Walden and Stein serve up burgers and laughs all afternoon. (Photo by Stephanie Breijo)
What you’ll hear first is a toss-up. A “Hey there, honey” or the front door’s jingle of bells is like auditory quick draw at Pop’s Dogs & Ma’s Burgers, the lively 16-by-16-foot diner in North Side.
“What do you want, sunshine?”
Melody Walden is herself a ray of sunshine, if sunbeams could wear hairnets and tie-dye and sling foot-long hot dogs smothered with slaw and chili. But she’s not all sugar.
“I’ll take a —”
“Not YOU,” she snaps back playfully at the regular she’s been ribbing for five minutes. “God, where’s that muzzle when you need it?”
The proprietor and “Ma” half of this Lakeside outfit is slow-drawl spitfire, part grill master and part entertainer as guests wolf down bacon and eggs, hand-spun milkshakes, and bacon-stuffed burgers at a six-seat counter littered with condiments, baskets of bubblegum, and vintage View-Masters. The walls are covered in bric-a-brac discovered and treasured by her husband, Richard, the “Pa” half of the equation. And then there’s the menu.
“We feel like you should be able to go places and get a reasonable meal for a reasonable price,” Melody shrugs. “Beef prices and other things have gone up, but we don’t go up 50 cents or $1; we’ll go up maybe 25 cents on our burger, and our community supports us.”
Pancakes for $2.99. Bacon-wrapped hot dogs for $3. Daily specials like pot roast, lasagna or pork ribs — all with sides, rolls and dessert — all at $7.25. Everything’s priced like this burger shack never saw the early aughts.
“I tell people, ‘Even though our food prices don’t fluctuate, the [market] price does,’ ” Walden says as her brother-in-law, Dave Stein, plates another patty. “So when we do eventually go up, it’s because we’ve absorbed that food price for six months to almost a year. Because it’s our average Joe who supports us, and that’s who we want stoppin’ in here.”
Pop's Dogs and Ma's Burgers is located at 7301 Brook Road.
