having boisterous, argumentative conversations until well after dark, all of which were perfectly audible in my room. Around the time they finished up and went home, my neighbors began having a loud argument of their own that didn’t subside until past midnight. When I called the front desk to complain about the noise, nothing was done despite the clerk's assurances otherwise. 

She's deactivated; Wrapped in plastic!

Guest safety also appeared to be of minimal concern as well. When I entered my room, a clear plastic trash bag had been placed over the smoke detector, presumably so some previous guest could vape in the room without worry of setting it off. Housekeeping had neglected to remove it, creating a potential safety issue. Likewise, when I went outside to check out the S-shaped pool (It was drained and the gate was locked. It’s still pretty chilly in Southern Indiana in early spring.) I noted the card reader on the side entrance to the building was broken, but the door had been propped open with a small rock, allowing anyone wandering by to enter the building undetected. 

"I've gotten all new drapes for my hotel room. Ed bought them for me yesterday at Gentleman Jim's."

Between the noise, worries about safety, and a barely functional in-room HVAC unit, I managed about three hours of sleep during my time in my hotel room. When I did manage to drift off, I had strange dreams involving a little man in a red suit slowly dancing while seeming to talk backwards. Weirdly, I understood every word he said. When I checked out the next day, there was no manager present for me to make aware of the issues I’d had. I left a list of complaints with the desk clerk, but it seems as likely as not that it went in the trash. I held off putting on my red-framed glasses on, clutching my laptop to my chest, and informing her that one day, my blog would have something to say about this. My blog saw something that night. (Ask it!)

During the heyday of the Howard Johnson brand, as well as the Signature Inn brand, a high emphasis was placed on customer satisfaction and guest comfort. Efforts were made to keep the experience between locations consistent and positive. In the low to mid priced hotel segment, that emphasis has slowly eroded away. For many large hotel companies, including Wyndham, franchising has become an increasingly lucrative revenue stream, and as a result, it has become increasingly advantageous for the company to keep franchisees, regardless of whether their properties meet basic standards to carry their brand. Many hotel companies, Wyndham included, own the rights to multiple hotel brands, arranged in a hierarchical structure of price points. When a franchised location no longer meets the standards of the high-priced Brand X, the parent company merely offers them a franchise agreement under the lower-priced Brand Y rather than forcing them to clean up their act, allowing the hotel owner to continue to operate as part of a well-known chain, and allowing the company to continue to collect franchise fees. It’s win-win. The only loser is the customer. Howard Johnson’s is at the low end of Wyndham’s brand portfolio, meaning it’s squarely in Brand Z territory, which would probably explain my disappointing, but in retrospect not surprising experience.

My brief stay at the Evansville Howard Johnson, formerly Signature Inn, was emblematic of problems with the hotel industry as a whole. Once storied and respected brands are now being used to allow franchised operators to run glorified flophouses under the flag of a national brand, often resting on the laurels of that brand's former glory There are still decent budget-priced chain hotels out there, but in today’s hotel market, cheap hotels run the gamut from generally acceptable to uninhabitable. For the foreseeable future, I’ll stick to Airbnb when I’m travelling, looking for a clean place, reasonably priced, as they tend to be acceptable to excellent for much less money, thereby freeing up resources for me to travel to more broken chains, and to continue my quest to find perfect cup of coffee and slice of cherry pie. 

The Captain's Side Hustle

G.D. Ritzy's is my favorite restaurant, and Evansville is home to my favorite G.D. Ritzy's locations.

I may not be the world’s biggest G.D. Ritzy’s fan, but I like to think I’m at least in the top five. Around this time last year, I went on a four day road trip to dine at every operating location. I have a G.D. Ritzy’s logo tattooed on my right arm. In the past 12 months, I’ve traveled from Metro Detroit to the farthest corner of Indiana no fewer than four times for the sole purpose of dining at my favorite three Ritzy’s locations in Evansville. I had long known that the trio of Ritzy’s locations in Evansville were the absolute best thing the town had to offer, but I only recently realized that they were better than everything else in town by such a considerable margin.

I spent a good chunk of this past weekend in Evansville checking out a few other places that struck my interest in addition to making a few obligatory visits to Ritzy’s. My experience led me to the realization that Ritzy’s long term success in Evansville in the face of the closure of nearly all the 120 or so other locations nearly 30 year ago was propelled by the ineptitude of the other businesses in town.

That’s not to say that Ritzy’s is in any way mediocre. I’ve visited every operating Ritzy’s at least once, and have always been rewarded with a transcendentally excellent fast food experience. But when every competing business in town aspires to mediocrity, a place like Ritzy’s that aspires to perfection and seldom falls short, shines all the more. 

After swapping emails with my unofficial lead location scout MapCat, I got curious about a restaurant chain called Grandy’s, the second best known fried chicken chain founded by a man named Sanders. Rex E. Sanders, (no relation) and Walter E. Johnson opened the first Grandy’s in Dallas in 1972. In 1983, the company was bought out by Saga Foods, who grew Grandy’s to a 200 unit chain. A series of buyouts, bankruptcies, and general turmoil of the next three decades left Grandy’s owned by Captain D’s. Their presence is significantly diminished today, with 40 locations open, the vast majority of which are in and around Dallas and Oklahoma City. Outside of Texas and Oklahoma, the largest concentration of Grandy’s locations is in southwestern Indiana and northwestern Kentucky with five locations in the area. I used these locations as an excuse to make my first trip to Evansville of 2019 to get my quarterly Ritzy’s fix and to check out Grandy’s.

I'm looking forward to eating at this particular Captain D's again. 

Grandy’s corporate parent, Captain D’s is a brand that I hadn’t had an experience with in the past 15 years or so. While not a broken chain, they’re definitely regional, and I had spent little time in their operating territory since I left Kentucky in 2004. As luck would have it, I would be passing right by the Defiance, Ohio Captain D’s on my way to Evansville. I stopped in for dinner with moderate expectations. The fast food seafood segment in general is waning in popularity, and my local Long John Silver's locations that haven’t closed are looking pretty long in the tooth. Captain D’s completely took me by surprise, though. The older building had been thoroughly renovated. The staff was courteous and helpful, and my food came out quickly, and was hot and fresh. I left with a much higher opinion of Captain D’s and with greater anticipation of experiencing their sister brand, Grandy’s. 

Grandy's buildings seem to be beige rectangles. 

Meal #1
Location: Grandy's, 2005 US Highway 41, Henderson, Kentucky
Order: Two piece dark meat fried chicken meal with baked beans and coleslaw, (allegedly) sweet tea

"Y'all want some chicken? I got me a whole mess of chicken in this here caterin' van!"

The next day, I drove straight through Evansville to the Henderson, Kentucky Grandy’s. I had checked the menu out before and knew exactly what I wanted. As I walked through the parking lot, past the dilapidated catering van, and in the front door to the order counter, I found the floor was noticeably sticky to the point that I had mild concern that I might lose a shoe. There was no line, and the lone cashier waved me over. I ordered up a two piece dark meat meal, and as if I was Betelgeuse, ordering a burger and fries from the first McDonald’s in The Founder, my order arrived at the counter just as I finished paying. I was taken aback by this, just as Johnny Dangerously had been at McDonald’s, but most fried chicken places tend to fry up large batches in advance and keep them warm, so it wasn’t terribly unusual for this type of place. KFC and Popeyes operate similarly. 

The chicken could have been more fresh and better seasoned, but this wasn't a bad meal. 

Since I had just crossed the Ohio River from Indiana into Kentucky, and was technically in the south, I filled my cup with sweet tea, and sat down in the brightly lit, but generally nondescript dining room. I was surprised to see my meal had come with a yeasty roll rather than a biscuit, but even KFC started out selling similar rolls, and it tasted pretty good when covered with the nondairy buttery spread and packet of honey-flavored corn syrup that came with my meal. Additionally, I was excited to see baked beans on the menu. Not only were they tasty, but they took me back to the good old days when every KFC in every town in America would sell you a Styrofoam cup of the Musical Fruit with your chicken. Sadly, KFC stopped selling baked beans years ago, but these Grandy's beans tasted similar and took me right back to my bean-eating glory days. Additionally, the coleslaw was above average with a tangy sauce coating nicely chunky pieces of cabbage. The chicken on the other hand, reminded me of the fried chicken I'd had in Wisconsin at the last operating Red Barn. 

The beige theme continues inside. 

I've never really met a piece of fried chicken I didn't like. It's one of those foods that's still pretty good, even when prepared badly. As with my trip to Red Barn, I visited this Grandy's at a not terribly busy time of day, thanks to my appetite not adjusting to a new time zone, and as a result, the chicken seemed to have been sitting for a while. It was a little soggy and not terribly warm. It was also under seasoned, without much in the way of flavor. In a fast food segment that's all about seasoning, whether it's Popeyes spicy chicken, The Colonel's famous 11 herbs and spices, or the 21 herbs and spices at Florida's own Maryland Fried Chicken, it's all about the seasoning in the chicken business. Grandy's, on the other hand, lets the natural flavors of the bird parts and breading speak for themselves, and they don't have much to say. To make matters worse, my sweet tea wasn't nearly sweet enough. I chalk that up to the fact I was just barely in Kentucky, nearly within sight of the bridge that led back into Indiana. I'll give Grandy's the benefit of the doubt, and assume that their more southern locations have sweeter tea. 

More like unsweetened and extra-unsweetened. 

I got up from my table, not feeling underwhelmed, but definitely not overwhelmed by my inaugural Grandy's experience. I was merely whelmed by the Henderson Grandy's, but I thought that Grandy's may have a trick or two up their proverbial sleeve yet. Unlike the big fried chicken chains, Grandy's has a breakfast menu. Following my lunch stop at Grandy's, a second lunch at G.D. Ritzy's, and dinner at a different G.D. Ritzy's, I spent the night in Evansville, and stopped by their Grandy's for breakfast on my way out of town.

Meal #2
Location: Grandy's 722 Landbridge Way, Evansville, Indiana
Order: Deluxe Biscuit with sausage, Sinnamon® Roll, Sweet(er) Tea

After spending a not at all restful night in an Evansville hotel, I really needed to cheer myself up with a good breakfast, and my hopes were high as I walked up to the order counter of the Evansville Grandy's. As I studied the menu board, a lone employee darted from the kitchen and drive thru window repeatedly, apologizing and assuring me she'd be right with me every time she passed, the longer I waited, the more apparent it became that she was running the entire place alone, an impressive feat of fastfoodsmanship. 

Menu boards were nicely printed and reasonably modern, if a little busy. 

Once the lone employee had the opportunity to devote the majority of her attention to me, I ordered, and she took my money. From there, I saw panic in her eyes. She yelled to some unseen and/or nonexistent coworker regarding what came on a deluxe biscuit. When she received no response, she turned to me and posed the same question. I replied that I wasn't sure, as I had never eaten breakfast at Grandy's before, but suggested that the picture of the sandwich in question on the menu board behind her showed what appeared to be sausage, egg, and cheese. Relieved, she studied the menu board, and assembled my order from the serving trays behind her as I filled my cup with almost passably sweet tea. I thanked the lone Grandy's employee as she was helping another customer. I overheard her mentioning that all of her coworkers were out back smoking. That turned out to be not quite true, however, as when I rounded the corner into the lobby, another employee seemed to be deeply engaged in friendly conversation with a regular customer while her coworker struggled to keep things running smoothly behind the counter. 

"No time to take the chairs off the tables. We've all got to take a smoke break!"

It was with a combination of amazement that the woman I had dealt with was running the entire place and profound annoyance at her less than esteemed colleagues' collective lack of work ethic, that I found my way to one of the tables that didn't still have chairs still stacked on it, and examined my order. Indeed, my breakfast sandwich had sausage, egg, and cheese on it, but the lone working Grandy's employee who assembled it, obviously overwhelmed by her workload and unfamiliar with the food preparation process had put it on a bun rather than a biscuit. I couldn't fault her for this, as she was doing about as good a job as could be expected given that her coworkers didn't seem to be doing any jobs at all. Still, the bun was too large for the egg and sausage patty, cold, untoasted, and dry. I ate two bites before giving up on it. I didn't have the heart to go back to the order counter to complain to the poor overworked woman single-handedly running the whole joint. 

That's a funny looking biscuit. 

I moved on to the Sinnamon® roll, and found it to be unique among fast food cinnamon rolls in that it contained both nuts and raisins. I don't have a problem with either when they're used properly in baked goods. The confection was enrobed in a sticky glaze, so I cut off a piece with a knife and extracted it with a fork. Unsurprisingly, it was room temperature, which was a shame. I didn't expect it to be freshly baked, but some time under a heat lamp or 20 seconds in the microwave would have enhanced my enjoyment of the Sinnamon® roll tenfold, but at room temperature, eating a pastry proclaiming itself to be sinful hardly seemed worth the risk of eternal damnation. Like the breakfast sandwich, I gave up after two bites, and dumped my tray in the trash. 

A little bit of thermal energy would drastically improve this thing. 

Like most of my non-Ritzy's stops this trip, Grandy's was a bit of a letdown. With its mostly fried menu, of foods that unabashedly aren't prepared fresh, the concept generally feels dated, and the locations I visited were unattractive, poorly maintained, and understaffed. These experiences stand in stark contrast to my meal at a location of Grandy's corporate sibling, Captain D's, which was stellar. If Captain D's corporate has any hope of keeping the Kentucky and Indiana Grandy's locations open in the short term, they need to motivate the franchisee who owns the locations I visited to operate more like the exceptional Captain D's I encountered in Ohio. If they want Grandy's to succeed and thrive in the long term, then they should look at modernizing the overall look, feel, and taste of Grandy's. They seem to have done a great job of doing just that with the Captain D's brand. It's all a question of how many resources they want to sink into reviving Grandy's. 

As for me, I now know for sure that G.D. Ritzy's is the only Evansville-based business worth patronizing. While in town checking out other previously unexplored businesses, I had a couple of other horrific transactions in addition to the one at Grandy's. At the risk of putting too much negativity into the world, expect my next couple of posts to be about the horrors that awaited me at other non-Ritzy's businesses in Evansville, Indiana. 

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Pop and Sizzle

The back of a customer comment card I swiped from one of the Evansville, Indiana G.D. Ritzy's contains the following copy:

“A visit back to the old-time goodness of G.D. Ritzy’s is deliciously special indeed.

G.D. Ritzy’s Award-Winning Luxury Ice Creams, voted one of the 4 best ice creams in America are created with dairy-fresh cream and milk, pure cane sugar, egg yolks and bursting with beboppin’ goodness.

G.D. Rity’s Grilled Coney Dogs are 100% pure beef and pop with every juicy bite.

Our 1940s Style Hamburgers are grilled right before your eyes. Shaped and seared on our extra-hot grill, they’re served crisp on the edges and tender in the middle.

And G.D. Ritzy’s Slow Cooked, Secret Recipe Chili. A rich tomato stock blended with chunks of sauteed beef, a delicate blend of spices, and the finest, freshest toppings.

It’s all a delicious Part of G.D. Ritzy’s Luxury Grill & Ice Creams.

G.D. Ritzy’s Has What The Other’s Have Not ..

Pop Sizzle & Bebop”

About half of the places that I write about, I’m experiencing for the first time. When I walk into a Roy Rogers, Ollie’s Trolley, or Arthur Treacher’s, I like to think that I can assess the establishment’s merits and shortcomings in a more or less objective way. I never intended to become an amateur restaurant critic. Instead, I set out to experience and document often overlooked pieces of history. But somewhere along the way, I fell into a groove of jabbing gently, and occasionally not so gently, at the foibles of the anachronistic businesses I patronize. It’s easy to be witty when you’re talking about a suboptimal dining experience, but difficult to make a post praising an establishment an engaging read. With little to no emotional skin in the game I feel little to no remorse skewering the places where my experience was less than perfect. Understand that I’m not sharing this information as a preamble to turning over a new leaf. I’m sure that I’ll continue to lambaste the occasional eatery, and even more occasional retail establishment, provided that I have sufficient emotional distance to maintain objectivity, but if there’s one chain I lack emotional distance from, it’s G.D. Ritzy’s.

G.D. Ritzy’s was hands down my favorite place to eat as a kid, and it’s sudden disappearance and subsequent long absence from my life made my heart and stomach grow fonder. Some of the earliest road trips that helped me discover my passion for forgotten fast food over a decade ago were to the holdout G.D. Ritzy’s locations in Indiana and Kentucky. It was a trip to the Huntington, West Virginia G.D. Ritzy’s last December that served, partially, as my inspiration to start this very blog. Earlier this year, I made a pilgrimage to every operating G.D. Ritzy’s location that culminated in me meeting chain founder Graydon Webb, who was working with his sons and a family friend to open a new Ritzy’s, the first in its one-time core market of Ohio and surrounding states to open since 1990. Last week, that new Ritzy’s opened. I drove down to Columbus to have lunch there on its fourth full day in operation, not fully realizing my closeness to the Ritzy’s brand would make the experience exceedingly difficult to recount here.

The previous weekend, I was travelling through southern Indiana, and made the obligatory stop at the University Boulevard G.D. Ritzy’s in Evansville for lunch. The six surviving franchised Ritzy’s are owned by three separate longtime franchisees, and while each franchisee’s locations have evolved a bit over the years and all have their own individual charms, the Evansville locations are my favorite. Their buildings, menus, food, furniture, even cups and tray liners, are all identical to the long-gone Lexington, Kentucky Ritzy’s locations of my childhood. Nostalgia is a powerful thing, powerful enough to draw me 450 miles from my home to Evansville for the sole purpose of eating at Ritzy’s no fewer than three times this year. (I’ve also been to the two Owensboro, Kentucky Ritzy’s one time each, and the Huntington, West Virginia G.D. Ritzy’s three times in the past ten months.) My secondary motivation for the stopping there, a distant second from nostalgia, was to have a fresh memory of my favorite Ritzy’s when I ate at the new location the following weekend. I had no doubt that the new Ritzy’s, while updated a bit from the original concept, would still have the same pop, sizzle, and bebop as my favorite locations in Evansville, but I thought it might be fun to compare the new Ritzy’s to the old. I figured it would be a unique angle. People would be flocking to the newly opened and long anticipated Columbus Ritzy’s, and the Evansville G.D. Ritzy’s locations are as popular as ever, but very few people, perhaps only me, would have been to both within a week, and all the other Ritzy’s in operation in the past six months. Every experience I’d had in the old Ritzy’s from Indiana to West Virginia had always been stellar. Why wouldn’t a shiny new Ritzy’s run by the founding family be any different?

An unforgettable luncheon in Evansville.

The new Ritzy's in Columbus, Ohio

At this point, you, the reader, are probably thinking that I’ve led you to some lofty precipice so that I, the author, may shove you over the edge in a dramatic reveal about some abysmal experience I had at the new Ritzy’s. I can assure you that said precipice is no more than an inch and a half drop. Congratulations. You’ve reached the anticlimax of this post. All things considered, my experience at the new Ritzy’s was pretty good. Given that the place, at that point, had been open for business for three full days with brand new staff, and that droves of nostalgic locals (and not so locals) had been lining up out the door from open to close for each of those three days my experience was more than satisfactory. Still, I left after my meal feeling vaguely disappointed. Some hard reflection has helped me realize that this disappointment is my own fault and not the fault of the new Ritzy’s.

The main focus of Broken Chains has been longtime holdouts of otherwise defunct chains. My exploration of decades-old businesses left me ill-prepared to fairly evaluate a place that had been open for half a week. My lifelong love for the G.D. Ritzy’s brand, and past exemplary experience at more seasoned Ritzy’s locations left me with expectations far too high to give the new Ritzy’s a fair shake. When you’re used to A++ experiences, an A- can be tough to cope with at first. 

I’m not even going to discuss the specific shortcomings of my experience at the new Ritzy’s. All you need to know is they’ve got the pop and sizzle, but the bebop needs work. I have no doubt that they’ll master said bebop in good time. To discuss the minor imperfections of my experience at the fledgling restaurant in detail would be picking the proverbial nit. I’ll admit to having nitpicked in previous blog posts, and I’ll continue to nitpick in future ones, but I have way too many emotions tied up in G.D. Ritzy’s to be give it the same treatment. I never set out to be a critic, and there are certain things that I can’t bring myself to criticize. 

Luxury Grills and Economy Cars Part 2

My younger brother was born just as the Ritzy's near us were closing up shop for good. As a result, he had no recollection of ever eating there. I doubt he ever had. Thankfully, he had business in Evansville that involved the acquisition of a new-to-him '91 Ford Festiva, and we were able to meet for lunch at the one Evansville G.D. Ritzy's I had not yet visited. Today's lunch at G.D. Ritzy's with my brother, his partner, and a couple of Festivas was one of my favorite meals in recent history. Afterward, my brother headed home in his new Festiva, and I headed to Owensboro, Kentucky to eat at two more Ritzy's. My lunch guests both thoroughly enjoyed their first G.D. Ritzy's experience. The Festivas, I hope, didn't leak too much oil in the parking lot. All three Evansville stores are beautifully run and thriving. They've really taken the concept and run with it.

Meal #1
Location: G.D. Ritzy's 601 North Green River Road, Evansville, Indiana
Order: Chili cheese coney, fries, Diet Mountain Dew, single scoop of Swiss chocolate almond ice cream in a sugar cone.

This particular G.D. Ritzy's has an extra large dining room, with a curved window at its curved corner. The building has definitely always been a Ritzy's though. Its interior, like the other two Evansville locations is an impeccably maintained time capsule. We're here at high noon on Saturday, and It's busy. People are lined up to the door. Still, the service is quick, the staff is friendly, and the food is fresh and delicious. When I go up to the counter to order ice cream, the cashier compliments the two Festivas we had driven over.

Evansville's largest G.D. Ritzy's, with more curved glass than an AMC Pacer

I need to organize a full-blown Festiva meet at the at one of the Evansville G.D. Ritzy's one of these days. 

Best fast food restaurant decor ever. 

Meal #2
Location: Ritzy's 4925 Frederica Street, Owensboro, Kentucky
Order: Single Cheeseburger, fries, lemonade, single scoop of Kentucky pecan pie fudge ice cream.

The Owensboro Ritzy's, are just called Ritzy's, as many of the later locations were. The building and signage have a different color scheme and different interior, but the basic building design is the same as the two Evansville locations I visited on the previous day. A couple sources I've spoken to have said the Owensboro Ritzy's were among the last to open prior to widespread closures in the early '90s. The building feels like an attempt to improve the original design. The dining area is not elevated. The floor tiles are square and are arranged in a black and white checkerboard pattern. There are no teardrop speakers on the walls. Menu boards have been updated, and there's a self-service drink station, unlike the Evansville restaurants. None of this is inherently bad, but the childhood nostalgia vibes aren't as strong here. I don't bother taking many pictures, though seeing a second-generation Ritzy's is interesting. The food is identical to that of the Evansville locations, and prepared just as well. This location has baked potatoes on the menu. Unlike in Evansville, the staff is wearing Ritzy's-branded apparel, but no old-timey soda jerk paper hats.

This building has the later-style signage, red awnings instead of green, and a sweet red racing stripe.

The building had the stainless railings with the monogrammed glass panes on the outside as well as on the inside.

Meal #3
Location: Ritzy's 4527 KY-54, Owensboro, KY
Order: Luxury PB&J, sweet tea, single scoop vanilla ice cream

I'm feeling the two lunches I've had in the past two hours, and a PB&J and some ice cream is all I have room for. This location has none of the signature Ritzy's architectural touches, other than the three sided sign out front. I suspect it was originally something else. It has the same owner as the other Ritzy's across town, and the menu and decor are identical. The PB&J here tastes even better than the one I had in Evansville. I've eaten a lot of Ritzy's ice cream in the past couple of days, and it's all been great. This vanilla may be my favorite though. I'm not sure what that says about my personality, but Ritzy's definitely makes a good, clean-tasting vanilla.

Meal #4
Location:  G.D. Ritzy's 601 North Green River Road, Evansville, Indiana
Order: Double Ritz with cheese, steamed mixed vegetables, Diet Mountain Dew, double scoop Banana Supreme ice cream.

I went back to the Green River Road Ritzy's for a late dinner, mainly because I knew I'd be hungry at midnight if I didn't eat something at 8 PM. Plus I wanted to try the Banana Supreme ice cream. It has ribbons of dulce de leche and bits of sponge cake in it. It reminds me of eating a banana Twinkie in a good way. It's even better than the vanilla. Ritzy's shoestring fries are my favorite fries, but I'd had them twice today, so I went with steamed vegetables, an option G.D. Ritzy's has offered since the eighties, as my side. It was a good decision. I wish more fast food joints had a steamed vegetable side dish option.

G.D. Ritzy's After Dark

The steamed vegetables justified the big pile of ice cream I ate immediately after.