Diamondback: Grill Food with a Difference

By Antoinette May Herndon

When my boss sent the second email touting Diamondback, I thought I’d better check it out. Like so many things that I kinda have to do, it didn’t top the list.

Little did I know what I’d been missing, the time I’d wasted! Diamondback, a restaurant on Sonora’s main street, is “just” wonderful, the kind of place you dream about stumbling into while exploring a new town.

The ambience set me to fanaticizing. Cool jazz playing in the background, vaulted ceilings, exposed rock and plaster walls, even the black garbed wait staff, had a dark, moody-broody Mack the Knife, Bertolt Brecht feel.

Think again, Antoinette! Husband Charles and I arrived in the late afternoon. He needed to rest his feet. I wanted to gloat over the antiques I’d discovered. Diamondback was enjoying a temporary lull. Another twenty minutes and the restaurant filled fast. An hour later it was packed. I hear, there’s often a line out the door and down the street. Diamondback is that kind of popular.

The secret of the restaurant’s success is grill food with a difference. Price factors too. Asian style BBQ back ribs top the menu at $14.95.

Everything else hovers comfortably between $8 and $10.

When chef Eric Davis and his wife Claudia opened in 1991. they resolved to create great food reflecting grounded sensibilities. Everything good, nothing presentations. And that’s the way it is today. Diamondback dishes are high quality, fresh and full of surprises, but don’t take themselves too seriously. Neither do the customers. Ranchers, lawyers, and tourists sit elbow to elbow at the counter, sleeves rolled up, biting into half pound burgers made from locally raised grass-fed beef.

Charles and I couldn’t resist the killer garlic fries ($7.50). They’re as fresh as I’ve ever tasted and laced with enough garlic to drive off a legion of vampires.

I had a cup of spicy black bean chilli—really spicy—lots of salsa and laced with sour cream. ($4.50). Charles ordered the bacon-cheddar burger covered with melted Fiscalini Farms cheese, lined with lettuce and mayo and garnished with red onion, tomato and pickle ($9).

There are ten other burgers from which to choose, also a variety of sandwiches—consider eggplant, tomato and mozzarella with olive oil and lettuce on sourdough with homemade pesto ($8.45) or sautéed mushroom, garlic and provolone with roasted red

bell peppers ($8.75).

The menu’s highlight, the signature dish defining Diamondback, is warm brie salad, ($9.75). Now, I know you’ve had brie salad on hundreds, maybe thousands of occasions. You’ve tasted the crumbled brie, the chopped walnuts, the cut up apple, the mustard vinaigrette dressing.

Sure you have, but nothing prepares you for this salad. It’s not crumbled brie, it’s a wedge large enough for a cocktail party. The walnuts are big; the apple spiced and caramelized, the dressing spiked with hint of liquorice.

Diamondback is a great restaurant, maybe too great for its own good. Or at least too popular. Tables are small, crowded, wait staff too busy just getting food on the table to be very attentive. But that doesn’t matter when the food is innovative and outstanding, the portions large? Be prepared to take some home with you—and to come back.

VITALS: 93 South Washington St., Sonora. 532-6661. Open Monday-Thursday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 11 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Sunday, 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Credit cards accepted.

aherndon@sierralodestar.com

Pictures:

1) The Diamondback dining room at a rare quiet moment

2) The Diamondback dining room,