[My ongoing series for 2016 continues ... with the FORTY-SIXTH of FIFTY tastes of FLORIDA (coming to you on sequential Thursdays. All. Year. Long.)!]
Establishment: Moonlite Diner
Location: Ft. Lauderdale
Meal: Dinner
Drink: fountain Coke
Appetizer: Chicken Noodle Soup
Main: Turkey Cuban Panini
oven roasted turkey breast, smoked ham, pickles, Swiss cheese, garlic mustard spread
Side(s): Loaded Fries
Dessert: Monkey Bites
warm cinnamon and sugar glazed monkey bites with creamy vanilla ice cream, caramel sauce and topped with whipped cream
Server: Maria
Website: http://www.moonlitediner.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MoonliteDiner/
Knowing that this particular taste would be posted during Thanksgiving week, the charge was to find a place that had a few options of turkey dishes of one kind or another, and this one in a set of Moonlite diners (there are three in the area) met the challenge. From the signs on the way out, it seems to be a Greek diner, but the menu didn't come across as having overly Greek influences ... and what a menu with lots of choices. As for which turkey dish got chosen and how the Troy-score was earned, see below:
AMBIANCE: 8/10 (it was just what one wanted from an old fashioned diner, with the booths and the counter and the neon and the shininess everywhere and the curved ceilings -- all that was missing was a jukebox at every table ... speaking of which, there *was* classic rock playing -- but the twist was that it was music from the *80's* instead of the *50's* as someone of my age might expect, so a point lost for making me feel old and a second point lost because as old time diner-y as everything was, there was a feeling that it was a manufactured environment instead of the real authentic thing)
FOOD: 8/10 (the panini was crispy and packed full of goodness, with pickle juice that was running down my arm as I ate it ... the fries, ordered loaded, came with just the right tasty amount of additions [see the bacon category below] ... and that dessert looked beautiful upon arrival ... but a point lost because the chicken noodle soup of the day was greasy [I thought maybe it was through the use of buttered noodles?] and a second point lost because the "monkey bites" tasted like the morning's leftover french toast that had been microwaved before being included in the dish -- a definite disappointment seeing as how pretty it looked)
SERVICE: 9/10 (I'm glad we got Maria, because the table across from us got served 2/3 of their dishes but had to wait a long time for the last one to arrive, and the table behind us of two ancient looking ladies who wanted "small" sundaes had to go through an ordeal about the rules before a compromise was reached ... as for our Maria, the only problem was that we waited longer and longer as the meal went on for her to visit, and she stood in plain view texting on her phone during one of the waiting spells [although, to be fair, the layout of the establishment didn't seem to permit a place for servers to go out of the sight of customers] which is why there is a lost point)
BACON: 10/10 (the bacon was everywhere on the menu as an option [helped by the fact that this diner serves breakfast all day], but what earns all the points in this category is that the loaded fries came with big chunks of "fresh" bacon ... not just little tiny bacon bits, but pieces of bacon almost as big as the small fries [as seen in the photo])
BONUS: 7/10 (+3 for having a booklet full of dessert options [seen in the photo] that reminded me of the old school Friendly's back home in central PA, +3 for having an outside section [although this was "fall" in Florida in the evening, so it was too "chilly" to eat out there], and +1 for being a place to which we will return whenever the classic diner mood hits again)
TroyScore: 42 out of 50 -- aka 84, a solid B
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