Kentucky.... specifically Louisville...south or midwest? (Lexington, Paducah: rated, cities, place)

[Ben Around]

Originally Posted by ajf131

Yep I just looked it up too. Columbus has 17 within its vicinity and Cleveland has 5 in its vicinity. Indianapolis has 9, St. Louis has 15, Kansas City has around the same. How have Chicago and Illinois managed to escape having Waffle Houses when the other Midwestern cities I just listed have not and Ohio has them as far north as Toledo and Cleveland. Well, in any case, I didn't know Waffle Houses were considered Southern attributes until I just researched it. If that's the case, it's becoming less so since they have already become well-established in Ohio, Missouri, Indiana, Kansas, and Pennsylvania. The Waffle Houses along with sweet tea and Cracker Barrel seem to be climbing further and further into the Midwest. maybe in thirty years we will find sweet tea in places in the Midwest other than just Cracker Barrel. In St. Louis and Springfield, IL that's the only place you can get it. Central Indiana (Cloverdale to specific, between Terre Haute and Indianapolis) has sweet tea from what I've seen already.

Re: Cracker Barrel, I don't think so. I used to look forward to stopping at CB's on my trips south so I could have grits and Virginia ham. I was delighted when they opened one in Mpls/St Paul many years ago until I found out they had a different menu. No grits, no VA ham!

Long live local, non-chain restaurants!

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by Ben Around

Don't you read The Onion? They had a headline several months ago, something like, "Mason-Dixon Line Replaced By Waffle House-IHOP Line".

Funny. I'll give you at least that. Mason-Dixon replacement those are not. If that's the case then all of Ohio and Indiana are Southern in addition to Missouri since Cleveland and Toledo have Waffle Houses...five within their metro areas. It's not pushing the Mason-Dixon line...it's crossing it. Plain and simple.

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by Ben Around

Re: Cracker Barrel, I don't think so. I used to look forward to stopping at CB's on my trips south so I could have grits and Virginia ham. I was delighted when they opened one in Mpls/St Paul many years ago until I found out they had a different menu. No grits, no VA ham!

Long live local, non-chain restaurants!

Cracker Barrels are more common than you take them to be and the restaurants are making their way north. Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio are full of them, as is Missouri. is this some kind of an attempt to convince me i'm southern, cause it's not working. I know those states very well given I visit them on multiple occasions per year. If they don't have sweet tea in Minnesota i'd be surprised because they sure as hell do have it in the lower Midwest states' Cracker Barrels (Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio). Indiana has the most sweet tea of any state in the Midwest, far more than Missouri. Indiana is practically half-dominated by sweet tea. Missouri not even a quarter.

[missymomof3]

I am suprised that Cracker Barrel has a different menu by region. I thought they prided themselves on uniformity (same decor in every one, etc) and the whole point is the country, Southern, down home cooking. I'm stunned.

[Phil75230]

I may know nothing about Louisville, but my travels in other areas tell me that even the "South" and "Midwest" have huge variation within those regions (e.g. Cincinatti vs. Minneapolis vs. Detroit; Charlotte vs. Jacksonville vs. Montgomery). Perhaps a better question is "Should the Louisville area be considered it's own subregion or not?" (I assume nobody would say Louisville is more Louisiana than Indiana, but I could be wrong)

[missymomof3]

Heck, different parts of the same city are different! How can anyone expect different regions or even states to be the same?

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by missymomof3

I am suprised that Cracker Barrel has a different menu by region. I thought they prided themselves on uniformity (same decor in every one, etc) and the whole point is the country, Southern, down home cooking. I'm stunned.

Me too as well. Cracker Barrels in Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio are the same as cracker barrels in the South. Cracker Barrels are pretty much the only restaurants in these states with sweet tea unless you are in the far southern parts of these states. Actually, I'm mistaken about Indiana. As far as sweet tea goes, they are an anomally in the Midwest from what i've noticed. Sweet tea is found as far north as I-70 in Indiana. I don't think it's found in Indianapolis but certainly very close by to it. Cloverdale, Indiana, between Terre Haute and Indianapolis off I-70 does have sweet tea.

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by Phil75230

I may know nothing about Louisville, but my travels in other areas tell me that even the "South" and "Midwest" have huge variation within those regions (e.g. Cincinatti vs. Minneapolis vs. Detroit; Charlotte vs. Jacksonville vs. Montgomery). Perhaps a better question is "Should the Louisville area be considered it's own subregion or not?" (I assume nobody would say Louisville is more Louisiana than Indiana, but I could be wrong)

Well...in some ways yes it is more like Louisiana. For example, it behaved like Louisiana during the Great Migration in that it lost African American population. It has sweet tea and is full of Southern culture. Still...I think it's kind of a bad state to compare Louisville to because Louisville has more in common with the other Upper Southern states besides Kentucky...Arkansas, Tennessee, Virginia, and North Carolina. For St. Louis and Indianapolis for example, it's true they have much more in common with Minnesota than any Southern state, but Minnesota is honestly not a great state to compare to the states of these two cities because it is an Upper Midwestern state. Missouri and Indiana, St. Louis and Indianapolis have more in common with other Lower Midwestern states, such as Illinois and Ohio and the major cities of those states...they honestly both remind me of Columbus, Cincinnati, and Kansas City. People often forget that the Midwest is subdivided into the Lower and Upper Midwest, while the South is subdivided into the Upper and Deep South. While the two subregions for each of these regions share a lot in common with each other, there are very noticeable differences between each pair of subregions as well (Upper Midwest vs. Lower Midwest, Upper South vs. Deep South)

[missymomof3]

well, I for one am going to stand behind my feeling that we are in the South and if someone else doesn't feel that way that's ok too.

[rgb123]

Kentucky IS in the south, no question.