Pancake Chef is a block off the main drag through Tukwila. It’s been there for as long as I can remember, dating back to my childhood, with a colorful awning that almost shouts, Hey, eat here!
But I’d never eaten there. Must’ve driven or bused by it a thousand times, so this morning it was finally time for breakfast at Pancake Chef.
Their website lists three slightly different hours they’re open — at the top, it says they’re open 6AM-2PM but closed on Tuesdays, but after the menu it says they’re open every day from 6AM-2PM, but after that, under “Our history,” it says they’ve been there since 1959, and they’re open daily except holidays from 6AM-2:45. Playing it safe, I made sure not to go on a Tuesday or holiday, nor between 2:00-2:45.
Had fine bus luck getting there — only a three-minute wait for the #128 bus, and nobody on board was drinking beer or smoking fentanyl or otherwise annoying at 5:45 in the morning.
It was my first time getting off the bus along that stretch of Highway 99. The nearest stop is 2½ blocks before the restaurant, but not knowing the neighborhood that stop snuck past before I rang the bell, so I had to ride around the corner and into the bus and train depot.
Walking back to the restaurant was about the same distance, 2½ blocks from the bus depot, through a thoroughly uninteresting neighborhood. There’s nothing but new condos and old gas stations and fast food, shacks and sticky-bushes, and the roar of jets taking off from the airport a few blocks to the south.
Soon as I walked in, my first disappointment was that there were sixteen cops in uniform, filling five tables, all burly ‘roided men laughing and backslapping. I hate cops more than I love breakfast, but the restaurant is big. Figured I’d find a stool at the counter, as far from the po-po as possible.
Second disappointment, though — there’s no counter. Aw, man… The counter is always where I’d sit when I’m alone in a restaurant, but this place has only booths and tables.
A nice waitress led me to a table for four, where I sat alone, directly behind the cops, but with a short divider-wall between us.
The restaurant has no pretty young waitresses, which is a hallmark of a good place to eat — no disrespect for the young and pretty, but please, give me a waitress who’s been on the job for twenty years. Every employee I saw at Pancake Chef was at least middle-aged, and my wrinkly waitress was friendly, efficient, perfect.
She didn’t give me “Hello, honey,” but you can’t expect to be “honey” on your first visit. If it was that easy, “honey” would mean nothing. “Honey” must be earned, and indeed, I heard the same waitress greet another man as “honey” a few minutes later. If I come often enough, I’ll earn my “honey.”
Couldn’t see most of the cops, because of the divider between our tables, but two of them were seated at a separate table across an aisle from the main crowd of cops. I could see those two, almost couldn’t not see them, and one of them kept eyeing me.
In about ten minutes watching those two cops sideways from my table, and one of them watching me, they said nothing to each other or anyone else, just nervously laughed at jokes from their fellow cops at the other tables.
The other cops were jovial, laughing at barbarian humor. One of them told a work-related story that was messing with my pre-pancake appetite, so I started too-loudly humming “Good morning Starshine” to drown him out.
I’ll bet there was nobody in the restaurant — customers or staff and especially the cops — who couldn’t have been arrested for something. We all have our secrets, right? Hell, I’d jaywalked twice to get there, and of course I shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die.
Then — oh, hooray — the gang of policemen stood and left as I was taking my first bite of breakfast, which brightened the ambiance.
It’s a pancake place, so I’d ordered a stack of pancakes, with coffee and a side of fruit.
The coffee came quickly, with a pot for pour-your-own-refills, and it was great so pour I did.
The fruit was blueberries, and they were ripe and juicy but nearly impossible to fork, and I’d been given no spoon, so I ‘drank’ them from the bowl.
The pancakes weren’t bad, but weren’t sweet, weren’t much of anything, really. Just pancakes, stacked neatly, with butter and syrup, but the butter and syrup was all I tasted.
There’s a Boeing factory about two miles to the north, and the restaurant probably does plenty of business before and after shifts there. Pictures of old Boeing planes hang all over the walls.
The music, softly through ceiling speakers, is 1940s swing and blues. Even Sinatra would’ve been too modern. One of the songs had a trumpet solo, another was “It Had To Be You,” sung possibly by Judy Garland. The volume was too low to hear much specific, but I liked the swingin’ grandpa vibe.
Couldn’t hear people talking at the other tables. Maybe I’m going deaf, or maybe the building’s architecture is such that conversations don’t carry, but there was no eavesdropping, so I read an old newspaper.
The pancakes, though. It’s sad that someplace called Pancake Chef should have so-so pancakes. They need a new pancake chef. I could’ve had better from a box of Bisquick at home.
For a stack of flapjacks, a side of fruit, and a cup of coffee, the tab was almost exactly twenty bucks, before the tip. That’s more than I’d pay at Mrs Rigby’s, but a fair price for breakfast in these overpriced times.
Still, I’m an old, fat guy, and I’d like to get older which means I need to be less fat, and that means I usually eat one meal a day. And that was it — my one meal for today was a disappointing stack of meh pancakes.
Well, grumble grumble grumble. I liked everything else about Pancake Chef, except the cops, so I might give ’em another chance. Might try to earn my “honey.” If I come back, though, I sure as heck wouldn’t order the pancakes.
Pancake Chef
15215 Military Road S, Tukwila
Food & drink: OK
Price: OK
Service: Good
Transit: Link #1, #A, #F, #124, #128
Verdict: MAYBE.
8/8/2024
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