Feature article
|
 |
|
 |
Pimento cheeseburger speaks of South Carolina
By Fred Sauceman
 |
Although not as recognizable as the palmetto, the pimento cheeseburger speaks of South Carolina. (Fred Sauceman photo)
Northgate Soda Shop
LOCATION: 918 North Main St.
Greenville, S.C.
PHONE: 864-235-6770 |
The Thurman Burger of Columbus, Ohio, is known for its height. The defining characteristic of a Guberburger at the Wheel Inn of Sedalia, Missouri, is a smear of heated peanut butter. At Solly’s Grille in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, hamburgers are capped with gobs of butter. Paul Duberek steams “cheeseburgs,” and the cheese, too, at Ted’s Restaurant in Meriden, Connecticut.
Writer George Motz traversed the country in search of hamburgers and published his findings in “Hamburger America: A State-By-State Guide to 100 Great Burger Joints,” a book with a companion DVD. Some states didn’t make the cut. Apparently Motz didn’t find a burger to his liking in West Virginia, since that state isn’t represented in the book at all. Also absent is Alabama. California tops the list with nine joints featured, followed by Texas with eight.
There are four entries from Tennessee: Brown’s Diner in Nashville; Dyer’s in Memphis (covered in the “Place Setting” column on November 11, 2004); Rotier’s Restaurant in Nashville; and Zarzour’s Café in Chattanooga (see the “Place Setting” column from January 17, 2008).
The management at Dyer’s claims to cook hamburgers in grease that hasn’t been changed since 1912. Zarzour’s, despite its Middle-Eastern lineage, is a Southern meat and vegetable emporium. I’ve never had one of Shannon Fuller’s now-famous hamburgers there. I go for greens and butter beans. I’ve visited neither of the Nashville establishments.
Virginia merits one entry in Motz’s book: Roanoke’s Texas Tavern, which we covered recently. On the way to Myrtle Beach late last summer, we visited Motz’s only South Carolina selection, the Northgate Soda Shop.
Originally a drugstore with prepackaged sandwiches, Northgate, when it came under the ownership of Jim DeYoung in 1965, helped define a South Carolina tradition: hamburgers smeared with pimento cheese.
Northgate’s pimento cheese is scratch-made, with sharp cheddar, Greenville’s own Duke’s mayonnaise and pimentos. Once the hamburger is halfway cooked, it’s flipped and topped with the pimento cheese.
“It’s different, unique, not something you can order at McDonald’s, Burger King or any of the chains,” says Northgate’s manager Brenda Vaughan, a native South Carolinian and a graduate of Wofford College. “We leave the pimento cheese on there long enough to start the melting process, but it still has enough firmness to hold itself together on the sandwich. We don’t pulverize the cheese into a spread. It’s still chunky cheddar, shredded cheddar, and holds that form.”
Joining the Pimento Cheeseburger on Northgate’s menu is the Cincinnati Steak Sandwich — sliced deli bologna, fried and topped with chili and cheese. It’s patterned after another South Carolina specialty, a hamburger covered in chili.
Actress Catherine Christophillis owns the Northgate now. On Thursdays, the “theatre crowd” comes in. The Chris Evans Burger got its name because one of the actors kept ordering a bacon cheeseburger with a fried egg on top.
Steve Green from Travelers Rest stocks the Northgate in fried pies. Cheriee Esteve bakes 12-layer chocolate cakes and Kentucky pound cakes for sale at the counter.
During the 41 years he owned the place, Jim DeYoung accumulated an amazing collection of church and funeral home fans, which he left in place when he sold the business. And not only church and funeral home fans but also ones promoting Lutheran Homes, the Furman Paladins, Miss Greenville, the musical group Southern Culture on the Skids, the South Carolina Gamecocks, Clemson University, and the University of Georgia Bulldogs.
Brenda points out two curious photographs behind the counter. The shot of James Brown shaking hands with the Pope, she says, is an “unusual pairing. They don’t sound like they go together in the same sentence.”
The other photograph she shows us is almost as strange. The late South Carolina Senator Strom Thurmond sits on a lifeguard chair surrounded by women in bathing suits.
Situated next to the Northgate Laundry & Cleaners and easy to overlook, the soda shop opened in 1947 and still serves fountain drinks typical of that era, plus some new versions. Cherry syrup and soda water make a Cherry Smash. With a Pimento Cheeseburger, Brenda recommends an Orangeade, made with the freshly squeezed juices of oranges, lemons and limes.
“The fountain has several dispensers,” she told us. “We have chocolate, cherry, strawberry, and vanilla syrups, and we can add them to any drink. We make Cherry Pepsis, even Chocolate Pepsis.”
Despite being heralded by George Motz as one of America’s top 100 burger joints, Northgate Soda Shop goes about its unpretentious way, delighting a largely local clientele by serving a South Carolina signature: hamburgers crowned with pimento cheese.
--------GoTriCities--------
Food writer Fred Sauceman, author of the book “The Place Setting: Timeless Tastes of the Mountain South — from Bright Hope to Frog Level,” is senior writer and executive assistant to the president for public affairs at East Tennessee State University. E-mail him at sauceman@etsu.edu.
|
|
|
|
|
