Lovejoy's Bar and Grill

Notes from Jess: Apparently I've summoned the mountain fairies, some way or another! This post was originally written Thursday but the mountain fairies have been having fun stealing my posts!

I'm currently sitting in the McDonald's off of the interstate in Rawlins, Wyoming waiting on my online school websites to load.  I decided now would be the perfect opportunity to use the wifi while I have it and talk about a wonderful experience dining out last night in Laramie, Wyoming.

My brother has been working in this area since around the beginning of February and he and his crew has found their favorite places in Laramie and Rawlins.  Last night for dinner we headed into Laramie and my brother took us to their favorite place, Lovejoy's Bar and Grill.

Lovejoy's is downtown Laramie and parking is a bit difficult to come by in the evening.  We ate a early dinner and had arrived downtown around 5 o'clock.  We got super lucky because of the largeness of my brother's truck we had to go around the block to get parking big enough...and then my dad decided he couldn't walk all that way because of his bad knee. We ended up back in front of the bar and just our luck, someone was leaving and left us plenty of room for the truck right across the street! Score!





There weren't many people in the bar yet but it had a really warm and welcoming atmosphere.  From the amount of people that were there and the ones that arrived while we were there I noticed that the flow of the restaurant was decent in terms of efficiency but the partition wall that separated the high standing tables near the bar and the regular tables was making it difficult for the waitresses to move around.  I have considered the possibility that in the state of Wyoming they may have to separate the bar from the dining area; I'm going to look into this.

There several TVs that had different games on them.  It was mostly soccer and baseball, both sports that I'm just completely clueless when it comes to knowing what's going on but I'm sure if it was basketball I would have been engrossed in the game like some of the other guests were with baseball.

Photo Cred:  Alyn Johnson

The four of us each got something different but we ended up sharing with each other.  It was basically just fend for yourself and everyone got a little bit of everything that was on the table.  The favorites of the night was the buffalo chicken mac n cheese that my Ma ordered after my brother told her how good it was.  We fought the most over fork fulls of this creamy pasta that had a bit of a spicy twang to it.  The next popular item that was fought over was my garlic mashed potatoes that I chose as my side to my dinner (I can't remember for the life of me what I got but it hadn't reached my high expectations).  Ma kept saying that she could eat a big bowl of those potatoes as a meal, they were that good.  The appetizer we got was the chile con queso made with what appeared to be pulled pork.  It was different from the chile con queso we get in the Wichita area but I personally really enjoyed it.  There were lots of flavors and it was just so tasty paired with the tri colored tortilla chips.

I think the best moment of dinner at Lovejoy's was when my dad couldn't finish his plate of the mashed potatoes and gravy that came with his chicken fried steak.  Need I remind you that my dad very rarely doesn't finish a plate of food.  He leaned back with just a little bit of potatoes and gravy left and said "All right, who wants taters?" In a flash three forks flew across the table to get potatoes.  My dad, surprised, though he shouldn't have been since he had watched us fight for food on everyone else's plates, jumped back.

In Conclusion.

We only got to sample a small portion of the menu but I would definitely go back again whenever we're passing through Laramie.  The wait staff was fantastic and fun to talk to.  The atmosphere was very welcoming and the food, was pretty good all around.  Also, the street view of the bar and grill is pretty impressive.  It's located at the historic site of the Johnson Hotel (no relation, that we know of at least) and sits at the corner of the street with tall windows looking into the street.  I give Lovejoy's a 4 out of 5 based on the overall experience and the food.

I wonder where we're going to end up next in Laramie!

P.S. If you're wondering, the wifi I did have in Elk Mountain was weirdly not there this morning and then when it did appear it was turtle paced slow.  Thus, we ended up in a McDonald's in Rawlins.