Fantastic Road Trip Food

Road trips are usually fun; however, road trip food can be hit or miss. Our recent drive from Texas through Nashville, Tennessee, to Washington, D.C. and back gave us many opportunities to try various foods. Fortunately, we lucked out on most of what we tried.

We had a long first day drive, and we knew we would arrive at our hotel in Nashville late, so we stopped at an IHOP in West Memphis, Arkansas for dinner. It’s not fine dining, but it’s a good, solid choice if you’re not quite ready or able for experimentation. We had a nice, quiet dinner and we were ready for the final push to Nashville.

 

The next day in Nashville for lunch, we found a little Vietnamese restaurant called Viu’s Vietnamese Kitchen, not far from Music Row. My wife and daughter have eaten Vietnamese food before, but this was my first attempt, and it was outstanding. The family is also well-versed and proficient in the use of chopsticks. Me, not so much, so I went with the non-chopstick default - I am much more comfortable with a fork. My grilled chicken over salad was just the thing for me after a day visiting the exhibits in the incredible Nashville Parthenon. Momma Viu has some great recipes, and we were pleased with our choices. 

That night, we were looking for something familiar, and as luck would have it, there was a Waffle House right across the street from our hotel in Nashville. My wife and I have eaten at Waffle House, but our daughter had not tried it and she was game. Like IHOP, it’s not fancy, but these little restaurants are well known for excellent, perfectly cooked breakfast (okay, dinner) foods. The waffles and hash browns were soft, buttery, and perfect. We left full, and happy, heading back to the hotel for a relaxing evening.

 

We were back on the road the next morning and stops for gas brought us to a number of different truck stops, including Buckee’s, Pilot, and Petro. Buckee’s has a huge variety of food offerings besides the usual convenience store type of fare. The other stops offer less variety, and at the Pilot Travel Center #491 in Harrisonburg, Virginia, I was hungry – not interested in hot dogs, packaged sandwiches, or other snack foods. 

 

This Pilot offered Sbarro New York Style pizza. I once lived in New York, and Sbarro was familiar, but it had been many years since I had eaten this pizza. I wasn’t all that sure that I wanted to try truck stop pizza. You never know what you’re going to get with something like this, but it looked like the best option, so I went for it.

 

I sat in the back seat as we hit the road again, and I dug in to my Sbarro slice. I have been a pizza fan since forever, and I have exactingly pizza standards. This was an unexpected delight. The cheese and sauce were tangy and perfect; the crust was absolutely fantastic. Maybe it sounds ridiculous to rave about pizza, but this Sbarro slice was delicious – as good as any pizza I’ve had in recent memory. I was surprised and quite pleased at this unanticipated find on Interstate 81 in the mountains of Virginia. 

 

Our first day in Washington, D.C., we spent most of the day in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum. After seeing the Hope Diamond and many other fascinating exhibits, we took a bus to the Lincoln Memorial, and then the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. By then it was late afternoon; we were hot and tired, and we hailed a taxi for the ride back to the Cambria Hotel, on O Street and 9th NW, not far from the White House. The taxi ride turned out to be a good choice for a future eating suggestion, but I’ll get to that in a minute.

 

Back in our hotel, we browsed on the Internet for nearby restaurant choices, and we picked Chaplin’s – a Japanese/Ramen eatery just one block from our hotel. We took a leisurely walk on a pleasant early evening and settled in at a table at Chaplin’s. It wasn’t crowded yet, and Aaron, our bartender/ server, quizzed my wife and daughter on what they liked and didn’t like about drinks. 

Aaron gave us a winning smile and told us to sit back and relax while he worked his magic. He custom mixed different drinks for them, and they were excellent – truly the work of an artist.
He’s not smiling in the picture, but he was all smiles all the while he looked after us. 

I ordered a beer I had never seen before: Green City Hazy IPA draft. I’ve been a beer drinker for            more than 50 years, and this beer was exceptional. It was cold, with a hint of citrus, and a perfect pour from Aaron - one of the best beers I’ve ever had. At 7% alcohol, it’s stronger than regular beer, but we weren’t driving, and I enjoyed every last drop of this outstanding brew (from the Other Half Brewing Company of Brooklyn, New York.) 

For dinner, we each ordered different Ramen-type meals, and they were excellent. Chef Myo Htun is a veteran and apparently, quite well-known. I had the 'Veggie Shio': bok choy, Napa cabbage, carrots, onions, bean sprouts, scallions, and Wakame broth. Outstanding. My wife had 'Shoyu': pork butt chashu, ground pork, bamboo shoots, with chicken broth. She loved it, especially the broth. We all ate exceptionally well.

The next day, we explored the Smithsonian National Zoo. As we wandered the zoo, we were soon hungry, and we stopped at one of the outdoor eating spots. Like the Pilot Truck Stop in Virginia, the zoo offers Sbarro food. I had already enjoyed Sbarro pizza, so I opted for a pepperoni and cheese stromboli, and once again, it was delicious. Just as the pizza slice at Pilot, the stromboli was perfect and thoroughly enjoyable. 

 

That night back at the hotel, we discussed our dinner options. On our first day, in the taxi from the Lincoln Memorial back to the Cambria, the taxi driver, a young man from Eritrea in East Africa, told us he knew of a very good Ethiopian restaurant close to our hotel. He explained that Eritrean and Ethiopian food were similar, so he was quite familiar with the food offerings. We had passed the Family Ethiopian Restaurant last night on our walk to Chaplins, so we knew where it was – just a half-block from the Cambria.

This was a small, family type place, and we were seated immediately by a smiling Ethiopian woman. None of us had experienced Ethiopian cuisine, so we asked our server for suggestions. She took the time to explain the various foods, and she recommended the family platter. We had lamb, spicy Wat (with seasoned ground beef), a chickpea dish, cabbage and potatoes, beets, and several other items common to Ethiopian dinner tables. The food was served on a large platter on a large circle of injera, a spongy, pancake-like flatbread, along with individual rolls of the same bread for each diner. The method is to tear off a piece of injera and use it to scoop a mouthful of food. We were very pleased with the restaurant choice, and we thoroughly enjoyed this interesting experiment. 

We had several other food triumphs on this trip, including a tasty muffuletta sandwich in the café at the Smithsonian Natural History Museum in D.C, a pulled pork dinner with steak fries at Texas Roadhouse in Knoxville, Tennessee, and ice cream from Scoops Homemade Ice Cream, on Central Ave. in Hot Springs National Park, Arkansas (mine was strawberry cheesecake). 

 

As mentioned, eating on the road is a bit of a gamble, as restaurants are often unknowns unless you’ve been through that town before. We were open to trying new foods, and our dining choices and experiences on this trip proved to be fun, interesting, tasty, and filling – a major bonus for this vacation trip.

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Larry Manch is an author, teacher, guitar player, freelance writer, and columnist. He has written 24 books; available in paperback and e-book on Amazon.com.

He writes about sports for Season Tickets, food and travel on Miles & Meals, and music/guitars on The Backbeat.

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