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016-Don & Pauls


Restaurants have a regional feel.  High end places are nice but it comes at a price.  The “normal” places tend to have a similarity that is boring and most low-end places are there for a reason (I never want to go into the kitchen of the Chinese restaurant on 25th street in Arlington next to the titty bar.  Nasty, nasty even though the delivery always tasted good).  But occasionally you stumble across a low-end place that isn’t, although the prices might indicate otherwise.  The fact that the menu hasn’t been updated since 1950 and the place is busy is a tell.

We loved this place.  Ate there every morning our 4 day layover at Waterford NY.  My dad would have loved this place too, he used to go to “Ole Timers” in downtown Rockwall for the same reason we liked this place.  Patron’s mostly seem to know each other.  They would kibitz while we ate.  The place hadn’t seen any investment in years, they were likely just hanging on but they were in the business of building community by selling breakfast.  We all long for community and these guys had it in spades.  And of course, the prices were great too, but that’s really secondary isn’t it?

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