EDITOR’S NOTE: This story was published in January 2011. Since its publication, the Old Pier House Restaurant has closed.
Steve Combs walks into the Old Pier House Restaurant, and by the time he finds a seat and tells everybody good morning, his plate arrives.
“I get the same thing every morning, and I don’t even have to tell them what I want,” he says. That’s dry wheat toast, grits, and an omelet with sweet peppers, onions, and whatever vegetables might be on hand. “Sometimes they surprise me with jalapenos,” says Combs, a broker with Coldwell Banker Sea Coast Realty in Carolina Beach.
Named for the fact that the restaurant used to perch on the pier — until Hurricane Hazel razed it — the Old Pier House has been around longer than anyone can remember. Tom and Debra Humphrey have been running the restaurant for 10 years or so.
“It’s like a little community restaurant,” says their daughter, Margaret Pennstrom. “The police and all the town employees gather here.” The restaurant prides itself on the biscuits made fresh every morning. “And they’re really big,” she says.
Old Pier House Restaurant
101 K Avenue, Kure Beach
(910) 458-8616
Don’t miss:
The “really big” biscuits.
In North Carolina, spring brings the scent of fresh-cut grass and memories of helping Dad mow the lawn.
Nostalgic burger joints are like time machines, delivering something extra special that keeps us coming back.
This tiny city block in downtown Greensboro once had a gigantic reputation. Not so much for its charbroiled beef patties — though they, too, were plentiful — but for its colorful characters and their wild shenanigans.
In the 1950s, as Americans hit freshly paved roads in shiny new cars during the postwar boom, a new kind of restaurant took shape: the drive-in. From those first thin patties to the elaborate gourmet hamburgers of today, North Carolina has spent the past 80 years making burger history.
