The Wonder Bar has a spectacular reputation in the state. It's known as one of the best, and since it's located right in Clarksburg, Vicki and I saw it fitting to try it for a celebration dinner. The restaurant is located atop a hill bearing its namesake, giving it a beautiful view of the city.

We arrived for our reservations around 6:30 and were seated in a back room. I noticed the dark, old-school interior and how the part we were in looked like it was an addition. The main area had dark red walls, and the ceiling was slightly different.

Our waiter brought us out menus, and we ordered a special appetizer - crab-stuffed shrimp. There were only a handful, but they were good. Some melted butter on the side.

I ordered the petite filet mignon (6 oz.), which came with a house salad. Our waiter got a little confused. I asked for blue cheese on mine with their house dressing, but somehow ended up getting the blue cheese dressing with mozzarella cheese. Vicki had an incorrect salad altogether, but when they brought out the wedge, it looked great. Mine was tasty, despite it not being exactly what I had ordered.











We were served some bread along with our entrees.

We had the option of adding onions or mushrooms to our steak, so I got mushrooms. Plus cheese melted on the top of the steak. For my side, I got pasta with their blush sauce. The steak came with bearnaise sauce, and it was just truly delicious.

It was cooked to a perfect medium, the cheese was amazingly rich, melty and creamy. Mushrooms added a nice flavor, and the sauce was just a different level of rich. The meal overall was spectacular. Nice attention to detail and additions to make the meal customized.

The pasta on the side was an after-thought, and I mostly ate this leftover since I had so much for my entree. But the sauce was a good - a nice mix of their red and white.

At this point, I was super pleased with our meal. From start to finish, I had great food. The appetizer was good, the salad was good, the entree was incredible, and the sides were all great. So, I figured I'd top it off with dessert.

I ordered this mousse for dessert. By this time it was around 8:30. We didn't eat especially slow, but we had a few different courses, and they weren't always the quickest to come out. But I noticed that we were literally the only table left in the dining area. They had pushed all the tables to the edges and literally began sweeping right beside our table.

If there's a more blatant way to say "get out," I think it would be to verbalize that statement. There were people coming in and setting up. Apparently they booked that room at 8:30 for some event. If that's the case, I'm not sure why you would sit someone in there at 6:30. Unless they assume we would get an entree and leave. But they also weren't quick to deliver each dish.

Regardless, it really left a sour taste in my mouth. The dessert was great. I could've probably bathed in it. And I highly recommend it, but if I'm paying in the three-digits for a meal, please don't be sweeping literally right beside my table, urging me to leave, as all that dust is flying into my $13 dessert.


Grade: B

The 36th Annual West Virginia Italian Heritage Festival in Clarksburg was a pretty cool time. In addition to some music, I got to try lots of wines - and mostly from wineries I haven't heard of.

Stone Road Vineyard
Wine Tree Vineyards
Batton Hollow Winery
West Whitehill
Cascarelli's Old Country Wine
and Kirkwood I have heard of.

The wine garden was great to explore some of those wineries. Remind me to do a blog post later listing all the wineries so I can start checking them off as I go to them.

Also - I was able to try a D'annunzio's pepperoni roll! So good. Also had fritti from The Blue Bird, which is just like a donut - but thinner and more wobbly. Technical terms, people.

Pretty fun, and fairly cheap. The wine garden was $10 for samples and the cup. My pepperoni roll was $3, and fritti - just $1.

North Central West Virginia is well known for their Italian cuisine - apparently from Italian immigrants who had been recruited to work in mining and glass manufacturing. There are a number of iconic Italian restaurants in the area, including Muriale's in Fairmont and Puglioni's or Oliverio's in Morgantown. Minard's Spaghetti Inn is the Clarksburg equivalent of that - local, Italian, and beloved in the area. It even earned a spot on the 101 unique places to dine in West Virginia.

I feel like I first heard about Minard's when I saw their sauce for sale, but since I can't find anywhere that says anything about them selling their sauce, I might just be crazy. Regardless, I had a free Saturday night and so did Tony, so we made the small trip there to see what all the commotion was about.


Once we got the address right on the GPS, it was easy to find. It's 813 EAST Pike St., FYI. And, it's a really pretty building, actually. I was expecting something older, possibly run down. But it looks like a house that was transformed into a restaurant. I dig it. Inside, there are some kind of old-school decorations - it is 75 years old afterall - some odd nooks and crannies, but comfortable. Just like you'd want an Italian dinner to be.

Their menu has the traditional spaghetti, ravioli, baked ziti, stuffed shells, rigatonni, lasagna, eggplant parmesan and some white sauce options like chicken fettuccine alfredo. Nothing really new or inventive, but classic Italian fare in Appalachia.

My mother's stuffed shells were my favorite meal growing up. I would beg for stuffed shells in place of ham for Christmas - and sometimes it worked. When I began celebrating Christmas on my own, stuffed shells became the main course. And, I use her recipe. It's the best mixture of ricotta, parmesan, romano, parmesan in a marinara sauce. If I'm feeling fancy, I'll make meatballs for some protein. But it's seriously my favorite homemade meal.

I knew this wouldn't be the same, but it's hard for me to pass up stuffed shells at an Italian restaurant in hopes they might come close to nipping at the toes of the deliciousness my mother can produce. The menu said they are stuffed with seasoned ground sausage mixed with a blend of four cheeses and herbs and baked in their famous red sauce. All that for $11.95. I also ordered a side of meatballs because I wanted to see what they were like - two meatballs for $2.

The entrees come with salad and bread. I went for the house Italian dressing. The waitress asked if I wanted tomatoes, and of course, I want all of your tomatoes. When the salad came out, I immediately felt bad for anyone who didn't order tomatoes because you just lost half your salad. Their salads consist of iceberg lettuce and tomatoes. House dressing. I get that these are supposed to be simple - or whatever - but you can't give me a sprig of carrot? A crunchy crouton? Nada? It didn't help that the tomatoes weren't especially flavorful. Big surprise. But the dressing was actually good. I like the light olive oil/vinegar. Light but with tang.

The bread, which others have claimed is fresh baked, looks straight from a bag to me. It wasn't even warm. Meh meh meh. I feel like they probably brought bread out because you're supposed to. But it was lackluster.

The stuffed shells - I think I had a total of four or five. Not super huge helpings. It was simple, but good. Not a super complex sauce - tomatoes, herbs, sugar, etc. But it was good. It was basic, but not canned, and what you'd want from a base sauce. I would've loved some mushrooms to give it a bit more depth, but like I said - basic, but good.

The inside was filled with mostly meet and very little cheese. I was a little disappointed because I was hoping it'd be the other way around. It was still good though - great flavor, well-seasoned and tasty. More cheese would've made me a lot happier, but it was still overall good. The meatballs I had were pretty much in the same seasoning as the filling of the shells, but they were even better. They were moist and had a perfect amount of spice. If you're looking for some basic, yet tasty, Italian food, check it out.

Check them out on Yelp and Google+.

Grade: B

All of the sushi places in Morgantown probably know me by name now, so my friend Afton and I decided to get out of town for a bit and try something different.

We ventured out of Morgantown, through Fairmont and landed in Clarksburg at their resident Japanese restaurant: Shogun Japanese Steak House.

Rather than go through the hibachi show, we sat in the sushi bar area. Unfortunately, they sat us right beside the door and every time new people would come in, not only did they gawk over us and our food, but they also let in this chilling puff of air. Bleh.


The menu is very visual, but none of the rolls really spoke to me. So I looked over the accompanying chef special rolls (all of which were $11). I had the TNT roll, which was spicy tuna, crab, avocado, deep-fried and topped with spicy mayo, eel sauce and masago. I also ordered the Shogun Crab Roll, which was crabmeat and cucumber wrapped in seaweed and rice, topped with shredded crabmeat and Japanese sweet mayo. Afton ordered the Tokyo, which was two pieces of shrimp tempura, topped with spicy tuna, crunch and eel sauce.

Our waitress was incredibly sweet and accommodating. Our food came out fairly quickly, despite them being fairly busy on a Saturday night.

The TNT roll was good. I think they forgot my masago, but it was fine, regardless. Maybe this is me being bratty, but when it's deep-fried, I kind of like the tuna to still be raw on the inside, which probably isn't easy to do. But I've had it before and now prefer it that way. So this was fine. Not super flavorful - quality could've been maybe a little less than extra fresh.

The Shogun Crab roll was pretty simple. The sauce on it, which ended up being this white/cream/yellow sauce was just ... not appealing. I think if it were totally white, like a mayo, or totally yellow, it would've been a different story. But it just looked goopy and yucky.

The Tokyo roll wasn't bad either. I hate having to rip apart a roll to take the tail off in tempura rolls because it just becomes a mess, but it was fine.

I just keep finding myself saying that these items weren't bad. They were kind of right down the middle average. I wouldn't seek this place out again, but if it were convenient, I wouldn't be opposed to going.

Grade: C