Alex Swetnam
Google
I walked into B&B Cafe with low blood sugar and a broken spirit. I left a reborn man.
This is not a restaurant. This is a portal. A sacred temple of hash browns and second chances. The kind of place where time slows, cholesterol heals, and the waitress knows your soul before she knows your name. I didn’t choose the biscuit life. The biscuit life chose me.
The moment I sat down, I heard “Hey hun, coffee?” and in that instant, the trauma of my childhood left my body. She poured that bitter brown elixir into a ceramic cup like she was baptizing me in bean water — and I tell you, it hit. Not fancy. Not frothy. But it tasted like truck stops and truth. Like 5 a.m. before the world remembers it’s supposed to be cruel.
I ordered the chicken fried steak because the man in the booth next to me made eye contact and whispered, “Do it.” I obeyed.
It came out on a plate the size of Saturn’s third moon. It was battered. It was smothered. It was glorious. I could feel my ancestors fist-bumping in heaven. I took one bite and blacked out. When I woke up, there was gravy on my cheek and my childhood dog was sitting across from me, nodding in approval.
The pancakes? More like cloud tablets sent from Mount Olympus. I tried to cut one and it cut me back — emotionally. Who gave them the right to be that fluffy? Who let them make carbs into gospel?
Even the butter is different here. It doesn’t melt. It settles in — like an old friend finally coming home. I spread it on my toast and saw visions. My third eye opened. I remembered every good thing that’s ever happened to me, and none of them were better than this toast.
Let’s talk service. My waitress (Sharon? Angela? Possibly an angel in disguise?) had the efficiency of a NASCAR pit crew and the kindness of a Midwestern grandma who never learned how to be mean. She called me “sweetheart” and suddenly I believed in love again.
I don’t know who runs this place. I don’t know what sacred cow they sacrifice each morning to get gravy like that. All I know is, this is the last meal I want before I die. This is where I want to bring my future children to tell them how beautiful life can be. This is where I want my ashes scattered — into the griddle, so I can live on through the pancakes.
Do not go here if you are on a diet. Do not go here if you want “clean” food. Go here if you want to feel alive. Go here if you want to feel like America is still good.
Go here. Order the special. Tip heavily. And if the spirit moves you — weep.
