J and I ate at Randy's for lunch today. We've often driven past Randy's on our way to South Park for Mexican food, and joked - Dang, we could have gone to Randy's! Today, we actually went there.The slowly decaying Randy's, located along the Boeing plant drag on Marginal Way S., is determined to never change a thing - not even its waitresses. You can probably assume that the place is only still in business because it's within spitting distance of Boeing.
From the street, Randy's looks scary - it's dark, broken-down, and the parking lot is filled with the kind of vehicles you'd expect to see at a rest stop along the deep East end of Highway 90.
Even though it was against my better judgement, we pulled into the parking lot, and walked into the front door. Once inside, we were sucked back in time. The vinyl booths were pink and orange striped, model airplanes swung from the ceilings, photographs or illustrations of old Boeing planes adorned the booth walls, and the waitresses were most likely there the day Randy's first opened their swinging doors.
After getting over our nervous laughter from Randy himself seating us all the way in the back, behind a partition, we surveyed the menu. Randy's is incredibly inexpensive - most plates were less than $6 or $7, and they offer everything from a 24-hour breakfast to Veal Parmesan.Our waitress was an ancient woman. Half-deaf and mostly grumpy, we could tell that she didn't really care for us, and when J tried ordering a strawberry shake, mid order, she abruptly disappeared. She came back a few minutes later, and rather than upset her further, we ordered as simply as possible.
J ordered a mushroom-Swiss burger and I decided to go for the veggie burger. When our food came (along with the check), I was shocked to find an actual Garden Burger brand garden burger (their factories closed last year due to health violations), and since I'm probably one of the only vegetarians to ever visit Randy's, I'm certain I wasn't just sitting in a time-warp, I was eating one too.
Overall, I probably won't be craving the place anytime soon. I would suggest trying it only after you've exhausted all other options in Tukwila, Burien, Georgetown, and South Park.
The signs have all started to lose their bits, so if you go looking for Randy's - look instead for Ranay's.
Food: 1/5 (minus almost all points for the ancient Garden Burger)
Atmosphere: 3/5
Good times: 4/5 (extra points for it becoming funnier the longer I've thought about it)
Comments