Restaurant Review

Friday, February 23, 2001

Eatery offers dish on sweet simplicity

Enjoy home-cooked meals in cafeteria-style atmosphere at Farm to Market

At a glance 3218 Leopard Street Phone: 881-9191 Entrees: $ Credit cards: yes Checks: yes Other: No smoking Spirits: Full Bar Wheelchair access: yes Hours: Mon.-Fri: 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Food: 2 ½ stars Service: 2 ½ stars Atmosphere: 2 ½ stars

Keeping things simple has been the theory behind the appeal and the success of Farm to Market Country Restaurant, which is located on Leopard Street across from Buccaneer Stadium and has been in business for the past 3½ years. From the menu items to the manner in which meals are served, simplicity appears to improve the quality of the food and the service for the restaurant's diverse clientele. A family owned and operated business, the restaurant is an offshoot of the family's catering business, Sunset Food Service, Inc. Upon entering the restaurant, you might want to grab the first available table. Note the wooden cowboy pointing the way to the serving line. Once you get to the counter, you're greeted by one of the smiling members of the family who will call out the entrees and the sides and serve you what you want.
   Cafeteria-style
   Meals are served cafeteria-style. You simply grab a tray and silverware, then pick out the entree and the two sides you want, with a slice of white or wheat bread. You go to the cashier, who hands you a dish of banana pudding with a vanilla wafer, select the kind of drink you want and pay $6.39 for your meal (tea and soft drinks are 89 cents each). Entrees are limited to three or four a day, with about the same number of vegetable sides. Each day of the week features one or two different entrees, in addition to the daily features of baked chicken and chicken fried steak. These include the popular King Ranch chicken casserole, chicken and dumplings, meatloaf, smothered steak and beef tips over rice. On this day, they served baked chicken, beef strips, chicken fried steak and fried fish.
   On our visit there we tried the fried fish, chicken fried steak and the beef strips. The fish is dipped in a light flaky batter that brought outthe full flavor . The chicken fried steak is a lightly battered, tenderized beef cutlet you can almost cut with a fork, and is topped with your choice of cream or brown gravy. The beef strips are also prepared from a beef cutlet and are smothered in a delicious brown gravy made with grilled onions and bell peppers. There's nothing precooked or frozen about this food; the owners prepare everything from scratch every day .
   Good for yoThe vegetable side orders consisted of some of the things that Mom insisted were good for you, but that you didn't like. The sides included okra, prepared with tomatoes and onions, steamed cabbage, fresh spinach mixed with onions and bacon slices, mashed potatoes with gravy and niblet corn. We tried everything, except the steamed cabbage, and found all of them fresh and prepared in a manner that made them a delicious compliment for any of the entrees.
   When you only have an hour to eat lunch, cafeteria-style dining is the way to go. But that's not the only appeal that brings patronsto this restaurant. The glass-covered tables and the old pictures and license plates that hang on the walls-not to mention the red 1950 Chevy pickup truck that's used as a refill station for iced tea-offer nostalgic looks into our pasts. In addition, the family members who wait on the restaurant's customers, and know most of them on a first name basis, make you feel at home and like one of the family. The owners claim that about 60 percent of their customers are regulars who come to eat there two or three times aweek
  
  

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Restaurant reviews are written by a team of freelance writers. The Caller-Times pays for the meals. From time-to-time the writers visit previously reviewed restaurants to update the information.

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