The Red Arrow Diner - 19

Date: 9/25/10

Restaurant: Red Arrow Diner   
Address: 63 Union Square   
City: Milford   
Phone: 249-9222

Web site: www.redarrowdiner.com   

Breakfast Hours: 24/7       

The day after Sven and I went to the Red Arrow Diner a friend of mine took me out for a belated birthday brunch. If you are ever in the Greenfield, MA area and are looking for some really good food, check out Hope & Olive. Out-of-this-world delicious! Well, thanks to Sarah and Hope & Olive, I was able to forget about my food experience at the Red Arrow.

Eggs **
Underdone. 
       
   
Potatoes *
Kind: Home Fries
Terrible. No seasoning of any kind. Way underdone even after Sven requested that they be cooked well done. Why doesn't anyone get it? It is baffling.   
   
Toast *
Kind: Sven - Cinnamon Raisin, Olga - Wheat   
Homemade? No
Tasted as though it had been pre-toasted and then just sat around waiting for someone to order it. The slices were tiny, cold, dry (even though it had been buttered) and kind of spongy.
  
   
SERVER RECOMMENDATION
Our server wasn't very helpful with recommendations. All she did was point out the "Queen's" breakfast, which basically consisted of eggs, meat, pancakes or french toast, potatoes... that kind of thing.   

Red Arrow Omelet w/some sort of "cheese" sauce.

SVEN'S BREAKFAST * Red Arrow Omelet w/Pan Fries and Toast
The omelet consisted of ham (which was pretty good...oven-cooked, not canned), mushrooms (fresh), onions, green peppers, tomatoes and cheddar. The omelet came with a "cheese" sauce on the top. We aren't sure if this is what they were calling the "cheddar". It was kind of gross. Basically it just wasn't good.

Veggie Hashbrown Special = blah

OLGA'S BREAKFAST ** Veggie Hashbrown Special with 2 Eggs and Toast
The hasbrowns were undercooked. There were a few crispy pieces, but not many. The vegetables were decent and it was blanketed with cheddar. Real cheese, not the sauce like on Sven's. The eggs, which I ordered over-easy, were underdone. The toast was horrible. There was absolutely no flavor to the meal. I kept adding more and more salt, hoping for just a little bit of flavor to hit my tongue.

SERVICE ****
Other than having to ask twice for water (a big pet peeve of mine) they got the job done.

DECOR ****
The outside of the diner was really cool looking. The inside would have been much better if were able to see beyond all the marketing graphics. It seemed too commercial, which took away from the uniqueness of a diner.
   
NOTES
It was busy, lively place. The was quite a bit of franchise and merchandise promotion, which along with all the graphics, and the bad food left us feeling pretty disappointed about the place. However, we were SO happy to be having breakfast together, that it just didn't matter!

SVEN'S TAKE    

So, Olga and I went to the Red Arrow Diner — did you know you can buy a franchise for this place? The diner used to be a real authentic local place to eat, and then it was purchased by the original Red Arrow Diner in Manchester, NH as the first franchise expansion. Apparently this place is frequented by Adam Sandler, and you can actually get a franchise. The menu looked enticing, especially the part where they tell you that you can get a franchise. I guess anyone can eat here, and you can just purchase a plate of eggs and potatoes and bacon; but if you want to get a whole restaurant out of the deal, they are more than willing to sell you a franchise. The food sucked, but I hear the franchise opportunity is really amazing. Our breakfast was a little more expensive than I would have expected from a local place, but not as expensive as buying the whole franchise. Do you think all of this talk about franchise opportunities is annoying? So did Sven and Olga.    
    
    
    
    
   

Shyrl's Diner - 18

Date: 9/4/10

Restaurant: Shyrl's Diner  
Address: 31 Main Street  
City: West Lebanon  
Phone: 298-6918

It's been a little bit since we ate at Shyrl's. Sven and I took off for Swan's Island, ME before I was able to post our most recent breakfast. Our breakfast at Shyrl's was pretty memorable, so hopefully I will be able to do it justice here.

After a couple weeks of being able to order whatever we wanted, it was kind of funny that we both were sort of in the mood for a "standard". So  this week we were back to our old routine. It was kind of nice.

STANDARD - 2 eggs OE, potatoes, bacon, toast

Eggs *****
Perfect.         
  

Potatoes ***
Kind: Homefries. These are getting a strong 3. Some of them were actually crisp! Came with optional onions. They were cooked, but not mushy. These potatoes were alright! Thought about giving them a higher rating because of the awful potatoes we have had thus far, but I had to remind Sven that we needed to hold on to our standards. The day we find potatoes that are a 5... well, we may just have to quit after that.        


Toast *****
Kind: Wheat  
Homemade? Yes.
It was only 10¢ more for homemade toast, which just seems silly to me, but man, look at that toast! It was a beautiful thing... thick, crispy on the outside and fluffy.
      

Bacon **
Overdone. A couple bites were chewy, but the rest was dry and crunchy.
  
 
  
SERVER RECOMMENDATION
We asked our server what her favorite breakfast was and what she recommended. She told us she didn't eat breakfast and just read the specials off the "specials board" which we could read quite clearly from where we were sitting.
  

SPECIAL **** Banana Bread French Toast w/2 Bacon and 2 Sausage
Great flavor that lingered. The portion was the perfect size. The greatest part was that a pint-size container of REAL maple syrup was placed on the table at no extra charge. No dinky little cup of syrup...I think I used half of that pint!

SERVICE ***
We are giving our server a 2 for personality and a 4 for service. She got the job done, but had absolutely no spunk.  
     
      
DECOR ****  
A definite breakfast place with counter seating as well as tables. The walls were bead board painted brown with yellow and green accents. There were framed, cross stitched trite sayings, photos of older women and pictures of flowers on the walls. There were a number of vases of fake flowers around as well.
      
    
  
NOTES
Not sure if it was our arrival at such and early hour, but the place was filled with elderly folk. The place was busy the whole time we were there and I noticed a few tables of younger people on our way out. There was a broad age range of the folks working there. Some seemed to have a bit of spunk, but we didn't get to experience that first hand.

SVEN'S TAKE    
    
    
    
    
    
 

Peterborough Diner - 17

Date: 8/28/10

Restaurant: Peterborough Diner   
Address: 10 Depot St.   
City: Peterborough   
Phone: 603-924-6710

Web site: www.peterboroughdiner.com   

Breakfast Hours: 6-noon M-F, 7-8 Sat & Sun.       

Potatoes *
Kind: Home fries. Horrible. Seriously, look at this...

You may not be able to tell from the picture, but they were crunchy. Not from being sufficiently cooked on the griddle, but because they were raw! I would like to say that it is starting to get humorous that NO ONE can cook good home fries, but really, this isn't a laughing matter.
       
Toast ****
Kind: Multigrain   
Homemade? N
Even though this bread was not homemade, it was pretty great. It was thick cut, nicely toasted and big. It was way too big for the breakfast sandwich, so I ate one slice with the sandwich stuff and one slice with strawberry jam. I would have to say that the toast was the best part of the breakfast. 

       
Bacon *
Overdone and dry. There was zero moisture, not a speck of grease. He thinks it was either cooked in the microwave (to death) or it spent the night in a food dehydrator.
   
SERVER RECOMMENDATION
Omelets and breakfast sandwiches.

      
   
SVEN'S BREAKFAST: *, **, ***   1,2,3 (1 egg, 2 bacon, 3 french toast)
See "Sven's Take" below.

OLGA'S BREAKFAST *** Breakfast Sandwich
One egg over medium on multigrain bread with cheddar and sausage. The bread was great, the egg was fine, the sausage was decent. The bread was big enough to accommodate two eggs and it would have been better if the cheese had been fully melted. The potatoes... well you already know about the potatoes.

SERVICE ***
Our server was sweet. She was a little flustered at first due to a broken juice machine. We were the first ones to arrive, right at opening, and even though she was trying to deal with the juice problem she was able to answer, or find out answers, to our questions. She definitely put forth a good effort.        
    
   

DECOR ****
This was a great classic diner car. Photos of old cars hung on the walls. It wasn't quite as decked out at the Tumble Inn, but it was pretty great. I large outdoor seating area gives the place even more curb appeal!    


NOTES
The place was pretty quiet, but it was pretty early. The people who did show up while we were there were mostly old men who seemed to be regulars of the place.

SVEN'S TAKE
This is just the kind of place I love to eat at. According to their website, the core of the restaurant is a 1950 Worcester Lunch Car, in a very groovy dark green and cream color scheme. It sits right in the center of Peterborough, with a big parking lot, and about a dozen picnic tables available for outside dining. In typical New England fashion, the years have brought more than a few additions to the place. Case in point: walk through the kitchen and say "Hi" to the cook on your way to the boat-like bathrooms jutting out into the back parking lot.

The food here (and the service) were just OK; but honestly it didn't detract much from the experience. I ordered up the appropriately named "1-2-3" --"appropriately" not because it included 1 egg, 2 pieces of bacon, and 3 pieces of French toast; but rather because the bacon earned 1 star, the egg got a generous 2 stars, and the French toast got a middle-of-the-road 3 stars. The bacon was something: easily taking the title for the driest bacon I have had in the past decade. In fact, I felt a little like an archaeologist handling a delicate old fossil as I tried to gingerly lift the bacon and move it towards my mouth without having it fall apart under its own weight. The one egg I had was comically tiny, but good nonetheless. The French toast was actually awesome, with plenty of cinnamon and a generous helping of maple syrup. It might have been worth 4 stars, but I docked it for the cold plate it was served on (and cold syrup, to boot); and frankly just to deliver some poetic justice.

While eating there, I was reminded of a story from my college days. I want to caution that this story has NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with the Peterborough Diner, other than the fact that they had an out-of-order Vitality Juice machine. Long ago and in a different state, I had a friend who worked in the cafeteria at Boston College. While he was working there, they began to have trouble with the Vitality Juice machine delivering less and less flow. They cleaned it, looked at it, did some standard maintenance to it, but couldn't figure out what was  wrong with it. So they called in the Vitality Juice man. He came in, took the machine apart, and came to a filter screen that was only accessible by taking the machine apart. All the juice flows through that screen. That screen had become completely, entirely clogged with . . . hold your breath . . . dead cockroaches. No kidding. And what is worse is that my friend reported they were meticulous about cleaning the counters every night with bleach. By his estimation it was one of the cleaner kitchens he had worked in. In any event, suffice it to say that I don't drink Vitality Juice or any other cafeteria juice for that matter. So I wasn't too disappointed that the Peterborough Diner's machine was on the fritz.