Feature article
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Family fuels Funtastics food
By Fred Sauceman
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| This is the double cheeseburger at Funtastics. |
A reader recently asked me about the one characteristic that distinguishes my favorite eateries from the rest of the pack. I thought for a moment about menus, décor, location, price. And all those are important. But my answer was this: the presence of the owner on the premises.
If you’ve followed this column from the beginning, you know that we never cover a place without first talking to the owner. Those conversations tell me a lot. They deepen my appreciation for those who make their living serving food to the public. They acquaint me with the history of the place. They allow me to get behind the counter and find out the origins of dishes.
I like talking to restaurant owners on the premises, face to face, not over the telephone. If I have to track an owner down in another town, I usually drop the idea for a column. Restaurants suffer under absentee ownership.
On the other hand, when the owner’s there, whether it’s taking up money at the cash register, seating diners, twirling pizza dough, or even sweeping up at closing time, your odds of getting good food, efficient service and cleanliness jump significantly.
There’s Jean Davis. Jean has seven children, 14 grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren. Somehow, she manages to keep up with them all and still run a restaurant, Funtastics Food and Ice Cream Shoppe in Kingsport. Jean’s been in the food business about 30 years. She started out as a waitress when the Ramada Inn first opened on Stone Drive, and she advanced to dining room and banquet supervisor.
She went out on her own in 1988 and now owns Funtastics with her son, Eddie Branham. It’s in the former location of Kay’s Ice Cream, and Jean has kept the menu largely the same, only adding such items as the Philly steak and Swiss and chili cheese fries. Her handful of a hamburger is the Big Kay reborn.
I asked Jean what makes a good hamburger. She didn’t mention blue cheese, or even Swiss and mushrooms. Didn’t even bring up the subject of bacon. “It’s freshly ground beef, never frozen,” she said. And she’s as traditional as can be on fixin’s — lettuce, tomato, onion, pickle, mustard, mayonnaise.
She points out that Funtastics is not fast food. She’s even printed that warning on the menu. Instead, there’s a full line of classic short-order choices, the B.L.T., a fish sandwich, chipped ham grilled, a chuckwagon steak sandwich, and hotdogs, just to start.
At Funtastics, you can come in every day for a month and never repeat ice cream flavors. There are 32 of them, all well-labeled. Raspberry’s a rarity. German chocolate cake ice cream is gooey with caramel. Orange Blossom tastes like Dreamsicle. Muddy Sneakers reminds you of a Snickers bar. Play Dough’s reminiscent of sugar cookies. Superman’s vanilla with child-attracting colors. Key lime pie’s the newest flavor.
Each flavor can be blended into a milkshake, even the bubble gum. An employee of Quebecor kept ordering a milkshake with bubble gum ice cream, and Jean wondered how he got the gum through the straw. He said he didn’t. He drained the shake then chewed the gum.
Any of those abnormal ice creams can be substituted for the orthodox vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry in a banana split. Another holdover from Kay’s is the Banana Wheel, sliced bananas layered with hot fudge, vanilla and whipped cream and served in a cup.
There’s always a pie or cake on hand, made by Mary Flores. Chocolate, butterscotch and coconut are her signature pies, topped with about two inches of meringue.
Funtastics delivers within about a three-mile radius, which encompasses a lot of working folks, nurses over at Holston Valley, bookbinders at Quebecor, and papermakers at Weyerhaeuser, whose meal breaks are brightened with sandwiches, sides, add-ons, and sweets from this genial short-order emporium.
Funtastics Food and Ice Cream Shoppe
541 West Sullivan Street, Kingsport, Tennessee
423-245-3221
Open from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Closed Sundays.
Sample prices: Hamburger, $2.59; cheeseburger, $2.89; double cheeseburger, $3.99; fish sandwich, $2.79; chipped ham, $2.79; hotdog, $1.49; homemade cream pies and cakes, $1.79 a slice; cone or cup of ice cream, one scoop, $1.37, two scoops, $2.10; large milkshake, $2.79; Banana Wheel, $2.99; banana split, $3.99.
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Food writer Fred Sauceman, the author of “Home and Away: A University Brings Food to the Table,” is the executive assistant to the president for university relations at East Tennessee State University. E-mail him at sauceman@etsu.edu.a
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