Maxine's Chicken & Waffles

I’m so excited about all of today’s wonderful events. My wife called me and asked if we could go to lunch. This made my heart skip a beat, and put a smile on my face. She really knows how to make my day. She had the kids downtown at the library to get some more books. As always, it was another fine opportunity to find a great place to get some lunch downtown. What a hardship.

I asked a couple of co-workers if they were up to the challenge of feasting and imbibing alongside with my wife and kids… they didn’t even flinch. IT’s ON!! We’re going to Maxine’s Chicken and Waffles.

I’ve been there once before with my son to have dinner. It was kind of late in the afternoon before the dinner rush and hardly anyone was there. It really wasn’t a good time to gather a solid impression of a place like this. Today was a different story. The place was hoppin’ and the food was on point.

If you didn’t know, Maxine’s shares a building with a gas station, so it can be kind of shocking the first time you see it. At least it was for my wife. It only shares the building though, not the same space. Once inside, there are no signs that you’re even close to a gas station.

The dining room is spacious with high ceilings and concrete floors. The kitchen is pretty open and you can see all of the great looking grub flying in the order window and out to the eager patrons.

The menu appears to have some more items added to it and our server said that a new one is about to be released. Just another reason to come back soon.

For lunch, Maxine’s offers some smaller $5.00 specials that my family and I decided to check out. We each got a waffle with a jumbo chicken wing. Our server let us exchange the kids’ wing in for a chicken tender and she was even nice enough to give them two to share. I also ordered some collard greens on the side for good measure. One of my co-workers ordered the fried catfish with fries and some greens and the other ordered chicken breast on rice, smothered in chicken gravy with a side of greens as well.

Our orders came out fairly quick, about 10-15 minutes, and boy did they look good. Each waffle comes with a soufflé cup full of peach butter. The butter was amazing, it tastes like candy. The wings were hot and had a thin coating of seasoned batter on them… quite tasty. But my favorite of all was the chicken tenders. I don’t usually rave about chicken tenders, but these things were amazing. They were hot and juicy inside and the batter was a little thicker and more seasoned than the wings. The flavor balanced perfectly with a couple of squirts of Frank’s hot sauce – YUM!

The collard greens were good too. They came with a slice of tomato and onion on top. They weren’t too firm or too soft… just right. And for some reason I didn’t every splash pot liquor all over my shirt like I usually do. It was a miracle.

The catfish was crisp and flavorful without a greasy feel or taste and the gravy on the smothered chicken had a lot of flavor without being either bland or too salty.

After all of that great food stuffing our gullets, none of us were able to get dessert, but I’ve already had the experience of biting into a piece of their homemade, made by a cake lady, caramel cake. You gotta get some. That’s all I’ll say.

The service was nice and expedient, and a plus was the free parking at the side of the building. That’s hard to come by when you’re near downtown.

Oh, I almost forgot to tell you. The fried cornbread is off the charts. It was hot and soft and when you smother that peach butter all over the top it’ll take you to a very special place… the ER. Just kidding. We don’t come here because it’s healthful. This is some serious soul food, and you’ve got to check this place out again and again and again--