The Lighthouse Cafe
 Lodi, Ohio              Date of Visit  07/09/11               No Known Website

We find ourselves in Lodi. Close to home but doesn’t happen very often, we are not outlet shoppers and haven’t discovered another reason to make the trip. This week our county is either kind or daffy enough to collect appliances free of charge and given the number of charges inherent in everyday life we will take all available discounts. What’s for lunch? Well, I hoped we had found a reason for return trips. The Lighthouse café comes with laurels and epic songs from the locals. Just up the road a piece the café sits right on the town square and is absolutely packed solid. We get the last little table up against the window and watch as the line grows behind us.
 

Very Little Danger of Running Aground Round These Parts
 

Small space, a little overdone with lighthouses: wall paper, calendar, figurines, etc. Our server is very friendly if a little simple and started to lag as the tables were turned over and over after the traditional lunch hours. We ordered pierogies, a fried cod sandwich which came with a bowl of clam chowder and an Alpine burger with fries.

The pierogies were a question to start with…our server said she would have to check with the kitchen to see if they had been done yet, since they are usually served at dinner with the all you can eat fish special. Hmmmmmmm. They might be done in house. Then they arrived, they don’t look homemade (too clean and pretty) but the widely varying stuffing makes me think otherwise. Loaded down with carmelized onions, sour cream, cheese and chives these tater stuffed noodles were awesome. Oh my! We are going to be coming to Lodi over and over. We even started talking about who we were going to be inviting to justify our trips. Well….
 

The chowder was next and while it would pass for any roadside joint it just couldn’t match the quality of the pierogies. Too, too thick, chewy clams bits and little else but cream for flavor. Too many calories for way too little payoff. We are batting 500. The cod sandwich looked awesome. It fell short in translation from retinas to taste buds. The crust ended up being mealy instead of crispy and really detracted from the flavor of the fish instead of elevating it. We were dreaming of Friday night fish fry glory and then woke up with a start, dreams forgotten. The burger (Alpine) with Swiss and mushrooms was much better, juicy with great ratios of toppings. The fries alongside looked stupendous but were horrifically greasy and were disappointing not French fryey.

So we will be returning to Lodi. Next year, if we have an appliance on the fritz. Maybe we will find another place to try then. We have pretty good burgers all over the place around here and the pierogies just aren’t enough to make the drive. My best guess is t'ain't much competition for really solid food in Lodi.