Restaurant Review / Good food at good prices
Rustic-looking Linda Lou’s offers home cooking, great breakfasts
CAMBRIA — How do you know when a place has a really good breakfast?
When you arrive at lunchtime, craving a homemade burger, and still order the corned beef hash, that’s how.
That’s exactly what happened on a recent trip out Wilson way. We headed for the Labor Day flea market and, after walking a spell in the hot sun, worked up quite an appetite. As we headed back up the road, I remembered having an awesome meal some time back at a new place atop Route 425.
At that time, I don’t think it had been open for long. In fact, there wasn’t even a sign out front identifying Linda Lou’s Cafe. But there were cars around, and we stopped inside and had a wonderful breakfast. It was so good that it came to mind again as I passed yard sale after yard sale en route to the ridge.
“You guys feel like trying a little place that specializes in home cooking?” I asked. “They’ve got great breakfasts!”
With a positive response from my dining party, I pulled into the angular parking lot that half surrounds Linda Lou’s. By this time, they had erected a sign out front — which is the only way I learned the name of the place. Before that, it was known as “that new place in the old building at [Routes] 425 and 104.”
It’s a rustic-looking place, featuring what appear to be hand-made, log-type tables and chairs fashioned from big, thick pieces of pine. Roomy, but not real comfortable.
Functional would be a key word here, if you know what I mean. The rest of the place is quaint and countrylike. There are a few tables and a counter, and that’s about it. The air conditioning comes compliments of the windows, when open.
A meat-and-potatoes type of place, if ever there was one.
But don’t they always have some of the best food? You know it.
You aren’t going to go broke sampling the fare here. Breakfast is probably going to set you back five bucks, unless you are truly starving; lunch maybe a buck or two more. Dinner is available Wednesday through Friday, with limited selections.
Linda Lou’s offers daily specials, with most of the offerings home-cooked. You can get breakfast until 1 p. m. daily and all day Sunday.
We all pretty much opted for breakfast on our visit, despite the lateness of our arrival. I had the corned beef hash and eggs, sunny side up, of course, so that they could be folded into the hash. That’s the only way to really enjoy good, crispy grilled hash. Top it with ketchup, and fork it atop some toasted rye bread, and insert into mouth. Enjoy. Repeat.
This is my secret recipe for starting a day off right. And at Linda Lou’s it cost only $4.50.
Daughter Meagan, apparently not as hungry as some of us, ordered an egg sandwich for $2. I wasn’t expecting much, judging by the price, and was shocked to see a monster of a concoction, served on fresh, thickly sliced hunks of bread that were toasted to a golden brown. It really looked like something I’d make at home, and she launched into it as if propelled from Cape Canaveral.
“I love it,” she said, still basking in the surprise telephone call informing her she had just been cast in her first college play at Niagara University.
Wife Teresa and our guest for this trip, Raphael, each ordered the Not-So-Hungry-Man breakfast, which, at $4.25, was a fairly substantial offering of one egg, one pancake, one slice of bacon, one sausage and home fries. Raphy chugged his down with two or three freshly mixed glasses of chocolate milk, which he declared to be the finest he had ever had.
The not-so-hungry plateful represented “just the perfect amount of food for me,” said Teresa.
Granted, breakfast is breakfast, and it’s hard to scramble it up too badly, but in the case of Linda Lou’s it was the little things that set it apart — the chocolate milk; the thick, fresh toast; the crispy crust on the hash; and, of course, the prices.
Linda Lou’s also offers a variety of deli, club and submarine sandwiches, with prices topping out around $6.50.
There’s the usual French toast, omelettes, pancakes and the like for breakfast, including a great-sounding “breakfast bowl” for $4.95 that is definitely on our radar for next trip.
It’s nothing fancy, to be sure, but it’s good food at good prices, served by good people. Sounds like a winning combination.
Linda Lou’s Cafe
4074 Ridge Road, Cambria (434-5496)
★★★½
(Out of four)
Favorite dish: Corned beef hash and eggs
Needs work: Exterior sign
Healthy choices:A few
Price range: Light on the wallet
Service: Excellent, friendly
Noise level: Quiet
Wheelchair access: Yes, but small
Parking: Small lot Kid appeal: No problem
Fall hours: Open 7 a. m. to 2p. m. daily, with dinners until 8 p. m. Wednesday through Friday.
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