Mar 15, 2008 - 04:06:25 CDT
It sits in a meat-and-potatoes neighborhood with a little grit on the side - the railroad tracks on its backside, and a lumberyard is the view out of its front windows.But a big-deal camera crew from Britain is about to give it some celebrity status.
The family-owned diner, the first Kroll's Diner, established in 1967, still vents its aroma into the industrial neighborhood - making the neighborhood smell like the inside of grandma's house. That is if grandma made a lot of dough, a lot of German food, knoephla soup and fleischkuekle.
Everyone from the guy driving the delivery truck to politicians to rock bands have eaten there. And still do. Because the Glatt family's very first Kroll's Diner, at 1915 E. Main Ave., now one of six Kroll's Diners, keeps cooking along.
And the regulars keep coming.
As well as some irregulars.
Friday, a British Broadcasting Corporation film crew stopped in.
They're in the midst of a project to highlight one thing in every state in the union. The travelogue series will air on the BBC in the fall, said Amanda Sealy, associate producer for the project.
In this particular whirlwind production tour, hitting 10 states in three weeks, Sealy and crew picked Kroll's because it seemed like a good slice of Dakota life with its German food in this "German sort of town." Also it's family owned, not a chain - and it's a diner.
"America is about diners," she said.
The Glatts, who bought the restaurant in 1972 from the Kroll family, likes the BBC's selection, said co-owner Alvina Glatt.
"It makes us feel very special, very proud of what we have done," she said. "It wasn't easy."
They bought the diner because her husband, Jim Glatt, a Sweetheart Bakery employee, had always wanted his own business. They put in 14- to 15-hour days while raising two sons, Kevin Glatt, 10 then, now Burleigh County's auditor-treasurer, and Keith Glatt, 5 then. Keith would become an attorney, but then left law, because he found it boring, to be Kroll's president.
Alvina Glatt said Kevin was in school in 1972. The littler Keith would be made comfortable with a television to watch in the restaurant's basement, a flight of wooden steps away from the kitchen staff and got regular visits from the parents. Keith Glatt said it's the same place where he now does his bookwork, and has his computer and a newer television.
"This is home,"he said about the diner. "I feel comfortable here."
And he's around extremely familiar faces, like Annie's, Janelle's and Mary's.
Annie Grenz, 73, is still there. The dishwasher since 1968 was working there, still is, in her same corner, from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. She remembers Keith was known to get up on top of the kitchen's walk-in cooler and use a squirt gun on various moving targets. She said she likes her job. "It gives me a lot of time to think," she said.
Janelle Wolf, 56, of Bismarck, Kroll's supervisor for 24 years, said the diner has about 50 regulars. And they like to sit in the same places. She and long-time waitress Mary Perela laugh that when the popular south section of seating for the regulars is closed for some reason - like when there is wallpapering in progress or when a clean carpet needs to dry - the regulars don't know what to do. Even though there are plenty of seats on the north end of the restaurant. She remembers having to explain that the wallpaper hanger didn't want things falling on them before she could convince them to try a new table.
Perela buys a couple newspapers, out of her own money, so her regulars have a morning paper to read. "We're just one big family,"Wolf said.
BBC's camera crew wasn't reading Friday. They were eating. "Excellent" was a word heard. But there was hesitation from another who considered the knoephla dumpling soup hearty, but would have liked some chili sauce in it. And another crew member expressed great admiration for the soup, after he put pepper in it.
(Reach reporter Virginia Grantier at 250-8254 or virginia.grantier@;bismarcktribune.com.)
Caligula wrote on Mar 15, 2008 4:10 PM:
Comments are reviewed for taste, tone and language before posting.
Some comments may be used in the Tribune's print edition.
We value and respect your privacy, but The Bismarck Tribune might
disclose certain information to governmental entities if served with subpoena.