An ode to Harold's

Oh, Harold. You make me so happy.

Even when I have to wait.

And especially when I get the last chocolate-glazed doughnut.

By Harold, I mean Harold's Koffee House, the family-owned diner that's been serving breakfast and lunch in Florence since 1958.

I love your smell: freshly ground coffee beans, butter on a flat-top and something sweet baked before dawn.

I love your look: a tidy 1960s time capsule of pale aqua booths, gold-flecked Formica, backless swivel stools and pie cases that keep their meringue-topped wares at eye level.

I love your clever design: a divided horseshoe counter that wraps around interior booths, with a pink-lined waitress walkway in between.

I even love your kind-but-firm signage: “friendliest koffee in town” banners, a “right to refuse service” plaque and a service policy that begins: “Cheap, Fast and Perfect ... You can have any two.”

On recent visits, I experienced cheap and perfect. Fast, Harold's was not. Expect to wait 20 to 30 minutes from order to first bite, especially on busy weekends. If you're really hungry, snag a 59-cent doughnut with your coffee. The small, skinny brown cake loops with chocolate or vanilla icing are known to eliminate growls and scowls.

I love to settle into a booth with a thick-lipped mug and a paper I've already read, the better to bathe in the clatter and chatter: grandfatherly singles at the counter nursing coffee and toast, Florence business owners gabbing about vacation plans, parents trying to keep their little ones occupied, couples young and old, aqua-aproned waitresses wielding coffeepots as if they were natural extensions of their arms.

When at last the food comes, I love that, too. For lunch, it's well-seasoned hand-pattied burgers served on small, buttered-and-grilled buns, with ruffle-cut chips and pickle slices for $3.59. Hand-cut and house-breaded pork tenderloin sandwiches that haven't been pounded or cooked to oblivion. Crinkle-cut fries that aren't greasy, and a coleslaw that tastes as simple and fresh as grandma's.

For breakfast, it's lightly seasoned eggs cooked as ordered. Fluffy pancakes and buttermilk biscuits and creamy sausage-studded pepper gravy. Hash browns that are flaked rather than grated — little petals of parboiled potato dusted with the paprika-colored house seasoning salt and fried to intermittent golden-brown goodness.

For desserts, it's gooey, buttery, nut-loaded cinnamon-pecan rolls. Milk shakes and malts. More of those tiny and terrific doughnuts, sometimes with a pleasantly peppery nutmeg kick in their chocolate icing. Light-as-a-cloud and cold-as-custard banana cream pie with firm loops of unweeping — dare I say happy? — meringue.

The menu lists dishes seldom seen elsewhere: Campbell's chicken noodle and tomato soups itemized unapologetically alongside the house-made mulligan stew or navy bean soup with ham. Denver and hot beef sandwiches. Corned beef hash. Cinnamon toast and the cooked wheat cereal Zoom.

A few modern surprises come with the nostalgia: truly tasty coffee made with just-ground Colombian beans (included with all breakfast entrees). Superbly sauteed vegetables (mushrooms, zucchini, tomatoes, bell peppers) folded into a perfectly seasoned omelet with big squares of bacon and melted Swiss. Thin waffles enlivened with a fresh blueberry-raspberry-strawberry purée and granola — creamy, crunchy and delicious additions that turned up the corners of my mouth on a rainy Sunday.

There's even something uplifting about the handwritten guest checks, tallied by servers who know the prices and do the math in their heads but let the register calculate the tax.

With tax and tip, my date and I spent about $16 for two just-right breakfasts and about $30 for two heartier lunches — complete with drinks, desserts, doughnuts to go and a contented feeling that lasted far longer than the sweets.

Contact the writer:

444-1069, nichole.aksamit@owh.com

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