Diner Week Day 2: Dodson Diner

Dodson Diner

1611 Dodson Avenue

Fort Smith, AR 72901

479.782.7750

Ya’ll heard about Dodson Diner yet? The place is also new in the past year, and finally seems to be catching on. Honestly, we’re surprised. Like most of you, we sometimes hold off on trying a new place till we figure out if it’s going to stick. This one we didn’t think would. The little hole-in-the-wall location on Dodson Ave., right up on the street with no other restaurants around and not much if any advertising, a while before they even had a sign, seemed to be a ticket to that Great Restaurant Cemetery in the Sky.

But no, it’s stuck. Now that we think about it, it makes sense. No other restaurants around, right near a hospital, unpretentious home cooking —we can see now why it works. We can taste it, too.

Charming much?

Pie-Off: Dodson Diner’s Coconut Cream vs. Lucy’s Diner’s Sweet Potato

Here at the Fort Smith Eats secret underground headquarters, we’re what you might call evil supergeniuses. Actually, we were going to say, “we’re what you might call pie fans,” but that a) sounded like something electronic used to cool pies (hmmm…where is that Patent Office number?) and b) really, really wanted to be replaced with “evil supergeniuses.” Sometimes you can just tell.

But we’ll leave our plans for world domination to another blog post. Here, our immediate focus is pie. Comparing and contrasting pies seemed like a brilliant idea because it meant, duh, we got a “reason” to eat pies (the sacrifices we make for you, loyal Fort Smith Eats readers!).

The rules:

1. The pies must be commercially available in the Fort Smith area. Don’t care how good your Aunt Lila’s strawberry-rhubarb is—if we can’t go buy it in Fort Smith, it doesn’t qualify for a Pie-Off.

2. The pies do not have to be from the same restaurant.

3. The pies do not have to be the same kind of pie. Why not? Just ‘cause. We’re the pie-eating evil supergeniuses with the blog, and we like variety.

4. There shall be no more than two pies in a Pie-Off.

5. In the end, there can be only one. No Highlander-style beheadings required.

First up to bat are two slices from what should be the quintessential pie pros: locally owned diners. Let’s meet the contestants: