Waffle House (Lawrence, IN)
7290 Pendleton PikeBy now, you know what happens when I travel south. I find a Waffle House.
I went to Indianapolis last week for a couple days of work. My co-worker had to stay a day longer than me so we drove separate cars and planned to meet at her hotel to drop off her car. We were heading downtown for our assignment and didn’t see the need to pay for parking twice.
The plan was to meet about 9:00 on the northeast side of Indy. I always get paranoid I’m going to be late and left earlier than I needed to. I got to town around 8:15.
I asked my phone if there were any Waffle Houses nearby when I was stuck in traffic on I-465. Of course, Google quickly found one just a few miles away. I still had 45 minutes and I was ten minutes from our meet up point so I snuck in time for a little breakfast.
Waffle House in Lawrence, Indiana is on Pendleton Pike just off I-465. The restaurant is on the north side of the road which puts it in Lawrence. The other side of the street is Indianapolis proper. I would describe the building but if you’ve seen one Waffle House, you’ve pretty much seen them all.
I walked in the restaurant and started to sit at the lunch counter. About 3 waitresses told me that section was closed. OK. There was a table open along the wall so I headed over there and sat down. I felt bad about taking up a whole table by myself but there were signs on the rest of the seats that those sections were closed. A waitress quickly came behind me to take my order.
I started off with a Coke but unfortunately, the waitress mishead me and thought I said coffee. I’m not a coffee drink so I apologized profusely and asked for a Coke instead. She took the cup back to the kitchen and grabbed the pop instead. I apologized again when she came back. As my wife will tell you, sometimes I talk like I have crap in my mouth.
I still have no idea what the full menu is at Waffle House. I know they have more than what’s listed on the menus on the table. I’ve never figured out why they don’t put the entire menu out. This time the menus on the table had less than they have in the past. I knew I wanted a Steak and Eggs so I just ordered without asking for a regular menu.
Waffle House has the option for a sirloin or T-Bone steak. I typically stick with the sirloin because I feel like you get more meat. The steak is pretty thin and it’s usually cooked pretty well done. The expectations for a Waffle House steak aren’t very high. The thing I also love about them is the crispy, salty bits around the edges from being cooked on the flat top. I ordered my eggs over medium and my toast white. The hash browns…the oh, so delicious hash browns, I got with ham and cheese. I think that’s chunked and covered? I didn’t have a menu to order the proper way. She recited it back to me the proper way but I wasn’t paying attention.
My bill was a little over $12 which is paid at a cash register near the entrance.
I typically annoy my travel companions by forcing them to a Waffle House with me late at night but this time, I spared my colleague by getting my Waffle House fix before we met up for the day.
Waffle House is the ultimate greasy spoon. It’s not fancy but I will never not stop at a Waffle House when the opportunity presents itself.
SW Michigan Dining 