Restaurant Review: Cracker Barrel (South Las Vegas)
MY LUNCH AT CRACKER BARREL (SATURDAY, APRIL 13, 2024)
A confession: I was wrong about Cracker Barrel. Until recently, I’d never been here before. Now, I’m an addict. Call me a Cracker Barrel addict.
Before, whenever I saw a “Croaker Barrel” on the roadside I thought back to Stuckey’s, which used to be trucker-tourist havens scattered along highways out in the middle of the nowhere. They were famous for pecan log rolls and shitty coffee. Surely, you remember them and their close second cousins — Stuckey’s, Waffle House, Denny’s, Cracker Barrel — destinations of the desperate. That’s where you ended up at 2:40 am on the brink of a hangover or when you made a wrong turn west of Wichita. That’s where you pulled into a gravel parking lot, sat down in a tan booth that hasn’t been cleaned in a decade, were greeted by someone named Mabel, and said to yourself — “well, everything else is closed and there’s no other restaurant within 30 miles of here, so hopefully the eggs, trash browns, rye toast, and Jimmy Dean sausage are safe to eat.”
But once I tried Cracker Barrel a few years ago, I not only liked it — I asked myself, where has this place been all my life?
On Saturday, Marieta and I celebrated our 33rd wedding anniversary. So, we dressed up, made a dinner reservation for two, and headed to Cracker Barrel. No, not really. We were driving near the Silverton Casino, and saw Cracker Barrel next door, and decided — what the hell?
Cracker Barrel is red-state Bible and brimstone scary. American flags everywhere. Twangy country music with fiddles playing. Winchester rifles on display. A burning fireplace (it was 82 degrees outside). The heads of dead animals hanging on the wall (I never understood the fascination with cutting off the head of a deer or moose and sticking it up on a wall — what the fuck is that all about?). The only thing missing here is Trump Bibles for sale in the gift shop.
The menu matches the decor. Most everything at Cracker Barrel is Southern fried *this* or gravy *that* and much like smoking a cigarette, with every bite subtract two minutes from your life expectancy. The food arrives and instantly I know the scolding “bad for you” sacrifice is well worth it. If I order desert in this place, I should drop dead by the time I’m out in the parking lot.
Today’s fare was fried catfish. Encrusted in corn meal. Hot buttered corn. Beans doused in pork, and I don’t even eat pork. Thick-cut steak fries. Plus a heaping basket of buttermilk biscuits and cornbread muffins, with real butter.
Those cornbread muffins. OH. MY. GAWD. I’ve never done coke before but if these muffins were in powder form, I’d be doing dishes in Tony Montana’s kitchen. Say hello to my little friends. Those muffins are astounding. Fluffy inside. Crunchy on the outside. Perfectly warm and tasty. Did I mention I like the cornbread muffins?
Marieta enjoyed a similar platter of stuff that’s life-shortening, but it was worth every bite even though it should come with a 10 percent off coupon for a cardiologist. The bill came to $39 for two. I even forgot about the dead deer staring at me from the wall. Fuck him. Just bring me another basket of biscuits and cornbread, pronto!
Cracker Barrel, I shall return.
