Don't Try To Eat Your Bellacino's Grinder Or Advertise Your 6th Avenue Grill During AMC's Walking Dead

When I lived near a Mancino’s franchise owned and operated by Theresa Hager in Lexington, KY, Sunday night TV meant spot-welding the TV tuner to AMC and settling in with a bottle of pop and a steak and cheese grinder from Mancino’s. I was a regular customer of Ms. Hager’s Leestown Rd Mancino’s and I hung with her even after she allowed her 15-year-old employee to attack me and call Barack Obama a “socialist” on election day 2008 when I entered Mancino’s wearing my “I voted” sticker and was asked for whom I voted. When I said “Obama” all hell broke loose in the restaurant where the TV which was usually tuned to Fox News regularly tormented me.

Incidentally, I recently found a pretty good but not great grinder at Bellacino’s in Barboursville where I was tormented by country music that was too loud and, well, too country. More on Bellacino’s later.

Anyway, Sunday night TV is no longer best enjoyed with a great sandwich – or food of any kind, for that matter. At least not this season. Not until Breaking Bad comes back this spring. You see, AMC’s current Sunday night show, Walking Dead, will ruin your appetite so even if I could find a good grinder in The Kanawha Valley I couldn’t eat it while watching AMC on Sunday night because I Walking Dead is just too gross.

And it’s been done. It’s derivative of Will Smith’s gross zombie movie, I Am Legend. 

Walking Dead is the second recent AMC programming mistake; the other one was the cancellation of Rubicon after just one season.

Now, back to my search for a great grinder. When I found out that members of the same family that started Mancino’s founded the Bellacino’s franchise, I went in search of a grinder worthy of being enjoyed on Sunday night while watching Breaking Bad. I almost found it. I say “almost” because the grinders I bought at Bellacino’s in Barboursville and Kanawha City were much better than the grinders I found at Larobi’s and Husson’s but not as good as the grinders I used to get at Mancino’s in Lexington.

I have a suggestion for Todd Forney, Suzanne Stevens and Shawn Stevens, owners of the Bellacino’s franchises in Kanawha City and Barboursville: take a drive down to Lexington, KY and get a steak and cheese grinder from Mancino’s on Leestown Rd. Forney used to work in Lexington so he should have no trouble finding the place.

By the way, I had lunch at 6^th Avenue Grill in St. Albans yesterday and I offer owners Guy and Robin Turturice and John and Amy Sowards the same advice I offer Forney, Stevens and Stevens: take a drive down to Lexington, KY, and order a Mancino’s grinder. Figure out how they make it. Bring it to St. Albans. It’ll be a hit.

Oh, and if you own a food business, don’t even think about buying ad time during AMC’s Walking Dead. Believe me, unless you are in the janitorial business or some other business where your job is to clean up messes, you don’t want your brand anywhere near the Walking Dead brand.