Restaurant review: The Barrel Springbrook Township, Penn.

The Barrel is a nondescript red and white building that has an outdoor window; the kind of summer stand that you would go to in the 1950's and eat a summer meal outdoors after ordering your hamburgers and hotdogs. Three dining stools grace the counter but there is plenty of other seating.

Inside you come up the indoor dinner style counter and also booths along the wall. There are two other dining rooms and a porch where you can seat yourself. Just keep walking until you see an empty table. The whole restaurant is nonsmoking so you don't have to worry about where you sit.

Going to The Barrel is like going to your Nana's for dinner. You are going to get homemade stick to your ribs meals with all the comfort you get from Nana. There are specials every day as well as a couple of homemade soups. The menu has French onion soup and chili every day. My daughter always orders the chili.

The menu at The Barrel is interesting. While on one hand, it has all the old favorites like hot wings and real onion rings, they also have gravy fries, cheese fries, and sweet potato fries. More unusual are the mini potato pancakes, pierogies and batter dipped cauliflower.
The kids will be happy with the variety of burgers and wieners and it doesn't stop there, you can have a Reuben, a cheese steak or a meatball hoagie. Healthy choices are offered as well with wraps and salads. These are popular and great for lunch but the dinners and the hot plates are what keep us coming back.

One of the best meals here is the Chicken and Biscuits. It really is quite amazing with the best creamy sauce and homemade biscuits. The chicken is all white meat and melt in your mouth tender. Among my other personal favorites are the stuffed peppers, and stuffed cabbage, meatloaf, the roast turkey dinner and the hamburger steak with fried onions. These are all homemade good and I always have enough to have a second meal.

 Dinners come with two sides and you can choose from homemade mashed potatoes, French fries, baked beans, white rice, coleslaw, pickled beets, applesauce, corn, green beans, glazed carrots, broccoli or a side of pasta. I have to admit I am quite addicted to the gravy fries and have them almost every time I go there.

My husband likes the stuffed pork chop and the roast pork. They do offer a strip steak which is a good deal at $14.25

Dessert here is hard to resist. They make some excellent pies as well as rice pudding and strawberry shortcake. They do serve milkshakes and I have to admit that I love their root beer float. They also do a full range of ice cream sundaes.

If you can't get to Nana's for breakfast, lunch or dinner, The Barrel Springbrook Township, Penn. is an excellent substitute.