Cotton fields ready for harvest, Highway 87, south of Lubbock, Texas, (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
My company is negotiating with a potential business partner, which required me to make a trip to West Texas to look at the potential location for our project, a few miles outside of a very small cotton-farming community called Seagraves, Texas. After we finished our tour, our hosts suggested we drive into town and have lunch. We’re always up for lunch, and had plenty of time before our return flight.
Seagraves is located on a state highway in the cotton belt, and is known for being halfway between Odessa and Lubbock. And cotton gins. The surrounding area is flat, dry, with a red soil good for growing short-fiber cotton, if given enough water. This is a shot of what the edge of the town looks like. It goes on from here for about 100 miles.
- View at edge of Seagraves. Cotton has been harvested, but not yet planting time for next year’s crop. Not the prettiest time of year out here.
We pulled into the Cotton Country Cafe. I have a good feeling about this when I noticed the artwork on their address plaque. Obviously, these are people of breeding and good taste.
My alma mater. Well, the school, not this actual location.
Our table consisted of myself and my co-worker, three men who were our business contacts, and a few of their business associates: a man who did all the workovers (1) on their production wells, and another who was their fishing tool (2) contractor. All of the people at the table knew all of the staff, which is typical of small town places, and most of the diners seemed to either know or at least recognize each other.
I went for the special of the day, Chicken Tidbits, which turned out to be chicken breast strips, with one of the crispiest coatings I had ever eaten, served up with typical country mashed potatoes and cream gravy. Eric ordered a jalapeno burger, and pronounced it, likewise, one of the best burgers he had eaten in months. Unlike some of the small restaurants in tiny towns, this place was bright, cheerful, and pleasantly decorated. The menu had some hidden humor in it. For instance, the “Cedar Lake Special.” Cedar Lake is a pond outside of town, that sometimes goes completely dry. There are no catfish in Cedar Lake. These are foods I don’t normally order. At home I tend to go for pho or sushi or curries, so having these comfort foods, well prepared, is a treat. 
In typical small town, oil business fashion, the contractor picked up the tab for all ten of us.
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- Fried and Dried (two differentgirls.com)
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Categories: Food, Work and Jobs
Two Different Girls 
Reblogged this on The ObamaCrat.Com™ and commented:
I love this post, takes me away from politics to a time, as a child, traveling with my grandparents on road trips and stopping at some of the best roadside eatery’s in America. Thank you Two Different Girls and I wish you & your family a wonderfully joyous Kwanzaa, Christmas & Hanukkah & a healthy and happy New Year around the world.
Thank you for the kind words and wishes. I travel a lot for business, and it’s quite often in small towns, so I find a lot of these little places
This cafe looks like just what you WANT to find. Good food, done well, in a clean friendly environment! Though goodness that is rather BROWN and FLAT scenery!
Change the trees and you could have been in outback Australia. Only other difference is that menu is almost incomprehensible to my Australian English – two nations divided by a common language?
I love how one minute you’re living it up in London and the next it’s tiny towns at the end of the road in Texas – makes your blog so interesting,
The menu has “cute” names. This is not how these dishes are generally referred to.
Biggest thief in Gaines County owns the place. Good breeding and good taste???? A long line of thieves with a taste for $$$. Good thing your “typical oilfield contractor” picked up the tab, otherwise you’d of been the one contributing to the delinquency of crooks!!!