Wright’s Restaurant

Pop quiz: make a list of all of the Tuscaloosa/Northport restaurants that you would consider to be “institutions” – the stalwart places that have been around forever and will always be around. Everyone’s list will contain the big names like City Café, The Waysider, and Dreamland. There are other places that would qualify too, but students don’t know about them. Places like Catfish Heaven or Mr. Bills – absolute bulwarks of their communities – rarely see a single UA student enter their doors. My goal with writing reviews for Druid City Eats is to draw some meager attention towards these kinds of places, places that are below student radar, that are pre-internet, that don’t have Facebook pages or people Yelping about them.

Here’s a great example of what I mean: if a Tuscaloosa meat-and-three has been around for nearly 50 years, wouldn’t you expect it to feature prominently on a list of T-Town institutions? Wright’s Restaurant in Alberta City fits that description, but it seems like no one on campus knows about it.

Wright’s Restaurant is a simple breakfast and lunch joint. It’s a single room with walls painted yellow, various religious signage hung on the walls. There’s only about 12 booths/tables in the whole place, with a few more stools at the counter by the kitchen. It’s always pretty packed, yet I’ve never once seen a single student eating there. Wright’s serves a working-class customer base, as well as lots of elderly consumers. The waitresses are attentive and legitimately nice. The whole experience looks and feels a lot like it must have back when Wright’s first opened nearly half a century ago. But all of that downhome atmosphere would be for nothing if the food wasn’t up to snuff, and the steady stream of customers at Wright’s suggests that the food is indeed a drawing point.

Let’s start with breakfast, because Wright’s serves what just might be my favorite breakfast in Tuscaloosa. Nothing flashy, no real reason why it stands out apart from simple execution. They have various meats available each day, ranging from ham to smoked sausage links to red hots. Their bacon is pretty darn good, perhaps owing to Wright’s bacon cook taking each strip off the griddle a bit early and then dunking them into a deep fryer for about 40 seconds. This method results in a crispy strip of bacon that isn’t also dry and overcooked. The pancakes are legit, the omelets look pretty good, and well, the most that I can say is that everything is cooked correctly. Breakfast foods get real sketchy real quick when under- or overcooked, and Wright’s super-efficient crew of three cooks doesn’t seem to make mistakes.

The biscuits are plenty good also, better than The Waysider’s for me. They do have biscuits & gravy on the menu, but last time I went for breakfast the gravy ran out before I got there, which disappointed a B&G fanatic like myself, but it speaks to the quality of Wright’s Restaurant: they don’t use prefabricated gravy. They make their gravy in-house each day. They make their pancake batter in-house. It’s reassuring and a sign of good things.

Lunch is less successful – about the quality of City Café — but well worth the price. Because the price is almost nothing – each lunch special costs under $5. Each day the meat-and-three menu changes. When I went on a Wednesday it was meatloaf, chicken pot pie, or a fried pork chop. Chicken & dressing is on Thursday, country fried steak is on Friday, and I won’t say any more in hopes that you’ll go find out their daily menu on your own. Wright’s also has a menu of constant lunch favorites: you can get catfish strips each day (which I have yet to try here), and their cheeseburger looks pretty legit.

While Wright’s has a small assortment of in-house pies available all the time, there’s also a special dessert for each day of the week (Monday has cherry dump cake, Wednesday has pineapple pudding, etc.).

If you’ve ever driven out on University Ave and into Alberta City, you know how utterly devastated that neighborhood was by the April 27^th, 2011 tornado. At Leland Shopping Center, where Wright’s is located, essentially every other business still has particle board over its windows. When every other place closed up shop because of damage or location, Wright’s Restaurant remained in business. It’s been open for nearly 50 years and it wasn’t about to let that tornado shut it down. It is, after all, an institution.

[barry]

Wright’s Restaurant is located in Alberta City at Leland Shopping Center (University Ave & 25^th Ave, by Leland Lanes bowling alley, right before the Piggly Wiggly).

Monday-Friday: 5:00am-11:15am (Breakfast), 11:30am-3:00pm (Lunch)
Saturday: 5:00am-11:30am (Breakfast only)
Sunday: closed

Chloe’s Cup Coffee and Teas

As you hear the bell clang over the heavy wooden door, citrus walls and homemade hula hoops silently greet you. A chenille throw is draped over a retro couch. Local art work lining the walls ranges from cow-themed paintings to tornado photography. Delicate jewelry made by local artisans gleams from the shelves. There is a mantel, but no fireplace. The smell of organic coffee is brewing. Soothing music emanates from a Pandora radio station. The chalkboard behind the counter will inform you of the daily selections.

And then you see Gail—a beautifully southern woman with teased mahogany hair who is always dressed to the nines. You can’t miss her. Gail Faulkner opened Chloe’s Cup in May 2010. She is a spunky woman who started a private business with two looming competitors: the economy and Starbucks. Gail has a simplistically profound mantra: “Stick with it, hang in there, and pray!”

Chloe’s Cup (named after Gail’s granddaughter) is setting itself apart from the city’s other coffee shops with the little things. Feel the ivory mug in your hands instead of an impersonal piece of plastic. If you are ordering to-go, there is no need to stand around awkwardly pretending to be interested in your phone. Just sit down and pull a magazine out of the spacious basket by the condiments. If you come in on Tuesday nights, you can snap your fingers while the Voodoo Saints play eclectic New Orleans blues. Employees quickly know you by name, and there is a low turnover rate, which is miraculous in a college town.

There is an innate sense of camaraderie at this downtown Tuscaloosa coffee shop.  UA English teacher (and future DCE reviewer, he claims) Austin Whitver, told me why he continually returns: “There’s really good coffee here. Gail is really nice, and I like the people that work here.” Whitver went on to explain the overall atmosphere and the key ingredient of his attraction to Chloe’s Cup: “The crowd here is usually–even when there are large numbers of people–civil and quiet. Starbucks is often more loud. And the idea of “local” is the most important thing…it’s something that I don’t think a lot of students think about very often: the importance of supporting local business.” He also appreciates the fact that Chloe’s Cup offers a 10% discount to UA students and faculty.

And as for the menu? My advice is this: take advantage of the specialty lattes. They make a mean raspberry white mocha and an amaretto (vanilla, almond, espresso and milk) that’s to die for. If you don’t like coffee, they offer real fruit smoothies, bubble tea (green tea, half and half, flavored powder and tapioca pearls), plus an assortment of hot chocolate flavors and teas. They also have an extensive list of sugar free lattes, great for all you health nuts who prefer aspartame to genuine cane sugar (I do not judge for I am one of these insanely illogical individuals). And there are desserts galore. My personal favorite is the sweet potato biscuit. Even if you avoid this vegetable at Thanksgiving, you’ll fall in love with the buttery confection dusted with powdered heaven. Chloe’s Cup also has fantastic chicken salad and black bean soup, but all the “real food” items are overpriced for the rather pathetic amount you receive (the fruit cup ratio consists of four grapes to one strawberry.) So, I recommend sticking to the fabulous coffee and treats.

Chloe’s Cup is a local business worth supporting. Go there. Eat the food. Drink the drink. Most of all, meet the people. Savor a refreshing variation from the monotonous chains that bombard Tuscaloosa. You don’t want to miss out on such a unique opportunity.

[amanda shields]

Chloe’s Cup is located in downtown Tuscaloosa at 2117 University Boulevard in the brick strip mall with Moe’s BBQ.

Monday-Friday: 7am-10pm
Saturday: 9am-8pm
Sunday: 2pm-10pm