Lunch at Cluff's Car Hop Cafe

Cluff's first opened in Fillmore in 1950 and has been owned and operated by the Cluff family for five generations.  It has also received many accolades as an excellent place to stop for a bite along I-15.    I arrived at Cluff's Car Hop Cafe at 1:00 p.m.

                                     The first thing I noticed was that the place was packed.

I was lucky to get a parking spot.  A lady was pulling out of her spot right as I was pulling in. I immediately claimed the real estate.

I ordered their quarter pound cheese burger, fries and and drink.

I wanted to sit outside but those benches were all taken so I settled for an inside table. 

That probably was the better choice.  It gave me an opportunity to enjoy their nostalgia.  My table is the one with the Coke cup.

Retro soda pop bottles are displayed on the wall

                            My cheese burger was fresh and tasty and the fries were exceptional.

My burger and fries.

Cluff's cuts their own fries and zips them with a spicy, flavorful seasoning.  The result is an order of fries that is well above the average fare.

I said hi to an older couple sitting at the table in front of me.  I was kind of curious as to what they had ordered so I asked them.  All I could tell was that it looked like a mountain of deep fried something.   What they had ordered was a round of Cluff's famous onion rings.    They even gave me one of them to try.  They also let me take a photo of the onion rings.

These were some of the biggest onion rings I've ever seen.  And this is not what a full order looks like.  They had already eaten some of them plus the one they gave to me.   When they first brought out the onion rings, they were towering.

Getting a little acquainted with this couple was one of those small world moments.  They also live in West Jordan.  And they were on their way to Saint George to stay with some friends like I was.  They told me they've been stopping at Cluff's for years whenever they're en route to the south.

They weren't able to quite finish all their onion rings.  They had two left and offered to let me finish them if I liked.  I was happy to oblige them.    

I took one more photo of Cluff's Car Hop before heading out.  Only last year, the Deseret News sent a crew of reporters down to do a story on Cluff's.  

Deseret News article on Cluff's 

And KSL sent a camera crew down to report.

KSL news clip on Cluff's.

Cluff's closes up for the winter so you will need to catch them in season.  It's interesting that 40 percent of their customers are pass through travelers.   Most families that frequently travel from here to there probably have their own place along the way where they like to stop, enjoy a little rest, and have a bite to eat.  Frostop was a drive-in franchise that probably filled that need for many Utah travelers.  These days, there's not a whole lot of them around anymore, though the one in Saint George survives.  For my family, it was the Saint George A&W drive-in where we always stopped on the way back to Las Vegas.  Unfortunately, it's also been closed down and for quite some time.  I found a wonderful photo of it posted at the Washington county historical society's website.  The photo was taken in 1967.

I want to say thanks to the guy standing by the VW Bug who donated the photo.  It's sad when places like this that provided so many cherished memories now can only exist in our memories.  But Cluff's is one of those great places that has withstood the test of time and the winds of cultural change.   The locals who grew up with it and the travelers who've been stopping there for years can continue to enjoy the good food, the good times and the good memories.