The Setting

By Alex Golden

What is a Classic Joint?  It is a place where all participants (proprietors, employees, vendors, customers and any others involved) have come together to create a unique, enduring and impactful establishment.  This can be done through great food, drink, atmosphere, music, or a combination of any or all of these.  Guy Fieri’s “Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives” does an incredible job of finding such places all over the place.  They typically concentrate on the food aspect of a place, and all the places they look at are restaurants (at least what I have seen), but it is a great example of finding places people love and exploring exactly why they are loved.  In this segment of exploring Classic Joints, I will explore a recent family trip taken in June of 2021, where we hit 4 of the very best!

We loaded up the family truckster and headed for Destin, Florida, a summer vacation spot for my family since 1974!  We took a long hiatus from the mid 80’s to the late 90’s but really started back up again when I had kids.  Silver Dunes is in Destin – not Seaside, Grayton, Rosemary or any other part of the Destin area built after 1990 (or so it seems).  Silver Dunes is nestled on the original Red Neck Riviera between and amongst several high-rise condominium complexes that are the primary reason for the crowded roads, restaurants, outlet malls and beaches in the Destin area.  However, Silver Dunes has managed to maintain its original charm.  It has a single small pool to service the whole complex, but it has less units per sq ft of land than others do, so it is not a problem.   The Beach has umbrella service available and due to lower population is typically able to provide front row service to your family.  The people-watching on the beach is awesome – as ALL walks of people stroll by in front of your spot in the sand; and the blue waters that stretch out before you are just as blue as further east on Florida’s emerald coast (though you might have to endure a few more advertising boats and planes than other less crowded spots!)  Typically, we cook fresh seafood ourselves from Sexton’s or Destin Ice – just a short drive away – but there are other great spots in Destin, if you can avoid the crowds sufficiently – Harbor Docks, Dewey Destin’s, Louisiana Lagniappe, The Back Porch and High Tide in Ft. Walton are a few that have survived since I was a child in the 70’s.  The primary advantage to Silver Dunes is it’s design – a “high rise” (only 4 stories tall) in the back facing the beach with sawtooth 2 and 4 story buildings going down each side of the property leaving a giant open green space (that’s right – grass!) between.  The Beach and the Pool are wonderful, but I simply cannot adequately describe the fun I had playing in that green space as a child and watching, as a father, my children play in that space as well.  I would trade it for absolutely NOTHING.  Silver Dunes is a true Classic Joint and still worth it.

Once in Destin, the next Classic Joint to mention (already mentioned above) is The Back Porch.  I barely remember it as a child – simply a place we could walk to (a long way back then – so tired) to get a great cheeseburger.  It was acquired in 1983 by a General Cobb who insisted on serving an amberjack sandwich, which changed it (for the better) forever.  They remodeled, expanding exponentially over the years, but maintain the best fish sandwiches I have had anywhere in the world, and the atmosphere is unlike any other.  No shoes, nor shirt necessary (they are encouraged however), but it is the only place that I can tolerate that kind of heat while waiting on my food – still feels like I am just standing on the back porch of a small A-frame house waiting on some great joint food to enjoy!  It is a laid-back classic joint that may have equals, but no one can beat.

I now, must return to my story of the long trek to Destin, because of course, flying is out of the question – only a 9-hour drive – that must be endured to truly appreciate the fruits of the true family beach vacation.  However, one particular year when I was very young, my parents decided to stop in Jackson, Mississippi to spend the night and stop at a steak restaurant.  Not many chains back then, so we were referred to Crechale’s… a family place that had great steak and seafood.  We have been stopping there ever since for their “Kings Cut” Ribeye, the soft-shell crab and the onion rings – oh my – the onion rings!!!  And the atmosphere has not changed in 50 years.  Same family who seats you and same jukebox (well it is a new jukebox, but same concept) that wails “Hail… hail… the gang’s all here” for a birthday celebration that happens almost every night.  Covid nearly did it in, but it is making a comeback and trying to re-staff as we speak.  I hope it survives – not many like it – a true Classic Joint.

At the end of our trip, we are normally just ready to be home and make the entire trek in a day with as few stops as possible.  But this year, we decided to exploit the opportunity to be able to drive into Greenville, Mississippi to the famous (at least to us Arkansans) original Doe’s Eat Place!!!  The tamales, soaked salads, and of course, STEAKS here are absolutely incredible!  Cooked in a unique broiler oven, and done to perfection by the family for years, is accompanied by the butter drippings that accumulate in this unique style of cooking, which make the fried potatoes an even bigger treat than normal.  And by the way, this is all done in an old house in a small older neighborhood of Greenville.  The Grill Room is the Living Room as you walk in the house and on to the back for dine in seating around a very large stove where there are skillets and big pots for frying the fries.  It is filled with locals and others who have heard about the incredible flavor produced in that little house…. And not just from the food.  The waitresses and other help who have mostly been there for generations (or at least years) are all in with treating each customer like their favorite uncle at a family BBQ.  It is an experience like no other, that I thoroughly recommend you take the time to enjoy.

We made it back to Little Rock a little later than usual that year, but we had a story to go with it.  I was overjoyed to have been able to enjoy it being straddled by the two small generations of my immediate family – 1) my parents, 2) my wife and myself, and 3) my kids – now old enough to appreciate.  Knowing how my father used to run over there with clients back in the 70’s and 80’s and how impressed he was with it even back then, and to get to see him introduce this place to my children and them actually enjoy it!  There are no words to describe the experience… And that is why these places are all Classic Joints!!!  Better try all of them quick – the world does not stop changing and these places won’t be around forever!

En Vino Veritas!

Alex

By Lex Golden

One of my several personal interpretations of Robert Frost’s poem, The Road Not Taken, is how your life’s influences are developed based on such simple unrehearsed decisions. Following on is such an example of how we Goldens became so interested in food and wine and its leading us to France and Paris……Alex has asked me to chronicle this path and it is likely to reveal how one small $25 decision on a bottle of wine in December, 1976 has played such an influence in our lives!

It began that year as Ellen and I hosted a Christmas party at our home offering a bar including beer, to a group of about 30 couples, and out of beer we ran…. off to Yancy’s to replenish whereupon on paying at the counter, I noticed a fine wine on display for the Season. It was a 1973 Chateau Lafite Rothschild, said to be the most highly regarded red wine in the world, and priced at $25, an outrageous sum at the time. Knowing most nothing of it, except it must be exceptional I had to have it (knowing Ellen always wanted me to be able to choose wines at dinners outings with friends, a talent I critically lacked, and this would/could be my excuse.)

I awoke the next day thinking “what more foolish act could I have taken?” Now committed however, I began reading of its qualities, others like it, the vineyards of so many varietals, and weather, water and sun, and winemaking, and tastes, and oxidation……on and on and on……. until it led ultimately to Ellen suggesting we travel for my approaching 40th birthday to Bordeaux, France, the home of this love child to put a “face” on my research! It was to be our first intercontinental trip as a couple and was in lieu of Ellen’s initial desire, set aside for my growing interest in wine, to go the Far East on a guided group tour. Can you imagine the divergence Frost spoke of and its impact!!

Just a few examples of which I will provide details about over the coming days and/or be willing to answer questions about and including priceless tips discovered and mistakes made including……

Most importantly, meeting new friends, both American, French and British, including memorably:

Herb Jones and Janet Treseder Jones, American IBM executives, who influence us to this day and whom we treasure, and with whom we spent several memorable weeks in the South of France and cultivated our love of that area.

Michel Cornubet, a true bon vivant Frenchman who has shared his culture with Ellen and myself fully and deeply and who now likely has more friends in Little Rock than we, and who has assisted us in exploring the interior of France in a way we would not have been able to otherwise.

Norbert and Monique Chiche, then owners of the most remarkable “blue plate café” in Paris, Au Pied de Fouet, who gave us (for 6 months) their son Benjamin, to assist in opening Chattie’s Restaurant in Little Rock, which brought the magic of duck confit, foie gras, geisier salads, oufs mayonnaise, lapin moutard, tarte tatin, and house wine by the carafe to Little Rock for the first time…

These new friends whose lives influenced us indirectly led to Ellen’s twenty plus years in search of all things French and the beginnings of Ellen Golden’s Antiques, as well as our mutual acquisition of Terry’s Finer Foods, the iconic grocery in the Heights neighborhood of Little Rock, resulting in a larger, more complete fulfillment of our dream of a fine French restaurant in Little Rock that brought two accomplished chefs over the years to America to serve us with style and flair….. These businesses inspired by France allowed us to experience the country, and mainly Paris, in a way that has given us rare insight into its workings and secrets. In reality, we have only scratched the surface, but to us, it is a deep cavern of knowledge that we would not have been privy to otherwise.

I would be remiss not to include also in this group our dear, and considered member of our family, Elka Halliger, the now deceased German born lady who shared my birthday (just a few years later), later immigrating to France who learned so well to incorporate her German strengths into the French way and shared them so fully with us, helping with bank accounts (not an easy thing), purchasing my adored, invaluable VW Touran that truly gave me the accessibility to Paris and France I so deeply desired, renting of apartments, both long and short term, which led us deeper and deeper in Paris becoming our true 2nd home, which Hemingway describes so aptly as a moveable feast.

We have so many memories and experiences which will be my Plaisir to reveal over time to you through Everyday SoMalYaY and I hope it may lead to an exchange of thoughts that will promote the enduring relationship between our America and France, our oldest friend…. And assist our followers in their ability to find experiences otherwise out of reach.

Purchasing that bottle of wine in 1976 (45 years ago) is incredibly poignant considering the last paragraph of Frost’s poem:

I shall be telling this with a sigh.
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.