Breakfast

Living in the burbs of the greatest city in the world, Chicago, there are things you tend to take for granted. One of them is eating establishments. Whenever I travel outside of the city, I notice how few independent food choices one has. Living here we have a plethora of choices for our morning breakfast meals. Most other cities I go to your choices are limited to a Denny’s or some other unholy chain. Where I live I have a ton of Greek restaurants and other assorted diners where I can enjoy a nice breakfast.

Back in the summer of 1989 I and my geeky friends got an idea. We would meet every Tuesday morning and go to breakfast. After each breakfast we would rate each place. We called ourselves the Tuesday morning breakfast club. It consisted of me, and my friends Rob, Paul, Joe Amado, Wally and Chris.

Why we did this I am still not sure. We would go to these establishments and order breakfast and then go to Chris and Paul’s house and rate each place on special surveys we created on Paul’s Apple II. In case you were wondering yes, we were geeks.

But, I have to admit that it was fun. We would rate the place on taste, cost, service and atmosphere. We went to quite a few establishments during our time together. If memory serves me right, Jedi’s Garden on 95^th and Southwest Highway got the highest marks and Steak and Egger on Central was by far the worst place we ate at.

Look up the term greasy spoon in the dictionary and you will see a picture of the Steak and Egger. It was on Central somewhere right after you get off of the Stevenson. You had the one old haggard Flo type waitress with Vic Tayback manning the grill. I remember them serving us Tang and calling it orange juice. I think Rob got the Steak and Eggs and got the fattest piece of meat possible served to him.

After the Tuesday Morning Breakfast club stopped meeting we found another greasy spoon to hang out and that was Bac’ and Eggs. It was located on 79^th and Cicero just behind the infamous Scottsdale outdoor mall. Home of the Goldblatts and the southwest Burbs finest pick pockets.

Bac and Egg’s was similar to the Egger in that it also had the hardened waitress (who if memory serves me once started flirting with either Wally or Chris.) But it also had Marv the cook. Marv was an old Army cook who didn’t say much and had looked as if he had been through the ringer a couple of times.

The key to the place was to not stray to far off the main menu. If you got bacon and eggs you were fine. It was cheap and really it is kind of hard to fuck up scrambled eggs and bacon. But, being young we would always try to look deep into the menu to try and find some hidden gem. Like the time Wally ordered the perch dinner.

Only a truly brave soul would order a perch dinner at Bac and Egg’s and well I guess Wally was feeling a little adventurous. When he ordered it the waitress raised an eyebrow. That should have been a signal to re-think his order, but he stayed with it. This was like seventeen years ago so my memory is a little hazy but I think I remember Wally saying it wasn’t bad going down. It would be the after effects that it would produce that we would all pay a price for.

To say my friend had gas afterwards would be an insult to any person who has ever taken a Rolaids in their life. No, this was not gas, this was an unholy beast that was leashed upon us from the depths of hell that was using Wally’s ass as an oracle. I have smelled some unpleasant things in my day, but nothing like this. What he unleashed in the car on our way home and throughout the rest of the night had a very tear inducing effect. I think an autopsy might smell better.

On top of the gas producing fish that was available at the B&E you could also win some money. They had a poker machine in the back. On one trip there my friend Chris put some money in the machine and thought he was playing for fun. He kept betting and betting and kept winning what we all thought was play money. Then Dave, our older and wiser shaman who originally turned us on to Bac’ and Eggs (and also introduced us to Bush Light Draft beer) looked at how many credits Chris had and told him not to touch a thing. Dave summoned Marv the cook, who took out a sweaty stack of money and paid Chris his winnings.

We would go back a number of times to that back room but would rarely win again. You bet different when it is for real, I guess. The place closed down a number of years ago as most diners of that ilk do. For every Les Brothers and Georgio’s that stay around forever there are ten that close. Paradise, Fantasy, J.C. George’s, Daniel’s, and the White House are just some of the many locally owned dining establishments that have closed their doors.

As for now, I still try and hit breakfast as much as I can with Joyce on Sunday mornings. We really like Southern Belle’s on Archer and Koko’s on 95^th. To me one of the perks of living where I do is that number of different places I can grab a short stack at. To some this may seem trivial but, sometimes there is nothing like a greasy spoon breakfast to start the day off right.