- Second story pizza parlor, DI: Many, many years ago when I was a kid, I remember stopping at the Martin Y and walking up an outdoor staircase to a pizza parlor. It had booths and a pinball machine. We had to wait quite a bit for the food to get done. My mother took me outside at one point onto the stairs. I remember it being night out, but not too cold, so I'm guessing it was early evening in early fall. I don't remember what I ate that night. It was the only time I remember going there, although I think I remember driving around another night to find some other pizza place between Martin and Allen, but it could be this one, or another. The intersection at Martin has been remade a few times since then, so I can't be sure where the pizza place once was. The only two-story building still standing does not seem to have an outdoor metal staircase. However, there is a Giovanni's right in the middle of the roads. Whether or not it is the same pizza place from when I was a kid, I don't know. I have not eaten from the current place, to the best of my knowledge.
- [Super America, currently Speedway, TO: Back in the 80s, we would occasionally stop here for me to pick up a fountain drink and/or some pre-packaged food when we weren't going anywhere special. Never for fuel. After some corporate mergers and buy-outs, the name got changed to Speedway. We would still stop there time to time, but almost never for a drink. Haven't stopped there in well over five years.]
- Long John Silver's, TO: When the LJS was built at Martin, it opened some new opportunities for me. It was in the perfect location to pick up dinner on the way back from long shopping trips to Huntington or Lexington so we wouldn't have to cook dinner. Since it was closer to home, the food wouldn't have to be reheated as much as a dinner from Prestonsburg. We would go in to place the order, and I would wait for the order to be packed while my mom went to the restroom. It was here where I first tried their "lobster bites" (Actually, it was some other shellfish.). I felt it was too buttery for me, but I didn't have any allergic reactions. By the 2010s, our eating and shopping habits had changed. We were getting in earlier now, so we had the time to actually cook dinner again some trips. My mom would demand to eat at another place in Prestonsburg on other occasions. (I'll bring that one up in a future post.) As such, we basically stopped going there. The last time I stopped there was around 2020, after the worst of the pandemic conditions were lifted. There had been a wreck on the mountain on the way home, so we had to detour a very long way around that night. Because we were going to be so late, and we had some coupons, we decided to try the Martin LJS. By the time we got to Allen, mom suggested we take the old road to Martin instead of Route 80. Now, I had driven on Route 80 many times, day and night. I had rarely driven down the old road, and never at night. I was going super slow to make sure I didn't wreck. By the time we got to Martin, the LJS way shuttering the lobby for the night. We didn't go to the door to make sure, and I don't do drive-throughs, so we were forced to go somewhere else. I would soon find out that they were closing the LJS, and I had missed my last chance to eat there. The spot is now a Mexican restaurant. As to where I would wind up eating that night, it wasn't the next entry.
- [McDonald's, TO, ⭐️: Now, I haven't eaten at many McDonald's. However, I have driven my mom to this one to stop for coffee and for her to use the restroom some mornings. In fact, we have stopped there just a few months ago. I had only been in here once, on the night mentioned above. When it looked like the LJS had shut down the lobby for the night, we tried here instead. When my mom looked over the ordering kiosk, she was confused about how to do it. She also balked at the price of what I would be getting. She refused to order from there, even after I said I would get something cheaper and pay for it myself. Even though it would be way too late to cook something and I didn't have anything at home to fix, we left. We would stop at a supermarket where I picked up something nowhere near enough for dinner, cheap. While she said she was sad about me not having anywhere near enough to eat that night, (she settled for leftovers, which I can't eat due to my sensitive tongue) she has never apologized for what she did. I won't say any more.]
- Burger Queen, later Dairy Queen, DI/TO: Burger Queen was probably the first chain restaurant at the Martin Y. Or at least a forerunner of it was. There were a lot of name changing and rebranding back then. Anyway, the only and last time I remember eating there was my sophomore year of high school. I was in band, and we stopped here on the way back from performing at a tournament ball game. My mom was a chaperone, so I ate with her. Just some fires, as I was just coming out of the worst of my picky eater stage. Soon after that time, Burger Queen got bought out by Dairy Queen and got remodeled by the 90s. We would stop there a few times that decade, mostly on the way back from taking my grandmother from the doctor. I would get a Blizzard, while my mom would get one for my grandmother. Back then, there was still a focus on making your own, which was good for me since I didn't like many of the mix-ins. Nowadays, it is more on the pre-selected flavor combinations. This would lead me to create my own recipe clone. First, I would take some vanilla ice cream on put it in a metal bowl to thaw a little in the refrigerator for around thirty minutes. (All time are estimated. Your times may vary.) I would then get it out and add the mix ins. Mine were mashed banana and strawberry jam. I would then use a hand mixer, with maybe just one beater in, the combine everything. I would drizzle in some 'Magic Shell" chocolate sauce while mixing, so it would combine without most of it solidifying. I would then put the bowl back in the freezer for another 30 to 45 minutes. I would then take it out and mix again for a few minutes. While it wasn't an actual concrete, the generic industry term for said frozen treat, it was quite close. An emersion blender would have worked better, but I didn't have one back then and they weren't yet that popular. I don't remember where I got this idea. It could have been Food Network, but I don't think our cable provider had it yet. Anyway, it was such a complicated treat, that I ultimately stopped making it, especially after our mixer died and most stores stopped carrying my favorite brand of ice cream. I haven't had a Blizzard at any Dairy Queen in decades. We continued to stop at this DQ a few more times for coffee for my mom, but not in many years.
A puzzling little blog still looking for its voice, but sometimes gets lost and has trouble finding its way.
Wednesday, March 26, 2025
My Culinary Odyssey: Martin
The next stop in this series is Martin, as it is the next location with multiple spots. (I will be coming back to some places I skipped over later in the series.) While not that big, I do have some notable memories associated with some of these spots. Check back with the introduction here to see how the entries will be organized. Let's start things up.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment