I love the Blarney Stone. It was a big chain that dominated the Irish pub scene in the 1960's and 1970's. There seemed to be one in every neighborhood. They had cold beers and tap and everything was dirt cheap. We used to love to go to the one all the way downtown near the Battery Tunnel on the New York side.
The best thing about it was the steam table. They would have a long glass filled carving area with big corned beer and pastrami and brisket and boiled potato and cabbage and franks and all kinds of great stuff. You could go to the bar and get tanked up and then get a plate of corned beef and cabbage with some boiled potato. You would shovel it down, belch, fart and then go back to the bar for some more beer.
It was a working mans pub. Not just construction workers although there were plenty of them. But office workers and guys who just had to get away from their job for a pint and a sandwich at lunchtime. You don't see much of that anymore. Everybody is very politically correct. People don't go out for a beer at lunch time. God forbid someone smells it on your breath. They would report you to human resources or send the President an email or something. Going to the Blarney Stone for a pint and a corned beef sandwich at lunchtime is a thing of the past.
The funniest thing I ever saw in the Blarney Stone was when my buddy Tim ordered the oxtail soup. No nobody ever ordered the oxtail soup but he was English and he had weird taste in food. Anyway he orders it and the Spanish kid behind the counter actually puts a piece of the ox tail in the bowl. It was hilarious. Even more hilarious is that he ate it. As he was chewing he spits out this thing. I don't know what it was. A bone? A Marble? I have no idea. But he spits it right out into his soup.
It was really funny at the time.
But we were drunk.
3 comments:
Just googled Blarney Stone for the heck of it and there are two still operating, one on 8th Avenue at 31st Street and the other at 3rd Avenue and, I think, 44th Street. In other words midtown west and midtown east.
Funniest of all are the yuppie comments about the "Blarney Stone experience" which make it sound like a trip fraught with peril into blue collar land. Surprising how many commenters say the food's a pretty good deal. Interesting that in one of the Blarneys there's no Irish beer on tap.
What's a seven-course Irish meal?
A baked potato and a six-pack.
I was in New York last week and into the weekend for the flute convention I did a post about on my blog. Unfortunately, my plus-size wife did not come, otherwise, we would have high-tailed it to Brooklyn and Lee Lee's Valise. Oh well, next time. I promised to buy her a nice dress there when we're BOTH in New York at the same time.
It was total work, work, work. We had a skeleton crew of mostly younger women and two gay guys. The boss and I were the only straight males from our company. He grew up in New York, so he had all kinds of ideas where to eat and drink. But none of the usual guys were there, and the boss is all important meetings and such, so there was nothing to do and nowhere to go, except get an overpriced sandwich in the hotel at what passed for lunch, eat it standing up, and sit alone in the lounge at 10:00 PM after it was over.
What I would have given for a pint of Guiness and a plate of corned beef & cabbage and a couple of hours to enjoy them during those days I was on my feet 8 or 9 hours trying to be friendly and helpful to 3,000 of my best friends.
Next time I'm in New York, Trooper, it WON'T be work, even if I have to cash out what's left of my 401(K) to get the hell out of boring Boston suburbia for a few days.
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