Yoder’s Kitchen on Pittsburgh Street has been open longer than most of its regulars can remember, which is exactly how Betty Yoder likes it. She started working the counter in 1984 when her mother-in-law ran the place, took over the griddle full-time in the mid-nineties, and hasn’t really stopped since. On a Tuesday morning she’s already mid-conversation with three tables before she gets to yours.
I first went on a recommendation from a guy at the hardware store who described it as “the place where they still know what you want before you sit down.” He wasn’t wrong. I ordered the stuffed French toast on my second visit and it appeared without me saying anything on my third. Betty doesn’t make a performance of remembering you. She just does.
The room is small — maybe twelve tables, pressed-wood paneling, a chalkboard with the day’s soups, and a pie case that is never empty. It seats around forty if you count the counter stools, and on weekend mornings you will wait. The wait is not especially long. People move through because the food comes fast and nobody really lingers over a second cup unless the booth opens up behind them.
What to order depends on the time of day, but the breakfast side is where this place has its grip on Uniontown. Scrapple and eggs with toast runs you somewhere around eight dollars. The biscuits are made in-house, large enough to require two hands, and come either plain or with sausage gravy that has actual black pepper in it — a detail Betty mentions without prompting when she sets it down, as if she wants you to notice. You should. The pancakes are thick but not doughy, and the blueberry version uses real fruit, not canned filling.
Lunch moves toward sandwiches, daily specials, and the soups, which change every day. I’ve had a beef barley that I thought about for three days afterward, and a chicken corn chowder that was dense enough to count as a meal by itself. Prices stay modest — most lunch plates land between nine and thirteen dollars — and portions are the kind that make you rethink dinner.
Betty’s daughter helps on the weekend rush, and her nephew runs the grill on the days Betty takes off, though the regulars will tell you those days are rarer than they used to be. There’s a rhythm to the place that comes from one person caring about it continuously for a very long time, and you feel that in small ways: the coffee mugs match, the tables are wiped down promptly, the pie slices are generous to the point of being slightly ridiculous.
It’s cash or check only, which catches people off guard the first time. There’s an ATM a block down if you forget. Worth the inconvenience, and I say that as someone who forgot twice.
Go on a weekday if you can. Get there before nine. Order the biscuit with gravy at least once, and whatever soup is on the board. If Betty asks whether you want pie, the answer is yes.
