Yellow Pages Dinner Club

This site was last updated 14 January 2003. Minor update: May 2005 .

The club is still active, but starting in 2005 we've slowed down from our once a week schedule. The website just hasn't gotten any attention since January of 2003. The backlog of reviews to add has grown to over 150.
If you really want to read the reviews (in a timely fashion) send me an e-mail and I'll add you to the YPDC mailing list. -dennis

Overview:
At the start of 1998, a couple of people decided to start the Yellow Pages Dinner Club. Once a week, members of the club will dine at a restaurant in Kitchener-Waterloo (with occasional excursions into the surrounding area). The selection of the restaurant is determined by consulting the restaurant listings in the local telephone books. Starting at the letter A, we're working our way through the alphabet until we exhaust the list (this will take place later this year, but we are going a bit further a field, so we might last to 2004 before repeating).

The idea for the club was inspired (via CBC Radio) by the Serial Diner's Club which is working it's way through Toronto. Their 13th year of operation (2002) finds them working through the E's. They expect to get to Z around 2034 (whether they have anyone left after 45 years of eating is another matter).

The purpose of this club is to broaden our culinary tastes and experiences. With the hopes of discovering restaurants to add our favourites list.

    Rules (developed thus far):
  1. We do not eat at donut shops, fast food chains, and/or major restaurant chains (except when we do).
  2. There is no membership fee. The only cost to you is the price of your meal and beverage(s).
  3. Members do not have to attend every meeting.
  4. Members may invite other people (spouses, friends, family, etc.) to join the club.
  5. Members are requested to submit a review of the restaurant/meal and any other comments/anecdotes to the YPDC website c/o dmullin@sentex.net.
  6. We reserve the right to change the rules as we see fit.

    Definitions:
  1. Abstract beer: Canadian mass produced beer, not!
    I'll let David explain.
    Our bar order at Dixie Lilly's Laundromat Cafe was a little different. They had Blue and Coors on draft, and when I asked about bottled beer, the waitress said they had lots. What did I want? Figuring that ordering imported beer might cause a lynch mob to form, I asked for a Waterloo Dark. She replied, "Sorry, we don't have any abstract beers". Abstract beer. I *like* that phrase.
  2. Comfort food: Food that you enjoyed as a child. For that warm fuzzy feeling. And thus the exact details vary from reviewer to reviewer.
  3. Gangster beer: Moretti is a decent Italian lager that has a picture of an old man with a large mustache and hat drinking a beer. A waitress at Ennio's told us of a previous customer who came in and asked for a gangster beer. Puzzled, she asked him what he meant. He replied that he wanted the beer with the picture of the gangster on it, meaning Moretti. I think the guy looks rather harmless, but then again I probably haven't watched enough of the Godfather movies. -David
  4. Local restaurant: A restaurant with generally okay food, but not special enough to visit unless you're local to it or in the area for some other reason.

Reviewers:
Ian Bell, Annette Brown, David Brown, Jasmine Mangalaseril, Dennis Mullin, James Nicoll, Frederik Poinot, Denise Tom, Michael Vasiliou, Nora Znotinas. (as of 2003)

Note: the higher the number in brackets, the more recent the review.

Review Index:

If you want to be on our mailing list or you have corrections, comments or suggestions contact: dmullin@sentex.net.