Road Trip: Main Street Diner--Richmond, IN ~ Simple Delicious Food Recipes

My kids stayed at their Grandparents for a few days this summer, and I met them halfway between our houses, in Richmond, to pick them up. Of course, my first thought was, we should meet at lunchtime. And my second thought was, where to go in Richmond? I actually wanted to try this restaurant I read about ages ago, but apparently it had gone out of business. I ended up just picking the Main Street Diner because it looked kind of cute, and looked like it had a menu that would please everyone. It’s an old school diner place. There are booths and a counter and that’s it. It was a little tight fitting the 5 of us into one booth, but they did bring us an extra chair. The guy working the front was really nice and enthusiastic—I think they are recently under new ownership.

It’s a pretty straightforward menu—burgers and sandwiches pretty much, although you can also order breakfast any time. I ordered the hand-breaded tenderloin ($7.50) with a side of hash browns (love that you can order breakfast sides as well as the regular ones). My son ordered biscuits and gravy ($3.25) and my daughter had a chicken sandwich ($7.50).

The food was pretty solid diner food—nothing blowing your mind, but care was taken with all of it. My tenderloin was hand-breaded and large, and tasted like the breading was made with corn flakes, which I always enjoy—giving it a little more flavor than many. It was super thin though, and tended to be a little on the dry side. My kids cut all the extra large edges that hung over my bun and ate them like nuggets. They gave you all the right fixins’ on the side, and I stacked up my red onions, pickles, lettuce and mayo. The hash browns tasted like they were seasoned a bit, which I appreciated. The portion was huge and the outside was pretty crisp (key for me). They were maybe a little more blackened than I prefer (I love a golden brown hash brown) but not too bad.

My daughter’s chicken sandwich was pretty basic—mainly because that’s how she tends to order them—just straight up chicken with cheese pretty much. My son really liked his biscuits and gravy—again, these were standard but still tasted good—there were nice chunky bits of sausage mixed in. The biscuits were pretty soft, but absorbed the gravy nicely. He only ordered a half order, which was one biscuit, and ended up ordering a second biscuit to finish up all the gravy.

Again, the guy waiting on us (and pretty much the only front of the house person) was very friendly and helpful. There were a few tables in there, but it was by no means full. It’s the kind of place that I bet makes a great solid egg breakfast as well.

Since we were there, and I had noticed it on my way down Main Street, the kids and I hit Olympian Candies on the way out of town. It’s one of those old-fashioned candy stores that for some reason Indy doesn’t seem to have (not that we don’t have great chocolate, but none of these shops that have been around for 50 years). They hand dip all their chocolates and they were delicious. My kids loved the marshmallows and the salted caramels, but I was partial to the dark chocolate covered raisin clusters. Super nice people, super yummy chocolate.