Lizard's Thicket, 6634 Two Notch Road: 2000s 16 comments
I don't eat at Lizard's Thicket that often, but it's good Southern comfort food. I recall working in Kansas for about a month once, and being so glad when I got back, drove out of the airport here and saw the Liz on Airport Boulevard. There are times when only field-peas-over-rice will do.
Someone described Lizard's Thicket here in the comments of some post or another as a "hermit crab restaurant", ie: one that likes to let another restaurant build the building and fail and then moves into the empty shell. It strikes me as a sound strategy, but that being the case, I can't speak to what was in this building before Liz. This particular store was a bit unusual in that it was one of the two Lizes closest together of all those I am aware of (the other is just a mile or so down Two Notch towards Spring Valley). It was also the closest Liz to our house, and the one we went to most often. I remember two things in particular about it. First, they had a pot-plant by the register which was connected to a lamp. Through some sort of capacitance effect, if you touched the leaves of the plant, the lamp would turn on, cycle through dim, normal and bright and then off again. Second, once when we were eating there, the waitress subtracted the cost of our drinks from the bill rather than adding it. I've had days like that..
The building sat empty for a bit after Liz left (to go down to a new location [and building!] near Sandhill) and then the current tenant moved in. From the amount of time it was taking, and the car I often saw parked there, my impression was that the new owner was doing most of the work him(?)-self. I think too, that when it first opened, the "Korean" rubric had not been added. I haven't eaten there, but it seems to draw a good lunch crowd. I doubt there's peas-over-rice though.
16 Responses to 'Lizard's Thicket, 6634 Two Notch Road: 2000s'
Subscribe to comments with RSS
-
Dennis
12 May 09 at 7:14 am
-
I think this building was originally Perkins Pancake House..there was one on St. Andrews Rd that I worked at back in 1978, and there was one on 2 Notch Rd also. So if I remember right unless there was another building that looked like this, then this was Perkins, then Lizards Thicket..
Del
12 May 09 at 9:39 pm
-
I remember this building being a Lizard's Thicket as far back as '84. Their website said that they started in '77. I had always assumed that this was the original location, but apparently not. Anyone know where the original was?
badger
12 May 09 at 9:47 pm
-
Badger,
I'm going to take a stab and say that the first Lizard's Thicket was either on Broad River Road, near SLED, where the current La Fogata is, or the Piney Grove Road Truck Stop, very close to where the Sportsman's Warehouse is currently located.Jonathan
13 May 09 at 8:34 am
-
I remember going to this place when it was a Perkins back in the 1970s. Thnere was also a Lizard thicket on Two Notch right next to the old Holiday Inn. BTW, neither my wife and I like Lizard Thickets either.
Tom
13 May 09 at 10:04 am
-
Jonathan ,
Here to help you out,growing up in Newberry, many late night runs where to the Casey Truck Stop, which became the Piney Road , Liz. During my USC days, we ended up at the Broad River Road Store...until they had my parents cooking..which was 40 min and FREE down the road. It was out of the CAN then TOO.LJ Upstate
14 May 09 at 9:30 pm
-
So what do y'all suggest for southern vegetables? Fran's was good, but if you got there after 5pm, they were out of most stuff, and it's gone now regardless.
ted
14 May 09 at 10:57 pm
-
Jonathan, You're correct. The original location was where the La Fogata is now.
E.J.
15 May 09 at 2:32 am
-
ted - good question.
I'd say Mac's on Main. Possibly Doc's Gumbo Grill. We go to Brookland Baptist Church's Banquet Center on Sunset Drive every few weeks (we'd go more often if it was cheaper) and they always have fantastic southern style collards and beans. Highly recommended.
Anyone been to any of these places? I want to check them out:
Mama Nems on St. Andrews Rd.
Mom's on Colonial Dr. (the sign says Southern Diner)
Etta's in the 2900 block of Millwood
Vegetable Medley (vegetarian) on Platt Springs Rd.
Dennis
15 May 09 at 5:01 am
-
Don't let the name fool you, Vegetable Medley is not vegetarian, they have a good selection of meat choices which will vary somewhat from day to day, for instance Thurs. is pork chop day. Great food, good people.
Also they have not been on Platt Springs rd. for quite a while they are on Oak Drive a couple of blocks beind the Barnyard Flea Market.Mike L.
15 May 09 at 6:53 am
-
mama nems closed down a while ago in the food lion shopping center next to the $1 (or whatever theater)
Michael
16 May 09 at 11:44 pm
-
That used to be a Perkins and the orginal Thicket was on Broad river rd across from SLED
James Sanderson
27 Oct 09 at 2:26 am
-
Frank's on Two Notch (near Beltline), Nathan's on Hampton, and The Kingsman in Cayce all have a good meat 'n' 3, but for lunch only. The Kingsman is open for dinner, but their meat 'n' 3 is M-F lunch only. All are pretty reasonably priced, too.
Jim
28 Oct 09 at 3:14 pm
-
Jonathan's first thought was correct...the original Lizard's Thicket was actually run from a home they had purchased on Broad River Road pretty much across the street from SLED. A couple of the rooms in the home had been converted into the dining areas (3 or 4 rooms). It was a sit down style restaurant back then (around 1977?? or so). I was surprised years later, early '90s, when I came back for a visit to Columbia and they had chained out and were more a southern style "fast food' kinda' place.
Shawn
27 May 10 at 2:24 pm
-
chicken livers on tuesday. my dinner every tuesday
chris
4 Oct 10 at 5:57 pm
-
They didn't "chain out". They had a large family and everyone worked there. They still own the Thickets. There are 14 now. If it seems "fast food" friendly, thats because 40% of the business is takeout.
J C W
19 Aug 11 at 2:47 pm
Well, I outed myself as one of the 5 or 6 people in all of Columbia who don't like Labrasca's, and now I'm going to do it again over Lizard's Thicket.
I ate at several of their locations pretty often for many years, but over time I noticed a decline in the "homemadeness" of the food and felt like they were just opening cans of vegetables and warming them up.
But they finally chased me off for good when I got really sick from the flounder at the South Beltline location, and they served my wife a grilled cheese that had OVEN CLEANER on it at the Forest Drive store.