2012 Vacation: Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives edition and original Buffalo wing

Aron and I like to eat at non-chain restaurants especially when traveling.  I feel so sad when someone tells me that they've traveled to another city, state, country and tell me about how they dined at another TGIFridays (no offense to the lovely folks at this fine establishment...I'm just using you as an example).  Why would you travel to eat the same food that's available to you every day at home??  Doesn't make sense to this girl.  However, to try a different restaurant can be a roll of the dice...sometimes you win, sometimes you end up with food poisoning from eating the lobster pie that sounded like a good idea at that restaurant in Maine that looked so great and end up in the hotel crying and wishing that you were dead.  C'est la vie. 

Luckily when I consulted this site, there were plenty of options of where to go thanks to Guy Fieri (Luke's hero) and his show Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.  We picked two of his selections and the third I picked just for fun.

Geraci's



First stop: Geraci's in University Heights (Cleveland)  If you click my
Geraci's link, you can watch the segment with Guy.

Yummers.  This was probably the best item we ordered: spaghetti with a homemade meat sauce. We also got a small pepperoni pizza for the kids to share, and an order of gnocci.

Happy boy who was able to steal from everyone's plates.

Double fisting the root beer.  We don't let the kids have soda very often
so we usually let them have it on vacation.  Ella didn't want this hot commodity
to go to waste before we left.

 Anchor Bar

This is the Anchor Bar which claims it is the home to the original
buffalo chicken wing. 

Please notice the fry in the bleu cheese.  Luke said "Look!  That fry's taking a dip in your pool, Mommy!"
These were pretty tasty.  I got the medium wings which I think were more mild in flavor.  If I were to go there again, I would order the hot ones instead.  I also got a salad which at $5 was way overpriced for iceburg, some chickpeas, croutons, and a couple tomatoes (yes, literally this was all the salad consisted of).  This was my only complaint about the restaurant.

3rd stop: Grover's of East Amherst NY (click this link to watch the video about the restaurant).  This used to be Grover Cleveland's old hunting lodge.
It's weird to think that it used to be out in the middle of nowhere when it's now smack in the middle of
Buffalo suburbia.

They're known for their burgers so Aron and I split one (there's half in the background)
and the kiddos had pizza sticks which seem to be a western NY thing because they were at both Anchor Bar and Grover's.  I'd say they were like a cheese stick with pepperoni enclosed with a wonton wrapper and served with pizza sauce.

I'm not sure which place I would say was my favorite because I liked them all in different ways.