Not being quite the iconic Route 66 roadtrip, we headed east along the A96 a few weeks back to Nairn where we had a classic, all-out American lunch at the Route 66 diner!
Tucked right in the heart of the royal Burgh of Nairn, we’d heard about Route 66 on social media, so on our day off, we went for a bracing walk along Nairn beach before trekking along for our lunch.
The menu was varies, with burgers and other all-american classics on the menu including Mac’n’ cheese, pulled pork, uber thick shakes and sweets containing that love it or hate it combination – peanut butter and jelly (jam).
If you didn’t fancy indulging too heavily, there were other options of sandwiches and salads to choose from…. as well as the Elvis Presley sandwich which is filled with peanut butter and banana fried in butter with maple syrup. Many items were available to take away.
Being lunchtime, we firmly stuck with savoury choices of BBQ burgers and shakes. While our meal was being prepared, we took the opportunity to check out the diner.
It has all the classic elements – red and white striped booths, shiny silver diner tables, checkerboard flooring and of course, the ubitiqious jukebox loudly churning out the classic 60’s diner tunes. I loved the feature wall of vintage wallpaper, it really brought the whole place together. While not having a ‘polished’ finish, it did have that classic American diner feel, which we felt was authentic to both the american theme, yet fits well with the other eating establishments in Nairn.
Onto the food and we were suitably impressed. None of the food was greasy or overly fatty. In fact the burger tasted more ‘meaty’ than I was expecting. There was a generous portion of salad – split between being in the bun and on the side of the plate. I chose baked wedges and Andrew went for twister fries. My picture unhelpfully doesn’t show the small but perfectly flavoured pile of pulled pork on top of my burger – the right balance of smoky and sweet in our book. There was of course the obligatory mustard and ketchup bottles on our tables for us to add as we wished.
Our shakes (not pictured; bad blogger skills!) were caramel for me, strawberry for him. They had a classic ‘slurpability’ about them and there was the struggle not to down them before our burgers arrived!
Our lunch of two burgers and shakes (which included a cheeky slide of onion rings that Mr B added on!) came to £28 which we recalled was less than a visit to Ed’s Diner in Inverness last year. As well as being cheaper, we felt the quality was miles above the chain’s offering.
Disclaimer: I was not invited to review Route 66 and all opinions are my own.
Thank you very much for your kind words. We try to find a balacce between service, quality and cost to give customers a satisfying dining experience.
Thanks Sandy – I was glad to pop by and hope to return soon!