I grew up a thankfully nourished child due to Oklahoma’s once-stellar free lunch program. To typically hungry kids like me that counted on a warm tray of eats every school-day for breakfast and lunch, the gorgeous ladies of well-balanced meals were the true educational heroes of the near-penniless students.
Those women in their tight hairnets and orthopedic shoes always made consistently delicious meals that can still inspire me today more than any celebrity chef that graces a local eatery with their overpaid presence ever could; if I’m being honest, there’s not a day that goes by where I don’t lament that long lost culinary tradition.
And while those days of free lunches might be gone, that taste—that goddamned taste I just can’t shake—is back in the best way possible at the incomparable Polk’s House, 2319 N. Lottie Ave. Sure, they might serve grown-up selections for grown-up hungers, but the spirit of that lunch-lady love remains as soon as you walk into the tiny corner building to order.
With a menu that changes every day, today they offered fried catfish, baked ziti, barbeque pork-chops and fried chicken, all lined up in silver warming trays, the server standing with shiny tongs ready to go. As my gal-pal Jodie made her lunch selection, I scanned the homemade cakes and pies across the top of the sneeze-guard, licking my lips as I chose my midday meal, somewhere around $11.00 each.