Your Guide to Authentic Regional Eats
Raised and glazed cake donuts and cream puffs, muffins and seductive chocolate gobs are the repertoire at this vintage 1930s donut shop that seems not to have changed much at all over the decades. Must eat: the huge, hugely satisfying cinnamon roll.
The Red Shed is a colorful and welcoming roadside enterprise where you can eat masterful meat loaf with all the trimmings, fallapart-tender grilled chicken, and a panoply of southern-style vegetables, followed by a spectacular selection of blue ribbon pies, cakes, and pudding for dessert. If a local fruit or vegetable is in season, you can buy it to cook and eat at home or taste it in the from-scratch meals that come from the kitchen.
Car hops carry classic burgers and fries, chicken tenders, and sandwiches of deep-fried chipped ham to the driver’s side window for in-car dining. Open since 1947, Jerry’s is fast, fun, inexpensive, and satisfying.
A laid-back market/cafe with a heart-warming old-neighborhood feel, Pear and the Pickle is known for excellent sandwiches at breakfast as well as lunch.
Prantl’s specialty is the burnt almond torte: a soft, almond-flavored, vanilla custard-filled butter cake, topped with buttercream frosting and toasted sugared almond slivers. It is available whole or in smaller sizes for takeaway snacks.
Hotcakes are as thin as crepes and every bit as elegant at Pamela’s. From-scratch corned beef hash, great Lyonnaise potatoes, a full-service soda fountain, and half-pound Lincoln Diner-Burgers make it a worthy stop for breakfast, brunch, or lunch.
Masterful European-style loaves of bread and pastries are made from the highest-quality ingredients. Coffee is available, but on-premises dining is limited to a single stand-up table indoors and a few tables out on the sidewalk.
There is nowhere in Pittsburgh better for an early morning meal than at a counter seat at the Gab & Eat, a blue collar urban hash house just west of downtown.
A Primanti’s sandwich is an all-in-one meal that includes your choice of meats, eggs, and cheeses plus slaw AND French fries all piled into the bread and served wrapped in paper to prevent premature spillage. Open ’round the clock.
Everywhere you look, there is fresh fish on ice, and as you explore this immense market, you also find meats, canned and bottled groceries, and produce of the highest quality. The house motto is “You buy, we fry,” meaning that any fish you see can be cooked to order and eaten on premises. Wholey’s fried-to-order fish sandwiches are legendary.
