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The Lou-Roc Award
Yes, it’s back. The infamous Lou-Roc award. While away, we’ve watched countless diners and other roadside attractions get drubbed at the hands of greedy, unimaginative, and just plain igno-rant people. The situation just begged for the return of the Lou-Roc, named for the Worcester, Massachusetts diner egregiously entombed in a brick box back in 1990.
Lou-Roc Award: Dolts deep-six Deepwater Diner
- Published on Friday, 03 February 2012 16:14
Update: We just discovered that the Deepwater Diner has its own Facebook page. Click here and leave your opinion of what they've done to the place.
In what reality is a plain white stucco box more attractive than finely-crafted, streamlined stainless steel?
Roadside first published more than twenty years ago. The Lou-Roc award debuted about two years later. The grapevine revealed to me a few years after that the term transformed into a verb — as in, "I won't lou-roc my diner."
The Deepwater Diner as it appeared in 1997.
All along the way, this publication and many others have spread the good word that diners offer both good food and a dynamic restaurant concept for entrepreneurs. People like diners. Actually, they love them. They feel good just to see them around.
Burlington's Taco Hell
- Published on Tuesday, 03 January 2012 18:48
Now called El Cortijo, which I believe is Spanish for "I hate diners." (Photo by Michael Rosol)
When Stratton Lines purchased and installed his new Mountain View diner in downtown Burlington, Vermont in 1954, he called it the Oasis. Just the name makes one think of a warm and welcoming respite from the long Vermont winters. Inside, one might expect to find hot and hearty comfort foods served by people with no greater concern than their customer's satisfaction. After all, Stratty went the extra mile and purchased a real American diner, no small accomplishment in any period of our twentieth-century history.
Trashing a diner, Mexican style
- Published on Saturday, 31 December 2011 09:31
Looks like we have another Lou-Roc in the making. Sadly, you'll find few diners out there as original as the former Oasis Diner. Except for the chunk of counter removed by the last owners, the diner where Bill Clinton sipped tea with the city's mayor. And now, somone else who doesn't want a diner bought one of the most orginal out there and will proceed to rip it up for their own ephemeral concept. If you care, please write to these people and plead with them not to do this.
The Fate of Sadie Katz: Tacos, Farmhouse-Style
POSTED BY CORIN HIRSCH
Burlingtonians wondering about the fate of the shuttered Sadie Katz Delicatessen space might find some comfort in what's coming on its heels — that is, if they can switch their allegiance from latkes to tacos.
El Cortijo Taquería y Cantina will open in the same space sometime this winter — bar, take-out window, NECI-trained chef and all.
Your call: Lou-Roc or not
- Published on Thursday, 08 September 2011 19:49
I received these photos of the Maybrook Diner in Maybrook, New York from Roadside correspondent Greg Matteson, and in his email, he wondered if we have a Lou-Roc'ing in progress.
As it happens, I spoke with the owners a little over a month before receiving these, so these renovations didn't come as a surprise, but I ponder it with heavy heart — at least as heavy as that roof looks over that poor unfortunate diner.
Owner Harry Toromanides bravely emailed me and asked what he and his brother should do.
Mayfair's Lou-Roc: Mea culpa runneth over
- Published on Monday, 19 April 2010 12:42
This just might make a little history. At least for Roadside. I think I need to revoke a Lou-Roc award.
Last weekend, I visited Philadelphia’s Mayfair Diner for only the second time since the Mulholland family sold it in November, 2006 to mega-restaurateur Michael Petrogiannis. After my first visit last year, I thought I’d avoid any further pain by never returning. I can best describe that experience as akin to attending a wake for a dearly departed friend. Though Michael had yet to perform any renovations, the overall experience — even during our post dinner visit — wreaked of death.
When RoadsideFans creator Glenn Wells sent along a photo of the Mayfair a few months ago showing recent exterior renovations, I felt that Michael had finally gone too far. I regarded the Mayfair Diner as simply one of the most splendid examples of diner preservation on the landscape. Its size, its history, and its menu had few equals, and the Mulholland family displayed their reverence for their diner that came out in everything they did. We featured Jack Mulholland’s daughter, Debbie on the cover of issue 27 of Roadside because of her efforts to help revive the surrounding neighborhood. Whenever I named my top five diners, I would always put the Mayfair on that list.
So, then, why bother tinkering with it? What could possibly be the point?
Lou Roc: Fall from the Heights
- Published on Wednesday, 10 March 2010 21:25
With heavy hearts, we heave, uh, bestow the latest Lou-Roc Award to the owners of Clyde's Bistro in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. In some ways, this was just too easy. Some newbie gets his hands on two fully restored diners -- at great cost, mind you -- and just tears into them with all the sensitivity of Jack the Ripper performing an appendectomy.
On the other hand, the proprietors, listed on the Clyde's website as Vivian, Lillian, Bryan, and Clyde, make the case that they took over a project that failed on a massive scale, three times. In their defense, they have posed that oft-heard rhetorical question: "Would you rather see them torn down?" Good question. Would I rather people remember me as I looked when I was vital and healthy, or after I was ravaged by a flesh eating disease?
In our own defense to those who say the Lou-Roc unfairly picks on people who have every right to do what they want to their own property, I agree with you. In this country, if you own it, you should be able to paint it purple and rivet used CDs to it if you are so inclined. Right?
Lou-Roc: Say good-bye to Hollywood
- Published on Sunday, 25 October 2009 09:57
Some people will look at these two photos and wonder why we picked the Hollywood Diner in Dover, Delaware and its owner for such ignobility. After all, the end result of this renovation produced a nice shiny diner, right?
No. The end result of this travesty produced a cheap, ridiculous cartoon of what a true diner should be. Bearing in mind that hardly anyone exists today that can fashion stainless steel panels in the fashion that Fodero once did, and you start to understand the grievious affront to our heritage that this diner now represents.
Yes, I know that highly polished stainless steel doesn't come cheap, but all that money might have gone to better use hiring an actual chef to turn out meals to truly remember. That's what packs in the customers. Instead, what I'm sure you will now find here is yet another pretense to diner traditions in meals served up more or less by Sysco or its ilk after a quick nuking or bag boiling. I would be very surprised to find anything better once this joke reopens. The fact that the owner would even consider doing something like this to such a gem indicates how little regard he has for his customers or his community.
There was nothing wrong with the original Hollywood Diner. In fact, it was one of the best examples of a late-1950s Fodero diner still standing. Inside, about the only thing its former owner Bud Jarboe ever changed was the vinyl on the booths. Its degree of originality after more than fifty years in service stood as testament to Mr. Jarboe's good sense and Fodero's quality of workmanship.
The new owners could have simply had some better landscaping, a new sign, a good cleaning, and had replaced the Flexglass and could have easily had himself a near-showroom quality diner. These renovations were simply a waste of time, money, and regard for the greatness that is the great American diner.
Say good-bye to the Hollywood. Say good-bye, my baby.
See more interior photos at the Diner Finder and here.
From Mayfair to Mayfunk
- Published on Tuesday, 15 September 2009 10:50
In 2006, the Mayfair Diner landed in the hands of Michael Petrogiannis after eighty years of ownership by the Mulholland family. As a result, the long-running relationship with its surrounding community that the family built on a tradition of quality and integrity suddenly came to a close. A visit there about a year later found the once-lively diner smelling of death and ineptitude. This new roof literally caps off the sad demise of a once-great institution.
We can only wonder now what travesty Petrogiannis will foist upon his other Philadelphia purchases, the Country Club, Melrose, and Tiffany diners. (Top photo by Glenn Wells.)
Lou-Roc Alert: Sweet City/Terminal Diner, Cleveland Heights, Ohio
- Published on Sunday, 23 August 2009 10:32
Steve Harwin called us last night to pass along some good and bad news.
Good news: Someone's purchased the ill-fated double diner complex in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. Bad news: They want to turn the Mountain View into an upscale tavern, wiping out all of its recently restored original features.
Though the new owners have kept Harwin in the loop with their plans, the man who restored the former Terminal Diner back in 2001 has made no headway trying to convince them of the folly of their ways. Harwin also tells Roadside that for now, the former Zephyr Diner, the O'Mahony diner, will stay much the same.
Originally conceived by Cleveland Heights entrepreneur Steve Presser, the over-budget and poorly planned project took years before it finally opened for business. Presser, who always thought big, wanted to have Dottie's Diner (the Zephy) serve as a traditional diner with an updated menu and pair it up with the Sweet City Diner which would serve only desserts.
Going wildly over budget and way past the original deadline for its grand opening, Presser's ambitious idea faltered almost from the start and bankrupted him in the end. In our estimation, the diners suffered from a hopelessly inefficient layout, a confusing presentation for customers (as configured, the restaurant had four entrances), and a site plan that needlessly broke up the traditional streetscape. Set back more than 60 feet, northbound travelers easily passed it by.
It's no secret that we don't like double diner restaurants -- at least where the operator pairs two intact diners. The roadside is littered with nearly a half-dozen such projects. We can't think of a single one that lasted more than two years. Read this carefully if you have plans to give this a try: Open one first. If that succeeds, then expand.
The new owners will at least do one good thing: Their boneheaded intentions have inspired us to bring back the Lou-Roc. Look for more such awards to come.