Dartmouth De Gustibus: Food for Thought

EATING A MEAL without having to wash dishes is usually worth the price. At least for bachelors and Dartmouth students. Throughout the years, restaurants combining modest cost with honest portions have come and gone on the Hanover scene. Some have gained immortal reputations, and every year as the reunion classes gather in June, alumni can be seen, families in tow, searching for those booths and counter stools of yesteryear, recalling long-faded epiphanies.

But those were the days of yore, the days of Ma Smalley's, the Rood Club, the Indian Bowl, the Wigwam, and Mac's. Where do the students of today escape the tedium of Thayer Hall? And what is the food like now? After spending a month in search of the answers, we present here a cursory dining guide to those sturdy eateries, new and old, which serve the men and women of Dartmouth.

HANOVER

Chao Chao Mein, Allen Street. (Daily except Monday, 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.; 4:30 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.)

Chao Chao Mein is Hanover's only Chinese restaurant. It occupies what used to be known as the Midget Diner. Arranging for his family in Taiwan to join him here, a Dartmouth student secured the defunct Midget a few years ago, and since then the locals have thrived on the oriental cooking of his relatives.

There are over 60 items on the menu, and it would be difficult to mention - or sample - all of them. Everything we've tried has been carefully cooked, and fun to eat. The waitresses are friendly and delighted to help customers choose a suitable meal. Most selections are enough for two adults. A few of our favorites: butterfly shrimp with bacon - shrimp and bacon spicily fried with shredded onions ($4.25); Szechuan-spiced chicken (a hometown specialty and sentimental favorite of the proprietor) chunks of chicken with mushrooms, bamboo shoots, and peanuts in a spicy hot sauce ($3.85); moo shi pork - shredded pork with egg, bamboo shoots, fungus and vegetables, plus mandarin pancakes ($3.65); subgum wonton - deep fried, with mushrooms, pea-pods, water chestnuts, bamboo shoots, and other Chinese vegetables - mildly spicy ($4.85). Tea is served with each meal.

Chao Chao Mein will cater parties or prepare orders to take out. An excellent place for four or more people to dine.

Hal's, in the Casque & Gauntlet alley, next to Walt & Ernie's Barbershop. (Daily; breakfast, lunch, and dinner.)

Hal's has been a mainstay in the fleet of Hanover eateries for a generation or so of Dartmouth students. The interior still reflects the campus mural and cartoon caricatures of the original - only the in-laid Indian head is gone - and the wooden booths and low-backed counter stools remain unchanged. However, the food and service have undergone a healthy revision since the old days.

Today's Hal's specializes in eco-nomically priced, home-cooked dishes with a flair toward natural and organic cooking. The cheesetomatoburgers (95¢) are still available, but homemade specialties changed daily, like Canadian cheese soup and salads, always crisp and abundant, are Hal's true calling. Try the veal scaloppine with buttered rice and broccoli ($2.25), or the turkey salad bowl ($1.85), or the vegetarian special - spinach cheese souffle, brown rice, tossed salad ($1.50).

Hal's also bakes bread and pies daily, and serves one of the few bottomless cups of coffee in the area (still 15¢). And there are three varieties of herbal tea: peppermint, rosehip, and camomile.

Breakfast at Hal's is pretty much like always - two eggs and toast (85¢), ham and cheese omelette (51.35), French wholewheat toast (75¢), etc. - with one notable exception: the only bagels (35¢) in the area.

Eating at Hal's is fun. The service is fast, and the people who work there are friendly. The food is cooked sensibly and well. The proportions are full and you'll get your money's worth. It's a nice place.

The Last Call, in the Casque & Gauntlet alley. (Daily, 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m.; Sunday, noon to midnight.)

This is the newest underground restaurant/pub in town. Located in what used to be a shoe repair shop, the Last Call is a spacious cavern featuring beer, sandwiches, and salads. There is Atmosphere - jukebox, television, and a woodburning fireplace - and pretty waitresses to attend your order.

There are seven choices in sandwiches, including roast beef ($1.75), Rueben (51.85), and grinder (950). All of them are hefty- The cheese plate - Swiss and Cheddar with salami, ham, and bread wedges (52.00) - goes well with a pitcher of domestic or imported beer ($1.60 - $2.25).

The Last Call is a warm, friendly place, especially with a roaring fire.

The Road Runner, a mobile restaurant, usually parked in front of Sanborn House.

The 'wich-man tolling for thee in dormitories and fraternities faded away a few years ago. Now, the Road Runner, a converted panel truck equipped with grill and refrigerator, serves up sandwiches, mild drink, cigarettes, candy, and other munchies. Stationed in convenient campus locations during the lunch hour, and in the evenings until well after midnight, this traveling sub shop features several varieties: the peppersteak ($1.25) and the sausage ($1.35) are best. Look for a silver and green truck with a turtle painted on the side.

Brookes Agora, Hopkins Center. (Most of the time weekdays; Sunday evenings.)

Stand-out items are quarter-pound hamburgers (60¢) and cheeseburgers (70¢). The soft ice cream cones are decidedly bargainrate at 20¢.

In ancient Greece an agora was a marketplace; in the Hopkins Center it is a snack bar.

Tony's Pizza, Allen Street. (Daily, 5:00 p.m. to 1:00 a.m.)

Tony's Pizza is the only place to go for pizza in Hanover. It is the only place that serves pizza in Hanover. Pizza is the only edible quantity, except for beer and soda, served at Tony's.

The customer has the responsibility for design, while Tony's staff executes construction. Unfortunately, the grand style of throwing floured lumps into gracefully floating pizzas has been lost to a rolling machine, but then a pizza is a pizza and Tony's are as good as any. Price depends on selection: the small version, at nine inches, costs $1.00 plus 25¢ for garnishes like anchovies, mushrooms, and pepperoni. The 12-inch version is $2.00. Bottled domestic and imported beer. Jukeboxes at each booth.

P & C Deli, P & C Supermarket, South Main Street. (Daily, including Sunday, during store hours.)

This is not a restaurant, but a little known sandwich shop worth a stop to pick up an inexpensive lunch for the road, for a football game or picnic. It's completely stocked with traditional deli items such as sliced meats, cheese, salad, and fruit, and even egg rolls, Greek olives, rice pudding, and fresh oysters.

The P & C sandwiches are huge and a bargain: liverwurst (620), pastrami (810), and roast beef ($1.02) are worthy samples. Cheese (5¢ extra): mozzarella, provolone, edam, muenster, cheddar, American.

At nearby counters are bananas, cookies, diapers, hair curlers, and beer.

The Bull's Eye, 72 South Main Street. (Daily except Sunday; lunch and dinner.)

The Bull's Eye'is a cozy restaurant and tavern that serves a separate menu at lunch and dinner. The dining room accom- modates about 40 people, and it is usually crowded.

The luncheon menu offers four choices: smoked bratwurst on French bread ($1.60), with rarebit ($1.80); half-pound hamburger on dark rye ($1.90), with rarebit ($2.10); shish kebab ($2.25); and steak sandwich ($3.50). All come with hot German potato salad, cole slaw, or sauerkraut, and all are highly recommended. Especially the hamburger with rarebit, probably the best buy in a sit-down lunch around Hanover.

The dinner menu is also fixed around a few proven selections: steak ($4.25 - $7.50); shish kebab ($5.25), and lamb chops ($6.25). The beef is prime and delectable.

Wine, mixed drinks, and beer.

The service, while cheerful, can be slow.

Cheese, Etc., Lebanon Street, directly behind Hopkins Center. (Daily, 10:00 a.m. to midnight; Sundays, noon to midnight.)

Combining delicatessen, food pantry, pastry shop and beer garden, this can be confusion, etc., but pleasantly so. Featuring sandwiches of Continental flair made from imported cheeses, sausages, and hams on homebaked bread, this little bistro is a hospitable place for lunch or an evening snack. The pastries are on a par with any to be found in a city-bound cafe. Understandably, as the owner and manager is a French lady who knows her puff pastry. It's the only place around for croissants.

Sandwiches, available day and night, cover a spectrum of tastes from spicy sausage to the mildest of cheese. Try the Pompidou - ham, cheese, salami, lettuce and tomato ($1.80), or the Georgie - Swiss cheese and corned beef on pumper-nickel ($1.70).

There are hot sandwiches such as the Croque Monsieur - swiss on ham ($1.15); and quiche lorraine ($1.25 per portion), shepard's pie, and fried chicken.

As for desserts, the fresh banana cake and German chocolate cake are not to be missed.

Cheese Etc. also stocks teas, coffees, condiments, and hard-to-find gourmet items.

Lou's, 30 South Main Street (Daily except Sunday; breakfast, lunch, dinner.)

Lou's, in its 28th year, is the "oldest restaurant in the valley," according to its owner, manager, and namesake, Lou Bressett. Town and gown do meet here, and so do students, tourists, and alumni. On the walls are photographs of many of Lou's distinguished regulars, past and present. Among them is Robert Frost, who once remarked that more town business was conducted at Lou's than any other place in Hanover.

As a matter of course, the food at Lou's is pleasant and honest. Breakfast is of the juice-egg-bacon variety, but the donuts - plain, sugared, glazed, jelly are homemade and definitely not run-of-the-mill. Alas, coffee refills are 150.

There are nearly 35 sandwiches on the luncheon menu; the best are the doubledeckers at $1.75. Supplementing the regulars are such typical offerings as a salad of Italian antipasto ($1.75), a large bowl of oyster stew ($1.15), and Welsh rarebit with bacon strips on waffle ($1.85).

We have singularly enjoyed Lou's dinners of baked haddock au gratin ($1.95), roast turkey with Grandma's Herb stuffing ($2.95), and broiled pork chops with apple sauce ($3.95).

Meriting special endorsement: the short lead - milkshake with egg (75¢), and the long lead - milkshake with egg and malt (80¢)

The Village Green, Main Street. (Daily; breakfast, lunch, dinner.)

The Village Green is an ice cream parlor that also serves meals. If it's your birthday, and you can prove it, they will give you a free ice cream sundae, and that's a good deal. The usual sandwiches can be ordered here, and so can special "luncheon platters" and "dinner platters." Breakfast is available.

Our choice is the ice cream, ascending from a single-dip cone at 320 to the banana royale at $1.25.

Peter Christian's 39 South Main Street. (Daily except Sunday, 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 a.m.)

This is the oldest restaurant/pub in town. It opened a year ago at about the same time the legal drinking age in New Hampshire was reduced to 18. Also underground, it specializes in "victuals and strong waters," features the art of local talent on the walls as paintings, photographs, and drawings; on the tables as pottery; and in person as entertainers. Dartmouth students wait tables and tend bar.

Peter Christian's victuals include homemade soups, a "super salad" ($2.00) that is a challenge to any saladmonger, fine cheese-and-sausage and cheese-and-meat boards (the latter being $2.75), beef stew, and an array of truly excellent sandwiches.

"Strong waters" define as domestic and imported beers on draught or by the bottle. The domestic is $1.75 by the pitcher. There is Pickwick ale to be had at 75¢; devotees favor it directly from the bottle.

P.C.'s is a fine place to eat anytime, or drink beer(s). It is small, usually active, and often crowded. Success has spawned imitators up the block.

The Tavern Under the Green, Hanover Inn (Nightly to midnight)

Back a decade or so before there was a Hopkins Center and before the Hanover Inn became the new Hanover Inn, there was a local hot-spot of sorts at the Inn Coffee Shop. And there once flourished a soidisant cocktail lounge, which suffered between underaged patrons and sticky liquor laws. The Inn never gave up as a watering hole for the serious imbiber, but it did, for a while, cut back facilities for a potentially high volume in student trade.

Then came a lowering of the legal drinking age to 18. Not to be left out of the race, the Inn converted an underground meeting room, the Tavern, into a public convenience serving up beer, mixed drinks, and a few sandwiches.

The Tavern is not really a restaurant although occasionally it provides a buffet dinner on selected nights. The fare typically includes a salad and choice between lasagna or corned beef sandwiches, with the price hovering around $1.75, depending on the offering Sandwiches are available at the bar until they run out. (Don't get hungry in the Tavern after 10:00 p.m.)

The ambiance is Dartmouth. Scores of photographs on the walls depict Big Greeners in action. Most nights will find some sort of live entertainment in the form of a folksinging undergraduate or a back country minstrel.

Open on Sundays but closed on Mondays, the Tavern will be temporarily displaced during the current renovation of the Inn.

ENVIRONS

Riverside Grill, Enfield Road, Lebanon. (Closed Mondays.)

No dining guide to the Upper Valley would be complete without mention of the Riverside Grill. Unfortunately for the year-round denizens of our region, the "Ver-side" only operates between the months of May and October. But from those early days of warm weather through the summer heat and up until the leaves begin their fall in earnest, this place is a haven for those who want the homliest in cooking. The mammoth servings are legendary. A full plate of fried clams or an order of liver and onions, offset on the side with a dish of green beans and salad, will seldom tip the check over $2.00. Yet satisfaction is assured.

The conviviality of the surroundings - the famed tapestries, the blown glassware, and crafted ashtrays - invites a loyal clientele. Once you've eaten at the River-side, you will always return. The consistently heavy crowds attest to this.

Unique and oft-imitated. A must.

Papa Giuseppe, 25 South Main Street, White River Junction. (Daily, 9:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.)

Papa serves the best Italian food around. Besides, the prices are low. Except for a few American dishes, everything is distinctly Italian from the appetizers to the desserts. In between are dozens of specialties to bring thoughts of leaning towers and ample girths.

The pasta, served with salad and bread and butter, takes four forms: spaghetti, ziti, shells, and rigatoni. Smother them in any of ten ways to satisfy the most demanding of hungers. A few we've liked: mushroom, meatball, and sausage ($3.25); garlic, oil, and anchovies ($2.50); clam sauce - red or white ($2.80).

If not simple pasta, try the ravioli, the manicotti, or the baked lasagna. There are almost limitless varieties, and none exceeds $4.00.

The veal dishes earn special praise. They include salad, bread and butter, and a side order of spaghetti or potato: cutlets ($5.25); cutlet a la parmigiana ($5.75); scaloppine ($5.25); cacciaitore ($5.95).

Papa Giuseppe's subs are among the choicest we've ever sampled. There are 18 varieties ($1.10 to $1.95). With a glass of beer, one of the best lunches around.

Polka Dot, White River Junction. (Daily, 6:00 a.m. to midnight).

Known affectionately as the Dot, this little diner has served late-night meals to countless nodding Dartmouth students. nee the Dot was an all-nighter. Then it was open until 2:00 a.m. Alas, service ends these days at the relatively early hour of midnight. Known to thousands as the Rome of the bo-burger, one must try it to understand.

Long a mystery, the origin of the name of this 25-year-old eatery is simplicity itself. "We have some in-laws in Ohio who owned a diner," related the Dot's owner. "They called theirs the Polka Dot. We thought it was a pretty good name." Voila.

Rated for its excellent atmosphere, complete jukebox, and yeoman execution of traditional diner fare, the Dot continues to offer a colorful alternative to the Hanover dining scene.

The Four Aces Diner, Main Street, West Lebanon.

It used to be that no matter the time of night, Dartmouth students could count on black coffee and food at the Four Aces. No more. This venerable diner now shuts down at 9:00 p.m. and is closed on Sundays. And according to the manager, in the last couple of years she's been able to do without the students who sometimes have caused more trouble than their business is worth. "Last Green Key - and I don't know for sure who did it, but I think it was Dartmouth students - somebody stole my new $400 sign off the roof!"

Yet during business hours, the Four Aces is still a good place to eat a hamburger among the citizenry of West Leb. The prices are fair and the food is filling. The daily specials are routine, but if you're hungry and like a good jukebox with the best of trucker tunes, it's worth the change in scenery.

Highly recommended for atmosphere, especially during the hunting season.

Healthful Living Center, 28 Main Street, West Lebanon. (Daily except Saturday.)

The Healthful Living Center is unique. It serves no meat. It is owned and managed by a friendly lady who for a number of years was a hospital administrator, and her menu puts it this way: "All food items served here are completely meatless. The meat-like articles are made of soybeans and other nutritious plant foods. Eggs and dairy products are used in some things. Our breads, rolls, and pies are made by us and contain no preservatives." Here, everything is good for you, and everything is delicious.

The breakfast and luncheon menus are replete with simulated sausage, a vege-cheeseburger with tomato and onions (85¢), chicken-like salad (75¢), a sliced turkey-style soya sandwich (75¢), and excellent fruit salads. The fresh carrot juice (40¢) and banana soy shake (70¢) and similar concoctions will sooth the most sensitive palates.

The homemade breads and pastries are wonderful.

The front of the Healthful Living Center is an organic food store; the snack bar is in the back. It is a clean, happy place. The food is excellent, unusually satisfying, and highly recommended.

Hal's at lunch. A mainstay in the fleet, it's been healthily revised.

Hal's at lunch. A mainstay in the fleet, it's been healthily revised.

C.K. Chao's menus beat the Midget.

Papa Giuseppe. Thoughts of leaning towers and ample girths.

The Four Aces. Sign trouble at Green Key, but the best of trucker tunes.

Michael Stuart '71 is a bachelor living inHanover, which explains why he thinkseating without having to wash dishes isworth the price.Next month: a culinary guide to the severalinns, hideaways, and restaurants of higheraspirations (and higher prices) in theHanover area.