Burton's Sunnybrook Restaurant
The main story on the front page of the Sunday Gazette-Times (or the Mid-Valley whatchamacallit combined version of the Albany Democrat-Herald and the GT) is about Burton's Sunnybrook Restaurant closing after some 80 years of operation, the last 38 years or so under the Burton's banner.
I know what it means to have a place* -- a restaurant where the waiters remember you, where there are often familiar faces at the neighboring tables, where the food is comfortably familiar. For many people, Burton's was that place. For me? No way. In fact, I have a hard time believing that anyone under 50 actually liked the food there, unless they were drunk or too hungover to focus. A third of reviewers apparently agrees (granted, the sample size is small).
The food was really pretty awful. I hear the pies were the exception, so to be fair, I will clarify that I have never tasted pie at Burton's. I never bothered sticking around for dessert, because the main course was consistently lousy. I have eaten there probably five times over the past decade, always at the request of someone else. Every single time, without fail, the waitstaff treated us with impatience and mild scorn and the food was overcooked and bland, not even in that excusably passable way that most classic diners squeak by with time after time. But old people apparently eat there all the time. Perhaps once your tastebuds start their inevitable decline, once your hair starts showing silvery strands and you show up in patterned polyester pant suits, the bitter serving staff will be kind and respectful and the food won't taste like shoes. Maybe.
*My place would have to be El Tapatio, in the Albertson's shopping center. It's not gourmet cuisine, but the enchiladas are always decent and the servers remember us enough to know we want extra salsa without having to ask.
I know what it means to have a place* -- a restaurant where the waiters remember you, where there are often familiar faces at the neighboring tables, where the food is comfortably familiar. For many people, Burton's was that place. For me? No way. In fact, I have a hard time believing that anyone under 50 actually liked the food there, unless they were drunk or too hungover to focus. A third of reviewers apparently agrees (granted, the sample size is small).
The food was really pretty awful. I hear the pies were the exception, so to be fair, I will clarify that I have never tasted pie at Burton's. I never bothered sticking around for dessert, because the main course was consistently lousy. I have eaten there probably five times over the past decade, always at the request of someone else. Every single time, without fail, the waitstaff treated us with impatience and mild scorn and the food was overcooked and bland, not even in that excusably passable way that most classic diners squeak by with time after time. But old people apparently eat there all the time. Perhaps once your tastebuds start their inevitable decline, once your hair starts showing silvery strands and you show up in patterned polyester pant suits, the bitter serving staff will be kind and respectful and the food won't taste like shoes. Maybe.
*My place would have to be El Tapatio, in the Albertson's shopping center. It's not gourmet cuisine, but the enchiladas are always decent and the servers remember us enough to know we want extra salsa without having to ask.
posted by Corvallist at
10:47 PM
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