Grade Changes

We made our debut by rating General Hoock’s a well-deserved A. A few others joined atop the grade leader board, but each return visit to Hoock’s separated more and more from the rest of the pack. Now, it’s caused a bit of a restructuring of the system.

No restaurant we’ve visited is close to Hoock’s level, so that is the only A. Hilton Family Restaurant has slipped to an A-, joining Tully’s, Rohrbach and DiBella’s. HFR was originally our No. 1 restaurant, and received an A when we reviewed it last spring, but has since been surpassed for the top spot by Hoock's.

Before the revision there seemed to be a logjam of restaurants in the B+/B crowd, so we’ve spaced them out a bit more.

B+ restaurants are all very good places that have a few items that really stand out, and are pretty good all around.

B grades are typically places that don’t appear special from the outside, but are surprisingly good and turned our heads upon eating there.

B- grades are places that are either… a.) Good, but interchangeable with several others (usually family diners) or b.) Not quite there yet, but have potential to be great.

Few places have fallen into the C category, but the ones that have are usually way too generic. Frankly, we haven’t been to any places we absolutely wouldn’t return to, but we wouldn’t go out of our way to return to these places.

So, here are the revised grades:

A: General Hoock’s

A-: Hilton Family Restaurant, Tully’s, Rohrbach, DiBella’s

B+: Joe’s Brooklyn Pizza, Taste of Texas, Philly Steakout, Great Northern Pizza Kitchen, Abe’s, Martusciello Bread

B: Carmine’s Dakota Grill, Jo’s Diner, Krony’s Pizza, North Chili Family Restaurant, Brian’s USA Diner, Chilango’s Mexican, Olympia

B-: Anchor Bar, Hose 22, Slayton Place, Golden Eagle, Lighthouse Diner, Millhouse Family Restaurant, Arlington, Rookies, Main Street Pizza, BBQ Fred

C+: Nola’s, Redwood Inn, Tillman’s Village Inn (Wednesday BBQ Buffet)

C: Sullivan’s Charbroil

C-: Minnehan’s

These new grades will be used as precedents for future visits. As strange as it may sound, we look forward to the day we go to an all-around subpar restaurant to see if this new scale is accurate in the long run, but it seems to fit for now.

Happy Anniversary, RWG

We’re celebrating our first anniversary here at Rochester Westside Grub, reflecting on our inaugural year which included climbing all the way to No. 2 on Urbanspoon Rochester’s blog rankings.

We’ve eaten a lot of good food in the last year, and look forward to what’s to come, but it’s going to be difficult to top one restaurant: General Hoock’s.

It was the first place we visited for the blog, and it’s yet to be surpassed. That’s why it’s our 2010 Restaurant of the Year.

We’ve made several return trips, bringing along different friends each time. We’ve also passed along word to others, who tell others and keep Hoock’s customer base growing.

Each return visit provides some new delicious twist as Shawn Hoock keeps unveiling – and letting customers create – new concoctions every day.

For instance, Waffleopolous – a breakfast sandwich in between waffles. (Yes, that’s bacon cooked into the waffle)

Or there’s the Roc Bomber, basically a giant garbage plate sandwich. (Image courtesy of Hoock’s Facebook page)
We could go on and on about Hoock’s creations, but we’ll leave it up to you to visit the restaurant on Buffalo Road in Gates and see for yourself.

Believe it or not we did go to, and enjoy, and number of other restaurants as well. In fact, we’ve come up with a list of our top five thus far:

1.) General Hoock’s (1308 Buffalo Road, Gates)- See the laud fest above.

2.) Hilton Family Restaurant (54 Hovey Street, Hilton)- Hoock’s has surpassed it as our favorite place in the last year, but our hometown HFR still brings the gang together for a delicious breakfast in an atmosphere that feels like home.

3.) Tully’s (1225 Jefferson Road, Henrietta)- Our favorite sports bar, with the best chicken tenders on Earth.

4.) Rohrbach Brewing Co. (3859 Buffalo Road, Gates)- Authentic German cuisine along with various other fantastic sandwiches and some fantastic white chili.

5.) DiBella’s (2450 Ridgeway Avenue, Greece)- Consistently voted best subs in Rochester, and very high on our list despite being (as Greg calls it) a niche restaurant.

Honorable Mentions: Taste of Texas (122 South Union Street, Spencerport), Martusciello Bread (2280 Lyell Avenue, Gates), Joe’s Brooklyn Pizza (1100 Jefferson Road, Henrietta)

Another restaurant, Yumbo’s, might have cracked the list, but we just found out it closed both its locations. However, Yumbo’s still does catering and is searching for a new location, according to its website. That’s some darn good barbecue, and I hope to eat it again soon. UPDATE (8/21/11): Yumbo's has since reopened at 1460 Lyell Avenue in the city, just west of Mt. Read Boulevard.

In other news, Hoock’s clear emergence as our unquestioned favorite restaurant has forced us to change some grades up, which will be further detailed in our next post.

Anyway, we’ve now added a Facebook fan page and opened a Twitter account in order to spread our name, so get involved and let others know – even if they don’t live on Greater Rochester’s west side.

We look forward to exploring visiting some new places soon and seeing if anything can touch General Hoock’s, which will be difficult. We may even make some trips farther west in to the Buffalo area, so stay tuned.

Well, thanks for a great first year, and hopefully the second will be even better.
-Rochester Westside Grub staff

Redwood Restaurant

6 Cohocton Street, Naples

Visited Aug. 7, 2010

Written by Tyler

There isn’t much commercial civilization to speak of on the back-road trek from Watkins Glen to Prattsburg, let alone places to eat, but we had to eat somewhere on our way to Chad’s camp from a day of NASCAR action at the Glen.

We decided to bypass both potential restaurants in Hammondsport and Prattsburg, and extend our trip a few miles north to Naples. Chad had previously suggested Redwood, telling us it was a family-diner-type place, which we always enjoy.

The place looks kind of like a red barn on the outside, but is just like a typical family diner on the inside, with a dining room and sit-down bar, plus a relatively upscale larger dining room as well. According to Chad, the ‘fancy’ dining room’s menu charges $1 more for everything. The menu featured standard diner fare for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

I went with my usual grilled chicken sandwich, plus a side of home fries. The chicken and its marinade (which wasn’t too strong) were decent, though it could have used a little dipping sauce, and the roll was a little different than usual, in that it was powdered on top. In all it was pretty good; slightly above average.

The home fries were also decent, but not quite as crispy as they appeared. In fact, they were somewhat soggy and greasy. They didn’t meet Hilton Family Restaurant’s (HFR’s) standard for home fries, but they were still good enough for me to scarf them down without hesitation.

Drew also went the chicken route, opting for a (fried) chicken fillet sandwich, or in cafeteria terms, a chicken patty. He said it wasn’t anything different from comparable restaurants, but still good because it was moist. He also had a chocolate milkshake, which did the trick in refreshing him after a hot day at the track.

Chad was also pleased with his meal; a simple bacon burger with fries.

The service was very welcoming and friendly. Not particularly quick, but nothing to complain about either. The booths were a little tight, and this wasn’t one of the cleanest places we have been to either – especially the sketchy bathroom – but nothing that severely hindered our experience.

I ordered cornbread as well, but it was unavailable because the person who usually makes it was out of town. I was disappointed I couldn’t try it – because I figured if they have a designated cornbread maker, it must be good – but they had a legitimate excuse. If I’m ever at Redwood again I’ll definitely try it.

As for our overall experience at Redwood, Chad put it best, saying, “The food is decent; there

are better and there are worse (places). The lack of competition makes them better.”

Like we said there aren’t many places to choose from in this area, but Redwood appears to fill its niche as a family diner in Naples.

“It’s very good, but not HFR level,” Chad said, to which we agreed.

If we’re at Chad’s camp, we know there’s a satisfying hometown diner available. Although Naples is nowhere close to the west side, it’s not a place you hear about in the news often, so we made an exception. We figured we were there, it was decent, it’s similar to other places we’ve reviewed, so we might as well give the Redwood its due.

Ratings:

Service/Atmosphere: The service was generally pretty good, and the restaurant had a classic small-town, family-diner feel.

Food: Nothing that blows you away, though not quite generic.

Value: The prices were good and we left with full bellies after sitting in the sun all day at the track.

Overall: Another pleasing family diner. There’s not much competition around, so there’s a good chance we’ll be back next time we head to Chad’s camp.

Grade: C+

A few notes...

After reflecting on all the places we have been to and consulting our grading standards, we decided our grades for a handful of restaurants needed to change slightly.

General Hoock's has blown away the rest of the competition and has even surpassed our beloved HFR, which we plan to revisit and re-evaluate soon.

DiBella's fell to an A-, simply because we haven't been back there nearly as many times as we've returned to Hoock's.

Yumbo's dropped from an A- to a B+ because it seemed closer to the category of our other B+ rated restaurants, not quite on the same level as places like Tully's and DiBella's.

In the same regard, the Arlington was changed to a B, not quite reaching the heights of our visits to places like Abe's and Krony's.

Recently a lot our reasoning behind the grades has been based on how often we would return to each place. With the updated grades, we are more comfortable with each assessment and feel they are now more consistent with our standards.

Hilton Family Restaurant

52 Hovey Street, Hilton
Written by Tyler

(Image courtesy of rochester.metromix.com)

As we stated in The Situation the Hilton Family Restaurant (HFR for short. Thanks, Mr. D’Amico) is basically our standard for how we judge restaurants. We grew up eating there, and it feels more and more like home each time we go back.

It’s the quintessential small-town, greasy spoon, enter-cliché-here diner, with nothing fancy about it. And we love it.

Aside from the old non-smoking section being opened up to all diners once New York State law banned smoking inside restaurants, no major changes have really occurred at HFR, it seems.

It has basically been the same since its inception in 1986. If you’re from Hilton, you will probably know more than half the people in HFR at any given time, and it seems like most Hilton residents consider themselves regulars, which provides for a great, tight-knit, small-town atmosphere that we look for in the restaurants we visit.

Families pour in after church on Sunday, and students fill it on half days or off days from school. Actually, the restaurant is fairly crowded most days, but especially on weekend mornings, though there is plenty of seating and I don’t think I’ve ever had to wait to be seated.

The prices are very fair, meaning a lot of “bang for the buck” as we call it, the service is always very efficient and the staff is very friendly.

As for the food – HFR has good dinners, from my experience. Some people say their dinners are inconsistent, though I personally haven’t had a bad experience. The Super (double) Cheeseburger is a popular pick and has left me satisfied every time I’ve had it, especially when complemented by the home fries, which I’ll address momentarily.

To be honest though, I get breakfast at least 90 percent I dine at HFR, so I can’t really say too much about the lunch and dinner choices. But, yeah, the breakfast is that good.

We’ll start with the home fries – greasy, but crispy and just the right size. Basically, you have to get them if you order breakfast (or any meal, I suppose) here, and they do come with most breakfast entrees. I’m not completely sure where exactly the crispiness comes from, but it really sets these home fries apart from the rest of the pack.

My dad has said for years these are the best home fries he has ever had. We have had good home fries at other restaurants, but nothing has quite matched that of HFR’s. Put salt, pepper, ketchup or whatever you want on them, but these home fries taste good no matter how they are topped.

Another popular choice is the breakfast sandwich ($3.25), which comes with eggs (made to order), choice of meat (either of the three – bacon, ham or sausage – are all safe bets) and cheese on either a hard roll (my preference), bagel, toast, croissant or whatever else you can think of that makes sense. It’s the perfect balance of each of the components of the sandwich, and did I mention it comes with home fries?

The many omelets (usually $4-5), with just about any option you can imagine, are frequented by several of my friends, always to satisfaction. The pancakes and French toast never disappoint and the toast is a great complement to any breakfast. Nothing kicks off a great breakfast like a delicious chocolate milk, by the way.

One thing that bothers me is when people around town, usually kids, refer to HFR as “the family diner” or “the diner.” That’s false; it’s the Family Restaurant. I guess that does show how regularly people visit HFR and makes it seem like it’s something that’s a given among Hiltonians. I guess I can live with that, though I prefer the proper name.

Contrary to another review I read, HFR does have takeout available. It’s like bringing home a slice of home, if that makes any sense.

They don’t take credit or debit, cash only, but there is a conveniently located ATM next to the register– perfect for some of our buddies who don’t normally have cash on hand (cough … Jay Clifford). It’s just another thing about HFR that has never changed, which I commend them for.
Are we biased? Absolutely. Many of these things aren’t much different from other family restaurants, but, again, this place makes us feel at home. No other restaurant can possibly have that authentic home feel HFR does, and that’s why it is the ‘A’ standard for all the places we dine at.

Ratings:
Service/Atmosphere- To reiterate, the service is excellent (friendly staff, orders ready quickly) and we feel at home whenever we come.
Food- Typical diner menu, but, at least from my experience, consistently good. I’ve never been disappointed by an HFR meal. Greatest home fries on Earth. Awesome breakfast.
Value- One of the more affordable places around, with great portions for the price. The standard for our emphasis on “bang for the buck,” you get the best value for your money.
Overall- Consistently good food, with the value and atmosphere, especially, putting it over the top. The standard for what we like in a restaurant. A place we really don’t think twice about going to when the opportunity arises.
Grade: A-

Note: A new version of the menu has recently been introduced. Some of the prices have changed slightly and there are a few new items.