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| Old Fort on I-40 |
Holding to the pattern, we may have been a bit late leaving the Highland Lake Inn and arriving in Snow Camp at Ye Old Country Kitchen for a buffet lunch.
http://www.yeoldcountrykitchen.net/
The drive was mostly on Interstate 40 again. Though this time we got off around Greensboro and took a NC Scenic Byway to get to Snow Camp and on to Chapel Hill. That was nice.
http://www.milebymile.com/main/United_States/North_Carolina/byway/Football_Road.html
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| Scenic drive |
We arrived at Ye Old Country Kitchen around 3pm. Since we were supposed to be back in Raleigh by 4pm, we were late and we voted not to rush at lunch. So we would get to back to Raleigh at about 5pm.
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| Ye Old Country Kitchen, Snow Camp |
On to lunch. We had the Sunday Country Buffet. It was great. We had a huge selection and everything we tried was delicious. We each only actually tried less than half of the offerings, there was just too much. But, Clay's favorite was the fried chicken livers, big and juicy and crispy. My favorite was the fried yellow squash slices. They were so thinly sliced and so lightly battered, they were otherworldly and ethereal. I know I can't make anything that light and crispy that is fried! Bob G. was promoting the fried chicken and the Brunswick stew. We both liked the chicken and Clay liked the Brunswick stew. It was good, but I didn't love it, it had a flavor of something like KC Masterpiece BBQ sauce. I prefer the kind that tastes more like Campbell's Tomato Soup, which Clay does not like. So there you go, different tastes. I did not like the macaroni & cheese, it had some kind of a spice flavor that I could not place but did not appreciate. Bob loved it. All the vegetables were really fresh and good. The chicken stew (or chicken pastry) was the chicken and dumpling style, with the big, puffy dumplings instead of the strips of dough. Tasty, but not my favorite. We both liked the homemade persimmon pudding. I also had (oink oink!) the banana pudding and chocolate meringue pie. (I also cannot make meringue like these 2 desserts had on them!) On the way out, we bought a whole chocolate meringue pie to take home and had it for dessert all week long. It was even better than the slice I had in the restaurant! This place was another real gem of a find and way off the beaten path! Oh, and how full were we? Well, they had a soft-serve ice cream machine with cones and Clay did get one! He said he was too full! There's a first time for everything!
Ready for some food porn? Scroll on down and enjoy! Remember that clicking any photo will show it full screen size and then click the back arrow to return here.
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| L to R, chicken livers, chicken stew, fried chicken |
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| L to R, apples, yams, cabbage, limas & red taters, field peas |
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| L to R, macaroni & cheese, squash casserole, fried yellow squash! |
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| L to R, mashed potatoes, roast beef, gravy, country ham, chicken stew, fried chicken livers |
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Meringue pies |
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| Banana pudding with meringue topping |
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| Persimmon pudding, all gone! |
That is the end. The rest was just the drive on home. Oh, one other note. There were about 6 people from the Triad area on the trip. Bob Garner arranged to pick them up at a parking lot off I-40 in Burlington on the way over on Saturday. On Sunday, he had a van and driver pick up these same people from Ye Olde Country Kitchen and drive them back to their cars in Burlington. That was a nice touch. The next Bob Garner Restaurant Road Trip is in February of 2011 and goes Down East from Greensboro. If we go, hopefully there will be another arrangement like this that for us to use.
http://bobgarnerbbq.com/road-trips Also, we noticed that the price dropped by $50 per couple to $700 for us. That is still expensive for an overnight trip, but moving in the right direction.
Signing out for now on this trip. Next up is a day in Hogsmeade for my birthday! We will drive down to Orlando and spend 2 nights in order to have all day on my birthday to spend at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. WWoHP is in the Islands of Adventure amusement park at Universal Studios Orlando. Check back later for our report.
http://www.universalorlando.com/harrypotter/
