Category: midwestern

Back to Basics: At Patti Ann’s, Diners Get Schooled in Greg Baxtrom’s Version of Midwest Nostalgia

If the sign outside proudly advertising “stroller parking” doesn’t give it away, the cheerful, primary-colored decor and board game-stocked cubbies probably will. If not, then certainly the menu will—a roster of down-home comfort food printed on a paper placemat that comes with an activity book and crayons. Patti Ann’s is a family restaurant through and…


The Family Table: A Hearty Meal From a Mining Town

Submitted by Pat King, Seattle, Washington In 1900, my grandmother Maud Olive Medsker came to Butte, Montana, from Indiana and married Martin Setzer, who was from Kentucky. In all the years of their marriage, they never quit arguing about who won the Civil War. Meanwhile, my grandmother learned to make pasties from her Welsh neighbors. Butte…