Our Way Cafe

At a time when longstanding meat-and-threes are slowly fading from our culture, it’s reassuring to again find the staff at Our Way shucking corn in the open kitchen while customers move through the buffet line, surveying the day’s choices.

The Avondale Estates mainstay reopened in April 2011 after a fire shuttered it in January 2010. The antique kitsch that cluttered its walls has been cleared; the whitewashed dining room now looks starkly plain by contrast. But the food on the steam tables remains wholly familiar: lemon-pepper chicken, roast pork, lasagna, sweet potato casserole, honey-glazed carrots, broccoli casserole. (All the vegetables are prepared meat-free.)

Our dream plate stars either meatloaf topped with mushroom gravy and tomato chutney or salmon loaf (made only on Fridays) with collards, mac and cheese, and the gently seasoned creamed corn. Also, a hunk of jalapeno cornbread on the side, please.