Gripado’s (click on “Blog” to see their menu) has long been on my list of Claremore Best Bets. I love the place, but I tend to forget they are there (and I will stop that right now). After trying to eat a late supper at a couple places tonight, unsuccessfully since one closed at 8 PM and the other at 7:30, we happened by Gripado’s, thrilled to find it open late. 

Tonight’s meal didn’t fail to impress, and I can heartily recommend the Italian bruschetta (the distinction is necessary, as they also serve the Greek variety) and the chicken parmesan. Jeane had the ham, peas, and bowtie pasta, which I have previously enjoyed. 

Adding to the ambiance tonight was a young keyboardist—Michael Womack—who played tasteful and appropriate music. It all added up to a great experience. We highly recommend them. And, since they also do double duty as a donut shop, you buy tomorrow’s breakfast tonight. 

We even did a live report from the scene. You can hear the piano in the background.

Since I decided to post about Claremore’s stinky and bad-tasting water yesterday, I thought it only fair to contact the city and see what they had to say. The Claremore city website lists Janet Donnelly as the Water Resources Director. Her name did not show up in the online directory, though, so I guessed at her email address and sent:

Ms. Donnelly,

I am a Claremore citizen, and I am growing increasingly concerned with the odor and taste of our municipal water supply. It’s to the point that it can be tasted in the iced tea and even through soda fountains in restaurants. I have spoken with restaurant owners who confirm this and who are facing the expensive reality of installing filtration systems to have to deal with it.

I understand that our water supply is perfectly safe, according to the numbers, but it’s not palatable. Can you provide some information as to what’s wrong with the water and what, if anything, the city is doing to overcome these issues?

I guessed right, for this morning she replied with this:

Thank you for contacting me regarding your concern for our drinking water quality; every water source has its own unique characteristics which may produce taste and odor problems. The primary issue with Lake Claremore is the nutrient load in the Dog Creek Watershed which feeds Lake Claremore creates an excess of algae and vegetation. These contain chemical compounds that while aesthetically unpleasing are considered secondary contaminants and are not currently regulated.

The City of Claremore treats for the removal of these compounds with activated carbon, however periodically the level of these compounds reaches such high levels treatment becomes less effective.

The City of Claremore also continually monitors the bacteriological safety of your drinking water and if the water would become unsafe to drink at any time you would be notified immediately.

Again thank you for your concern and if I may be of further assistance to you please do not hesitate to contact me.

Looks like I’ve been told that it’s safe to drink, they know it smells and tastes bad, and they don’t intend to do anything about it.

Just made a new YouTube find. It appears that someone preserved some footage of a feature called “Carolina Camera” and has posted them for us to enjoy. This is the type of local human interest stories that will help save local media. The spots are dates, which you can tell by the Pepsi cans and telephones among other things.

Check out the Slingshot Man, who, at 65, could hit quarters in the air and knock Japanese Beetles off leaves without damaging the leaf.

And then there’s Bessie, an 80-year-old sweetheard who acts as jailer/cook/dispatcher for a county jail. She cooked three squares a day for 16 years straight (as of the recording) because she said Matthew 25 compelled her to and she could not have slept if those boys in jail were hungry.

Click here to see more of the “Carolina Camera.” Very interesting indeed.

I’m a bit of a connoisseur of chicken fried steak (CFS) and strawberry shortcake. To look at me, you’d probably think I’m a connoisseur of lots of things, but that’s beside the point.

I am also a fan of the small-town cafe or diner. When I am traveling around, if the town’s main street has a restaurant, you can usually bet that’s where I’ll be eating. I was doing the diners, drive-ins, and dives tour long before Guy Fieri ever thought of it. And for the most part, small-town Oklahoma does an excellent job of slinging the hash.

The one thing the perplexes me, though, are the things diners and cafes take shortcuts on. One of my favorite places does an excellent homemade biscuit, then they cover it in gravy from a bagged mix. I mean, seriously folks, gravy is so dadgum simple to make, I cannot understand anyone choosing to slather a beautiful biscuit or crisp, golden chicken fried steak in some reconstituted wallpaper paste. On the other hand, the bagged mix gravy is a far cry better than the other extreme, and that’s so-called gravy that results from a cook who doesn’t properly cook the flour when making the roux for his gravy. You gotta really cook that flour in the fat (preferably bacon or sausage grease) until it smells nutty, goes runny, and begins to color (yes, even for white, cream gravy). If you’ve ever had that thin, sweet gravy, you have experienced gravy that is a result of an undercooked roux, and it’s a shame.

And speaking of chicken fried steak, it is another menu item that is sometimes relegated to the shortcut category. When eating at a small town cafe, I will usually ask my waitress (and let’s be honest, 99% of the time the server is female, either a high school girl or a middle-aged gal who’s been working there for decades, often still in the uniform dress) what’s good there. Most of the time that works like a charm. It’s a tad disappointing, though, when I ask what’s good, and they say, “Oh, the chicken fried steak!” and I order it, only to discover it is a pre-purchased, pre-fab CFS. One look is enough to tell you that this steak was not gently battered and fried in the kitchen. No, someone ambled to the freezer, knocked a frozen chunk of meat loose with an icepick, and tossed it in the deep fryer. I’m not blaming the waitress, though, as I would have probably made the same decision without her recommendation; I have a predisposition toward CFS anyway. I just can’t fathom what kind of home life she must have had to think that the beige disc of meat product on my plate (likely covered in bagged mix gravy) qualifies as “good.”

The types of good CFS are plenteous, and I like many of the varieties. Whether it’s the dredged and deep fried to a hot-as-fire, crisp specimen bigger than the plate like Shortcakes diner in Stillwater or lightly breaded and pan fried to a light, even somewhat soggy, finish like Thomas in Pryor and Dot’s here in Claremore, or somewhere in between like Clanton’s in Vinita, I love them all. Unless they didn’t actually make it back in the kitchen. Then my sensibilities are offended.

I still remember eating at Shortcakes in Stillwater during my college days. With limited seating, a 24/7 schedule, and a grill out in the open just across the counter, Shortcakes typifies what a diner really is. And I can still remember the care with which the short order cooks would grab that fresh piece of beef and massage the flour mixture into it before deep frying it to golden perfection. It made a real impact on my life.

And, while we’re talking about shortcake (the food not the diner), let’s be clear. Strawberry shortcake is not made with angel food cake. Angel food cake is good. And angel food cake with strawberries is excellent. But angel food cake with strawberries is not strawberry shortcake, mainly because angel food cake doesn’t absorb all the precious strawberry juice. My preference is strawberries over pie crust, though that’s not technically a shortcake either. My mother prefers her shortcake to consist of strawberries over a Twinkie, which still isn’t real shortcake, but it’s certainly an option, though not my preference. Genuine shortcake is strawberries and a slightly sweet biscuit (akin to a scone). And the strawberries need to be prepared and sugared much ahead of time to allow them time to macerate properly. I prefer more juice than berries, over the biscuit or pie crust, and maybe a touch of whipped cream. Heaven on earth, especially if the berries were lovingly cultivated in my father-in-law’s garden.

Overall, Oklahoma’s diners are doing a great job of keeping me fat and happy. If they’d just commit to real mashed potatoes, genuine gravy, homemade chicken fried steaks, and pie-crust shortcake, I’d be on cloud nine, and they’d really have an answer when the fat guy from Claremore walks in and ask, “What’s good here?”