Starlite Lounge--Holy Pierogi Batman

Let's say you're driving around Pittsburgh and you find yourself crossing the Highland Park bridge. You decide to take the first exit ramp towards Aspinwall and start cruising down Freeport Road. You pass a few Italian markets, some hockey gear stores, a mall, and then you enter the little town of Blawnox, Pennsylvania. Now you're starting to feel a little hungry, so you decided to see what Blawnox has to offer, it's a nice enough little 'burb, they must have something right? So you start looking around the main drag, and you pass by a pretty square looking building, just painted blue, nothing distinguishable to it, it just looks like well...a bar. A big, blue bar with no sign on the front, it's only once you pass it that you see the little board identifying it as the Starlite Lounge, but the place looked pretty bland right? Nothing too exciting?? Pretty boring...it's just a bar...just booze and peanuts right?? WRONG! You just cruised right on past one of the best restaurants Pittsburgh and it's surrounding areas has to offer...so pull a U-turn, find a parking spot, grab a beer and check out Moondog and the Starlite.

14 years ago a former musician decided to change careers and buy the local bar around the block...the Starlite. Around since '54, the Starlite is a favorite place to catch the Pirates' game, catch up with your buddies, and kick back with a Yuengling. The former owner sold the place to Ron--Moondog to everyone who knows the Starlite--he did so with one rule...the name stays. Moondog wasn't gettin' the Starlite unless it stayed the Starlite, so he kept the name and added his own touch to the menu, turning your typical bar food into one of the best meals I've ever eaten. Now you can definately still get your standard bar food, ya know wings, burgers, potato skins, that type of thing, but if you're lookin' for something more you can get that too from their fettuncini alfredo with chicken and mushrooms to meatloaf to the infamous chicken diablo, a spicy chicken and pasta dish that is a local legend. The one thing everyone says that you've gotta have at the Starlite though is the pierogis. Pittsburgh is a Polish town, and that means they've got some killer homemade pierogis. So whatever else you get on the menu make sure you're addin' on a pierogi appetizer, homemade with every order from the same recipe used by one of the Starlite's waitress' Grandma. These things are flying out of the kitchen so fast that on their website they actually recommend that you call ahead and pre-order them so they can have em ready for you. So when Ben and I strolled out of the movies on a Wednesday afternoon, we called the Starlite, ordered our pierogis and headed into Blawnox to see what else Moondog had to offer.

If you haven't figured it out yet, Ben and I are suckers for some good bar food. We would prefer a big plate of wings to the fanciest meal you could place in front of us, and because of that, the Starlite is in our top three of places we've been from Triple D (they're actually number 2 but I haven't told you guys about number 1 yet). We decided to mix up how we order a little bit so that we could both get a taste of everything, and I think our waitress thought we were a little crazy for it. Plus we were the only people in the bar eating, we didn't go into the actually dining room area where a couple other groups were. We decided to order a ton of food and just split everything and it was an excellent idea. We, obviously, had the pierogis and wow, better than could've been expected. Sauteed with butter and onions, and filled with cheese and potato these things (3 to an order) were huge and hearty. They were seriously a meal in themselves, served up with a side of applesauce, that my apple-hating boyfriend steered clear of. They were dense and fluffy all at the same time, a definate repeat order for the next time we roll into the bar. On top of those, we also got some BBQ wings, which weren't just your run of the mill drummies, no no, these things were whole wings, slathered in Moondog's famous sauce--they were Ben's favorite part of the meal. My favorite part was yet to come though...the Cowboy Burger. A huge burger covered in cheddar cheese, bacon, and BBQ sauce, plus fries that tasted like they were right off the boardwalk. Definately in the top 3 burgers I've ever had, and trust me I've had a lot of burgers, and few compare (again just wait for the number one Triple D joint). Our waitress expected us to need a box, but no way, we were there for dinner and we cleaned out plates and were ready for seconds. Everytime we talked about going out to dinner from this night on the Starlite always came up, but we haven't made it back yet, even though we absolutely will be back soon, and will probably order the exact same thing, because let's face it, why change a great thing???

Check out their Triple D clip and their menu:

http://www.moondogs.us/StarliteHome.html