There's A New King In Town

And it's called The Royal Peasant (kind of an oxymoron, but oh well.) In case you haven't heard, there's a new place to eat in town (well, in Athens anyway.) It's called The Royal Peasant, and it's located in Five Points, where The Mean Bean Mexican restaurant used to be.

I found out about it today, when one of the waitresses came into OfficeMax and handed me 25 menus to laminate as quickly as possible. I asked her if it was a Medieval themed place, and she informed me that it was "more like an English pub." I told her that I was FROM England, and that I'd have to come see just how "English" it really was! lol

The menu is kind of sparse, but they only officially opened yesterday, and there's only 1 guy who does all the cooking (but apparently he used to own or work at some fairly well-known restaurant, and he's an amazing chef.) The prices range from about $4 to $12 (for a 2 person serving of fish 'n chips), with the majority of items coming in at $8. All the prices are even dollar amounts (no change), and apparently they don't charge sales tax (or at least they didn't today.)

I had planned on checking the place out sometime in the next couple of weeks, but when Monica and I were heading to Wal-Mart tonight, to pick up a few needed items, I was apparently in a daze and on autopilot (thinking about my 10 days without a break work schedule), and drove right past Wal-Mart. Monica was talking on the phone with one of the receptionists at the place she has to go to tomorrow for an ultrasound, and we just sailed right on by Wal-Mart.

As we were passing Lowe's, and I realized I'd gone past Wal-Mart already, I also realized that I had no idea where I was going. I was just sort of driving. As we were both hungry, and I had told Monica about the new restaurant, we decided that we go check it out. So we headed over to Five Points, parked in the Hodgeson's parking lot (they're moving, by the way, after YEARS in that location!), and walked along the edge of some utility construction (that has part of South Lumpkin shut down down) to the restaurant which is just up the street.

We sat outside on the patio, and were waited on by the same lady who'd brought the menus in to be laminated (she seems to be one of the only waitresses working there at the moment.) She didn't recognize me because I was "incognito", having on sunglasses and a hat, but I decided not to mess with her too much, since she looked pretty busy.

She informed us that the bottled beers were still a little warm, and that they were just coming down to the right drinking temperature, and let us know that they were out of several items on the menu (which was a real bummer, because there weren't that many to start with. We were going to get fish 'n chips (which looked delicious), but they were out of fries, and were having to sub homemade crisps (potato chips) instead. You can't have fish 'n chips without large, yummy fries, so we opted not to get that this time. They were also out of their Rum Navy Pie, which we were also going to get, so that was another bit of a let down. They still had some delicious sounding items though, so we made alternate choices.

Monica and I both had the "Royale With Cheese" bacon cheeseburgers, and we shared a small cup of Lamb Stew (which case with a slice of nice crusty bread.) The stew was DELICIOUS, if possibly a bit salty, with lots of carrots and potatoes and big chunks of tender meat (I really want that recipe!) And the burger was one of the best burgers I've had in a long time!

So even though we couldn't get exactly what we wanted, we still had a wonderfully delicious meal! The restaurant/pub also has a nice selection of beers, ales, Guinness, a cider or two, and various other interesting sounding drinks, and these seemed to be one of the main crowd draws (this is a college town after all!)

At any rate, the food was delicious, and reasonably priced, and we will definitely be returning sometime in the near future to have a go at the fish 'n chips, to see just how close they come to the real thing! So if you planning on checking this restaurant out, let me know. Monica and I would love to join you! Hail to the King! :)