Being the inaugural article of this series, I placed a lot of stake in what particular establishment I would go to first. As the initial subject, it must be most revelatory about the entire Iowa City food scene, if not necessarily the most indicative. This particular establishment must serve then as the archetype for the series as a whole.
There are a number of eateries that fit this description well, and doubtless those will be featured at a later date as further subjects of articles in this series, but ultimately only one could ever answer the question of what Iowa City food is to me.
George’s Buffet is an unassuming dive bar sat just off of the one-way, westbound, Market Street. The small structure is saddled between an alley leading back to another side street and a modern imposing building housing The Webster (a high-end feature in Iowa City’s restaurant scene) on the corner of North Linn Street. Further up the road is the Bluebird’s parking lot, and its corresponding classic diner.
On its own, George’s doesn’t seem particularly remarkable. It’s a bar with at best precarious street parking out front. The distinctive black-and-yellow striped awning, amidst a bright building, pairs curiously with the dark front window, a black-painted facade of the buffet itself. One could stand outside and barely see the dark interior through the glass, shrouded behind a myriad of verdant plants and signs of beer brands obscuring the heart of the building.
And even if one chooses to enter this place, there’s little immediately to write home about. It is, to the George’s-virgin’s eyes, exactly the kind of bar it’s exterior eludes it to be. Mostly black furnishing fills the murky space. At any given hour the bartender is serving a variously-sized crowd of locals, occasionally bolstered by a stray party of collegiate bar-crawlers or quieter, studious types, tapping away at laptops over choice beverages. Collages, maps, and beer-branded placards adorn the shady, antiquated walls. These ornaments catch one’s gazing eyes. Behind the counter, amidst the bric-a-brac of liqueur and oddities, hand two old and dimly lit machines. To a modern viewer, they seem nothing more than another bauble in the long line.
The keen reader will recall the full title of this establishment, George’s Buffet. An inquisitive sort might find themselves looking for food within. Without inquiry, this sort of fellow might find themselves deeply disappointed. Chips hang amongst the liquers behind the bar, but little more, and certainly nothing resembling the traditional sense of buffet. I’m certain many people have stopped here expecting that one named part of George’s Buffet, and unsatisfied by its absence sought elsewhere for more overt dining prospects.
But what is there if you pull away the curtain, and look behind the veil? What can we find in searching this place for eatery?
It’s a well-worn, time-honored process: step up to the bar, and order 2 burgers. In my experience, you ask for everything on them, which doesn’t really amount to much. You can add horseradish, but I’ve never been quite fond of it myself. After a few minutes (or longer, depending on how crowded it is), they’ll bring the burgers out to you. They’re wrapped in the classic paper style, not particularly imposing things. George’s burgers are neither big, nor heavy, nor tall. And yet, they are in my own opinion the greatest burgers Iowa City has to offer.
These burgers are rather hard to describe, because they are ultimately so simple. They have pickles and diced onions beneath the fairly austere bun. The cooks put ketchup and mustard on them. What is the secret then, dear reader? What puts these burgers above the average barbecue uncle’s handiwork?
I might be content to call it magic. The truth really isn’t that far from it. In the back of the bar stands an ancient boiler. Longtime George’s regulars speculate, that it was forged by the first peoples to walk the earth, in times long forgotten even in myth and legend, shaped by a thousand hands, each belonging to masters of their craft, suffused with all the awesome power known to the elders of man. It is a keepsake from a time of heroes.
I kid. However, the broiler is in all fairness pretty dang old. I’m not sure exactly when it appeared, but I believe it’s been there since Georges opened more than 8 decades ago, or otherwise shortly after. The burgers made in the thing have almost a century of built up flavor embedded in them. To my memory, the owner of Georges once even tried making a burger the exact same way but in a different broiler, and it wasn’t nearly as good.
That’s the magic, if you’d like to call it that. I certainly would, dear reader.
George’s works as a starting point because it stands for much of the culinary offerings here in Iowa City as a whole.
If you came here as somebody from outside Iowa, what does Iowa City mean to you? We have a football team. We host a number of great academic institutions. You’ve likely heard of our hospital. But isn’t that just the surface level? There are so many wonderful shards of this place hidden beneath the surface, if you only look a little bit closer. I suppose that’s a kind of mission statement for this column: Looking beneath the superficial, gathering fragments to reassemble the whole of this college town. Seeking out the great food in Iowa City, be it obvious to–or obscured from–the surface view.
I only hope I can shed light on new experiences for you, dear readers. To look closer. Dig deeper.
Until the next.
