In Search of Tucker Duke's (8/27/16)
[8/28/16: Mystery solved. Look at today's Journal post.]
This has become almost an obsession with me since a local corporate trainer recommended the burgers, claiming no visit here is complete without sampling them. She did mention that they've moved a couple of times, outgrowing their facilities. But even though I'm staying at a local hotel within a couple of miles of the restaurant's purported location, I haven't been able to find it yet.
The story: Brian Cartenuto, a celebrity chef who has won a major contest on the Food Network, created a massive burger complete with onion rings, secret ingredients, etc. which is a featured entree for Tucker Duke's Lunchbox. Remember the infamous Burger King jingle? "Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce, special orders don't upset us..." That doesn't fly at Tucker Duke's: you buy the signature burger as is, or you don't order it.
Now I have gone on 2 or 3 drives trying to find it. Now Tucker Duke's has a corporate website which lists current locations, including the local Niceville location and at least one other I noticed in south Florida. If you drill on the Niceville location on the website, they give a W. John Sims (Hwy 20) address and a "find directions" link which seems to link to an E. John Sims location at an intersection of Reynolds and 20. When I check the street address with my Garmin, it seems to indicating taking a right if heading south on 85N, across a Taco Bell, maybe 2 to 3 blocks east of the lighted intersection. There's a KFC and a Japanese sushi bar in that area but no burger place I can see.
I initially made a tacit assumption the other night that Reynolds was a major intersection and quickly overshot it. I did find Reynolds today which is maybe a block shy of a major diagonal intersection. But this soon became a puzzle. Most of the area to the left of me (towards the intersection seemed to be empty except for a corner pawnshop (I think). To my right seemed to be a huge faith-based complex/campus; if it was located on the campus, I saw no sign of it. The map pin suggested it was at the corner of Reynolds and Sims, although the map had outlined the length of Reynolds. It didn't make sense that the address would have Sims if it was further down Reynolds, but I went down Reynolds anyway only to find most of it residential and probably not zoned for a restaurant anyway. Just to make sure, I crossed 20 to the other side of Reynolds and didn't find a restaurant there either.
Earlier at lunchtime, I found a Google reference to its location in a strip mall with a Grocery Outlet and a Dollar General a few blocks away from the Reynolds spot, and I recall reading one Yelp customer not happy with the idea of Tucker Duke's moving to a strip mall, so maybe that was the place, but I don't know why the corporate website wouldn't reference it. I went into the strip mall and couldn't find it--a vacant space for lease where I expected to find it. No Tucker Duke sign anywhere including the strip mall's registry of mall shops.
The Tucker Duke website had a "contact us by email" link, and I sent an unacknowledged "where are you guys?" email several hours back, no response as of the publication of this post. It should not be this hard to find a restaurant; who knows how many people have run into similar problems and the restaurant has lost potential customers. Maybe the trainer knows, and I'll find out Monday; I'll follow up if the mystery has been solved. In the meanwhile, I paid a second visit to the Cajun restaurant French Quarter where I enjoyed a blackened catch of the day. Life is good.
Tom Thumb and Invalid References (8/27/17)
I love my little Garmin (although I have occasional complaints when I unknowingly shoot past a necessary turn and it doesn't warn me: I may have mentioned in a softdoc post how I shot past the strip mall I needed to return my cable equipment in WV and found myself on a one-lane road in the WV countryside.) With a single click you can get a list of distance-tagged local gas stations, restaurants, etc,, with linkable directions.
Oddly enough, on my normal commute, I haven't run into a gas station. So I checked my Garmin and noticed a Tom Thumb up the street. Now just to explain: I lived in Irving, TX in 1992-3 and did grocery shopping at Tom Thumb. I didn't know they operated in Florida; I wasn't sure why they were listed under gas stations, but I've seen Kroger, Safeway, etc. with affiliated gas pumps. Well, surprise, surprise, it was just a typical gas station/convenience store. I did pick up a pricey muti-pack of Diet Coke (but it still beats paying up to $2 a can in vending machines (when they're working)). I wanted to pick up a few other items but now know where the WalMart is in the area.
