If your kids are like mine, Howdy Doody sounds like a crude joke from Suite Life of Zack & Cody and they assume all burgers come from fast food restaurants with obnoxious indoor playgrounds and kids’ meals with obnoxious plastic toys that mysteriously disappear every time they stay overnight with their grandparents.
Sometimes you need to expose your kids to another era, a simpler time when 5-year-olds thought a bluetooth was something you got from eating too much candy. A short 20 to 25 minute drive west of our home is a great little roadside 1950s style hamburger joint called Stratton’s.
My husband’s grandmother’s farm is in the rural community of Ashland City in Cheatham County and before Grandmother Jen (that’s Jennie Belle to everyone who grew up with her) passed away we would drive up to visit and it was on one of those trips to the farm that we discovered Stratton’s. During his summers off from college my brother-in-law worked for our hometown gas company and he and his co-workers would drive the 20 minutes to Stratton’s for lunch on a regular basis. It’s just one of those places well worth driving a country, winding road to.
Stratton’s is closing its doors forever this Saturday, September 4. The owner got a sweet deal from Walgreens and is retiring after 38 years in the restaurant business. I wish them the very best, but I will definitely miss their burgers and fries, and stepping back in time with Howdy Doody, Elvis, and a homemade shake.
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