Sunday, March 11, 2007

Day Three: Imo's Pizza (St. Louis); Lambert's - Home of the Throwed Rolls (Ozark, MO)

Day three began with a Holiday Inn Express breakfast in Effingham, IL.

Imo's: We drove down into St. Louis, where we got an Imo's St. Louis-style pizza. The St. Louis pizza has an ultra thin crust; the crust is just thick enough to hold the ingredients. Because it is so thin, they slice the pizza into small rectangles rather than the large triangles we are used to. The pizza was delicious! They use a special cheeze; I think it's a blend of pavorone (sp?), swiss, and mozzarella.

Lambert's: We drove I-44 to Springfield, MO and the exited onto 65S towards Branson, MO. We stopped at Lambert's, "The only home of the throwed rolls". There motto is "Come Hungry", and for a reason. You order an entree and then they come around with an endless, perpetual supply of "fixin's", such as black-eyed peas, fried ocre, hot tomatoes and macaroni, etc. They also come around with hot-out-of-the-oven rolls, which they throw (toss) at you. It's a lot of fun. Our server let us know that we could have as much of our main courses as well. I had a pot roast that was delicious. But I could barely finish it and definitely was not interested in seconds.

We drove on about 25 miles or so and are staying the night in Branson, MO. If you've never heard of Branson, it's kind of like a down-market Las Vegas, without the slot machines. It's an entertainment mecca, featuring Andy Williams and other "classic" entertainers.

The Holiday Inn Express we are staying at tonight is an older property and not as fresh as the excellent one we stayed in last night.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Mr. Ball, would you believe we lived in Springfield for a year!!!
Dean got saved there at the Seminole Baptist Tabernacle and we remained friends with our pastor for a lot of years.
Never heard of the "throwing the rolls," until after we left so missed out on that fun.
Since I didn't care for Branson's entertainment then, it has changed some, I prefered going on down into Arkansas for the Passion Play.
I hope you get there!!!

Betty G

Anonymous said...

Which one of the Branson hotels did you stay in? I'm trying to plan a trip up there and want to be near the action!

BallBounces said...

We stayed at the Holiday Inn Express, which was a bit old and tired. I would recommend you get a coupon booklet and go from there. You can probably Google to figure out which ones are close to the action.

"... nothing intellectually compelling or challenging.. bald assertions coupled to superstition... woefully pathetic"