When my husband, Bobby, and I went to Columbus on Saturday, March 19, 2016, I had only planned to attend a show at The Little Theatre Off Broadway in Grove City. Bobby had more in mind than that. He had been wanting to try The Thurman Cafe for some time. It wasn’t until recently that it was even on my radar.
I had no preconceived idea of where we were going. Bobby had talked about the “Thurmanator,” this truly gargantuan burger they serve. It consists of two 12 ounce burgers, bacon, sauteed mushrooms, onions, ham, banana peppers, tomato, lettuce, cheddar, mozzarella and American cheese served on a bun with fries and pickle spear. We did not order that, but I definitely understand how this can be the reason why someone would come to the restaurant. When we arrived it was right around 5:00. We walked in and the place was already crowded!
We gave our name and requested a table. (We prefer tables to booths.) The host said that it would be around 45 minutes for a table. We were alright with that as the show did not start until 8 p.m. We found a seat by their juke box and started to check out the menu. It wasn’t more than 5 minutes — if that — when he came up to us and asked if we would mind sitting at the bar. We thought it was a golden opportunity to get served quicker, so we took him up on it.
I will let you know that Thurman’s waiting area is almost as big as the cafe itself. In fact, we found out later that they had added the waiting area to the restaurant around 8 years ago. I tried to imagine how people maneuvered in the restaurant before that happened. The servers had to negotiate a packed room the day we were there. They tell you up front (in their menu) that everyone working can help with whatever you need. There isn’t an assigned waiter or waitress to a table. This would help make sure everyone had what they needed as soon as they needed it.
Sitting at the bar, allowed us to have an opportunity to have quick little conversations with servers behind the bar. We talked with Victor and Kevin and then a couple of other servers (I’m sorry, but I didn’t catch their names). We found out that the dollars are posted on the wall until there is no more room. Then they are taken down and donated to charity. Bobby, of course, said I should put one up with my website on it. (Who knows where that dollar will travel!) We also discovered that working at The Thurman Cafe must be a great gig. I say that because Victor has worked there for 27 years and Kevin for 30 years. You don’t do that if it isn’t a good place to work.
So how was the food? It was delicious! We started out with an basket of loaded fries with cheese and bacon. These fries were really thick fresh cut fries. They were smothered with cheese and bacon. We asked for ranch dressing to dip them in. And if that was all we had gotten, we would have been plenty full.
But we didn’t stop there! We decided to split a burger and a thin crust cheese pizza. The burger we ordered was “The Big TC” which is 3/4 pound burger with special sauce, lettuce, American cheese, pickle on Texas toast.
They bill their thin pizza crust as “thinner than thin.” Which is right up Bobby’s alley. (He comes from the East Coast and likes thin crust pizza.) Needless to say, we ended up taking home half the burger (which we had them cut in half and then we shared just one half between us) and some of the pizza. Bobby shared a some of the pizza with the couple sitting next to him. They had wanted to try it. They were going to refuse, but have you ever tried to refuse Bobby when he was offering you something? Pretty impossible — he is Italian!
Like I have said in a previous post, the trip to Columbus was one of our “perfect” dates. You’ll have to try The Thurman Cafe to see for yourself. Just make sure you take your appetite — oh yeah, and a dollar to put up on their wall.
We did.
