May 21 was, according to some, Rapture Day, the start of 5 months of judgment days, the start of end times, all culminating with the end of the world in October.
The WBC decided to kick all this off with breakfast at the Star Diner in White Plains. It’s not every restaurant that has to go up against the question “Was this a place worthy of Rapture Day breakfast?”
We posed this question to ourselves at the end of our meal. (Well, not all of us. Patrick was absent from breakfast, leading the remaining WBC members to assume he had flown over to Hong Kong in order to be raptured at their 6:00 local time.)
So, was our breakfast rapture-worthy? Had Patrick, in fact, been raptured? Read on to find out.
Star Diner
66 1/2 E Post Rd
White Plains, NY 10601 (Map it!)
Attendees: Shelley, Jeffrey, Reid, Sylvia
Was Star Diner really where I wanted to have breakfast on what could have been the last decent day on the planet? No, not really. But, it had been a year since we had last made an attempt to dine here (and left because there were no free seats), and Sylvia’s argument went something like this: “Well, we have to try it sometime, and it will be easy on our wallets.” And so I agreed to go to the Star Diner bright and early. On rapture day. Because it would be cheap, and goodness knows I want to have as much money left in my pocket when the rapture comes.
Accidental hot yoga the night before left me a bit sluggish and I arrived about 10 minutes late, apologizing to the group as I took my seat in the small booth in this small diner. I don’t exaggerate, Star Diner is very small. Hole in the wall is a term I’d use to describe it. Last year I remember driving past it several times before finally finding it. It’s kind of hidden, smushed between some nondescript store fronts on Post Road. I think the story is that it’s one of those trailer type diners. On the inside the cooking area is right behind the counter. You hear all the orders being shouted out by the waiters and waitresses.
I took a quick glance at the single page breakfast menu and settled on the first meal my eye gravitated to: a western omelette.
Now, a western omelette is supposed to come with ham, peppers, and onions. However, the peppers and onions were undetectable in my omelette, with the only filling I could notice being the large chunks of ham. The Star Diner strikes me as the kind of place that shuns vegetables in favor of meat. The side of home fries was plentiful, but tasted like they had been soaked in bacon drippings. I did not care for the flavor. My wheat toast came soaked in a bath of butter. My own fault for forgetting to ask for butter on the side. The eggs were well cooked, but I was disappointed by the uneven distribution of the fillings. If I had wanted a ham omelette, I would have asked for that, and saved myself a couple of cents.
Despite the crowd, and the steady stream of people coming in looking for a seat, our waiter didn’t rush over with our check the moment we finished our meals. Actually, we were allowed to linger for quite some time post-meal, and we had to finally hail our waiter to request the check. I think this was the cheapest meal the WBC has had in a while, which is good. However, I think the only positive thing about my meal was the price. Does the cheap price make up for the gross feeling that my greasy breakfast left me with? Eh.
Good thing I went on a 10,000 step walk with Sylvia and Jeff after our meal. After all, I had to burn off the greasy calories to prepare myself for the glorious baseball food that awaited me the next day. (See the Appendix to this week’s blog at the end of this post for more about that!)
Well, it’s rapture day. What better way to celebrate than by eating at the Star Diner?
It’s a small place right across the street from the White Plains Hospital. It almost looks like a hole in the wall or at least a pile of bricks. The place is tiny. It probably can’t hold more than 20 people, and that’s pushing it. So, what do I order?
Sylvia mentioned to order the home fries “well done.” I love potatoes. It’s one of my favorite things to eat. So, I ordered my home fries well done. What else to order on this day of rapture? Well, it was only about 19:30 and the time of rapture was suppose to be 6pm local time, so why not load up on the food? I decide to stuff my face with two pancakes, two eggs over easy, and a beef sausage. All this also goes with my side of “well done” home fries. I can’t wait!
Time goes by and conversation is conversated and finally the food arrives in glorious fashion. By glorious fashion, I mean a lot of plates. It seemed like they had one plate for each item you ordered. On eplate for the eggs, one plate for the pancakes, one plate for the home fries, and throw in a whole plate for the maple syrup container, which probably didn’t need an entire plate of its own. After some quick consolidation of foods, I could get down to business. The food could also be called a grease bucket. Everything had a greasy film to it. Not a disgusting greasy film, just an amount of grease that was noticeable. It actually made everything taste pretty darn good. It was heavy though, mainly because of all the grease. Eggs were eggs with added grease; potatoes were potatoes with added grease; and the sausage was beef sausage with I can only assume was the normal amount of grease. This is a delicious rapture day breakfast. The pancakes were also delicious. Something about them made me want to shove my face into them. They was cooked perfectly. It might have been the grease they were cooked in, but hey, I’m not complaining. One thing I did notice was that I ordered two pancakes, and I got three. This made me very happy, but also very full.
Star Diner is a small, local place to eat. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone from out of town who’s looking for an amazing breakfast experience. If you live in the neighborhood, hit it up and if you like it, great. If not, it’s a hole in the wall anyway and you really don’t have to give it anymore thought. However, if you do like it, you might want to walk it off. I know I had to. Some of us took the dogs out for a walk after the heavy meal.
The Case: The Star Diner v. The Westchester Breakfast Club
The Venue: Across the way from the emergency room of the White Plains Hospital
The Facts: Nestled between two buildings (it actually has a 1/2 address) the Star Diner is just that; built from and old-fashioned dining car of a train. It’s a throwback to the days before Amtrak replaced cooks cooking on grills with stewards nuking in microwaves.
It makes for a surprisingly intimate dining experience.
I’ve had family members at the WPH emergency room more often than I’d like to recount. One of the many downsides of that experience is that you don’t necessarily get to eat at regular hours. That might explain why my past trips to the Star Diner have lacked some of the atmospherics of this visit: the noisy scene behind the counter; the
old timers reading the newspaper and loudly commenting on the stories to no one in particular; and the EMTs standing in the corner like the cool kids, sipping coffee, refusing to visibly betray whether they are just starting or just ending a shift.
In the past, I’ve found the whole “train car wedged between two buildings” thing more kitschy than anything else. What was the point of dragging this obsolete relic into the middle of town and sticking where, quite literally, the sun don’t shine? The food wasn’t bad, but wouldn’t you be better off with a little more space and a little less
stamped aluminum?
But when you add the people to it, the car takes on a life of its own, and really makes the Star Diner a special place to eat greasy food. The shape of the dining car forces people’s attention toward the counter, meaning that everyone gets tuned in to the action of taking orders, preparing food, and getting plates to the tables. The cramped
quarters acquire a pulse, which runs through its occupants and makes everything feel alive.
The Verdict: Off hours, a decent place to get a quick bite to eat. At peak times, an experience worth going out of your way for.
The Star Diner is what a diner used to be and, really, should be: Small and cozy, busy and lively.
We had tried to come here before, but that time it was packed with a considerable wait, so we went to Splendid Coffee Shop instead. This time, I decided we should arrive early to ensure we get in with minimal wait. Jeffrey and I were early to our 9AM meeting time, and we were able to snag the last available booth. The place is tiny with only five booths available and a line of stools at the counter. No wonder it fills up fast.
As we waited, we each got a cup of coffee. With coffee prices up, Star Diner has limited the coffee refills to one. I drank my coffee very slowly, hoping to make it last through the meal.
The food choices were simple. Eggs, pancakes, French toast, oatmeal, and omelettes were the main choices available. There was nothing outrageous and everything was familiar. I chose the scrambled eggs with cheese and sausage, which came with home fries and toast. I also had a side of one pancake. There was an option to get one pancake on the menu, therefore I must try it.
The food arrived in waves. Pretty soon our tiny table was filled with plates, with nowhere to put them. After a little plate jockeying and food stacking, we were settled and ready to eat.
The eggs were scrambled with American cheese; the home fries could have used some extra crisping, but were flavorful. The sausage links were just as greasy and juicy as one would expect from a good sausage. The pancake was the best part. It was golden brown with a nice crisp along the edges. I suspect the syrup that came out of the jug was not real maple syrup. But since it came out of a jug, I’ll let it slide. Nothing is more wasteful than those little individual packets of glycol they serve at diners elsewhere (and yes, Star Diner also served the milk for the coffee out of containers as opposed to those little disposable packages).
All in all, it came out to $12 a person, which isn’t shabby at all for a weekend breakfast.
The czar says: A good, hearty, classic American breakfast, prices that I can live with, and a strangely comforting atmosphere. What’s not to like? Go early on weekends, and with parties less than 4. The place fills up fast and is tiny with no way to accommodate any party greater than 4 people.
Appendix (aka, Shelley and Jeffrey’s Funday Sunday)
Take me out to the ballgame!
But not without a solid breakfast in my belly first.
Jeffrey had purchased a pair of tickets to the final game of the May Yankees-Mets subway series, at Yankee stadium. And these were no ordinary pair of tickets. Oh no, these were tickets to the Jim Beam Suite. That’s right, suite. Yes, we’re just that important.
We made plans to take the MetroNorth from Ossining down to the stadium, and we’d have to depart at 11:30. I’d need a solid breakfast before the long journey to the Bronx, and so we decided to get some morning grub from one of our favorite cafes, the Cidade Cafe on Main Street in Ossining. You’ll recall that at our visit to Cidade this past January, we all raved about the breakfast sandwiches.
We got three egg, cheese, and sausage sandwiches on Portugese rolls and headed over to Chez Sylvia to eat. At my choosing, we also got a giant Bavarian cream donut. It just looked so perfect, so inviting. Buy me, it said. Enjoy me, it said. Ok, I said.
The smells wafting from the bag on the short car ride to Sylvia’s were incredibly tempting. I had to remind myself that it wasn’t that far to Sylvia’s, that I could wait to eat my sandwich until we got there. I was quite hungry, you see. I suspect it’s because my 3-mile hike with Jeff and Sylvia on Saturday had burned up not only the calories from breakfast on Saturday, but also preemptively burned the calories I would consume the rest of the day on Saturday.
In Sylvia’s kitchen, I unwrapped the foil to reveal what is perhaps the most perfect breakfast sandwich I have ever seen. The three of us agreed that if and when the WBC starts placing restaurants in “Best…” categories, Cidade would definitely win for Best Breakfast Sandwich. The Portugese roll adds an extra heft to the sandwich. If you go to a typical deli and get a breakfast sandwich on one of those standard round rolls, you’ll find that the roll tends to get soggy, and the cheese just melts into the roll. Not the case with the Cidade sandwich. This roll can hold its own against the contents of the sandwich. Also, Cidade uses Muenster cheese, which is a lighter, less gooey option for breakfast. The egg was well cooked, not too heavy, and the sausage was wonderfully spiced. I have no qualms at all about crowning Cidade Cafe with the WBC “Best Breakfast Sandwich” award.
Unfortunately, the Bavarian donut, which had called out to me like a siren in the night, didn’t quite live up to my expectations. The cake part was fluffy, yes, and the filling of cream generous. However, there was an underlying flavor to the donut that I couldn’t quite place, and that I didn’t care for. It might have been grease or the oil that the donut was cooked in. I’m not sure, and neither were Jeff or Sylvia. But I just didn’t like it and wound up not finishing my quarter of the donut.
But that’s ok, the donut doesn’t turn me off to Cidade. There are plenty of other yummy desserts to choose from. And when I want a good breakfast sandwich, Cidade can’t be beat. The consistent quality paired with the very reasonable price (our three sandwiches, donut, and two coffees came to under $20) make Cidade a breakfast spot worth returning to.
WBC groupie
June 10, 2011 at 10:13 am
I’ve only had lunch at the Star. On one of my walks I noticed it was an old rail car diner, so I said “What the heck”. Typical diner grub. For the record, I had a turkey club (very good), fries (lame diner fries), and a Coke…about $10 with tip. Not sure of their hours, but if they were a bit closer to Mamaronek Ave, they’d be the perfect low-cost, late-night, soak-up this alcohol, gathering place.
Patrick
July 9, 2011 at 9:25 am
But was I raptured?