The Gawd Awful in Salt Lake City

Salt Lake City. It is the capital of Utah and was home to the 2002 Winter Olympics. I must admit, I only found out that it was the home of the University of Utah a few hours before Brett and I arrived. I would not say Salt Lake City qualifies as a college town, but since I was there, I had to see what great college food I could find. By the way, it was also where High School Musical was filmed. ( you can see that Brett was pretty excited to have found the high school that was used )

After Brett was done with his high school musical stop, we drove onto Utah’s campus where I immediately came across this..

This is my favorite kind of restaurant to investigate. Any place that 1. was established before I was born  2. It is named after a person ( I have had great success with this at Mickies, Cisco’s come to mind)  and 3. has a pretty sweet painting on the side. I have to go check out further.

Upon walking into Big Ed’s, my heart sank to the bottom of my chest. It was my worst nightmare as a photographer. No windows, multiple colors of neon light, tungsten light,and fluorescent. This is a text book example of what not to shoot food in.  This lighting is awesome for creating an atmosphere and setting a mood, but not shooting food.  Big Ed’s had an awesome atmosphere to it. It is one of those great dive bar college restaurants. I love going to these types of places, but not shooting in them. I usually would not post something like this because the food pictures do not meet the standard that I hold myself to, but I am making an exception because what I ordered was so good.

I listened to the menu and went with the Gawd Awful.

Hash browns, 2 scrambled eggs, Chili, Cheese, Onions and Sour cream. Based upon its looks, it is pretty easy to see where its name comes from. It looks like a big mess, but wow! It taste amazing. The chili is awesome. It has that great rich burning sensation as it travels down the back of your throat. When mixed together with the eggs and hash browns, it left me finishing the plate. I can see why they are famous for it.

Big Ed’s might have gawd awful lighting, but the Gawd Awful on the menu is definitely worth a try. The University of Utah is probably most known for its recent success on the football field. Being a huge college football fan,  I had to check out their stadium and see where they play. Utah did not make it on the tailgate tour list, but 12 awesome games did. I am leaving Thursday to head down to Ole Miss for the first game of the College Tailgate Tour! I am pretty excited as to what I will find to share with you.

Over the next few months, I will continue to bring you my western and California trip, but I will also be bringing you what I discover on the Tailgate Tour. It might seem like I am jumping all over the place, well I kind of am I will be in 11 states in 12 weeks starting this week,  and was in 10 states in 10 days at the end of July/beginning of August, but don’t worry I promise whatever I bring you, it will leave you hungry.