FACES: Homemade chef: Being owner-operator of the Westside Drive-In allows Ryer Stark to be his own boss and to exercise his culinary skills

GRAFTON, N.D. -- No matter the weather, the opening of Ryer Stark's Westside Drive-In signals summer has arrived in Grafton that May.

On April 30, the restaurant's opening day, a steady stream of cars drove into the restaurant parking lot to claim a spot at one of the 16 car stalls and business hasn't let up since, Stark said.

"Every day it amazes me. Even if it's raining, it's still busy."

Westside Drive-In has been part of Grafton's landscape since July 1958 when it opened as an A&W. In 1975 it became the Westside Drive-In. The drive-in restaurant is one of the few, if not only, in the area that still has working intercoms, a covered canopy over the car stalls and has car hops who deliver the food to customers' cars.

"They're and few far between," Stark said.

He began his career at the Westside Drive-In in June 1997 at age 14. Stark was driving by the restaurant one summer day when he saw then-owner Darren Blanchard mowing the front lawn.

"I asked him if he needed help in the kitchen," Stark recalled. "He said 'You can start tomorrow.'"

Chef

Stark worked the first year as a fryer cook, and then the next summer became a grill cook. He continued to work at the Westside Drive-In in high school and during breaks from of college at The Art Institute International Minnesota where he majored in culinary arts.

During college, Stark worked at several restaurants in Minneapolis and after he graduated moved out to the West Coast where he was a line cook and sauté cook in a Portland restaurant and worked as a butcher at a German meat market.

In 2006 the Blanchard family asked Stark if he wanted to buy the Westside Drive-In. Stark returned to Grafton.

He's gratified by the response of the community to the drive-in's April opening. This year, like the others, area residents eagerly anticipated the restaurant's opening day

"It was nuts from the time I opened until 9 p.m. Our heads were just spinning," Stark said. "We went through 10 gallons of strawberry and butter ice cream."

Stark likes operating a business in his hometown where he knows many of his customers.

"I would say 75 percent of the people, I know on a first name basis. I know them. I know their kids.

He also hires some of those kids to work at his restaurant. Each summer about 20 high school and college students cook and serve food at the Westside Drive-In. About a half dozen of them have parents who once worked there.

Homemade food

Being owner-operator of the drive-in is a good fit because it allows Stark to be his own boss and to exercise his culinary skills.

"I do love the food," Stark said. "I know it's just burgers and fries and onion rings, but the majority of things I do is homemade." For example, each morning he makes potato salad and macaroni salad from scratch and hand-patties ground beef that he purchases from a local farmer. Meanwhile, the barbecue sauce for the Wagon Master, the Westside Drive-In's signature burger, is homemade and Stark also makes the breading for the broasted chicken he serves.

Each week Stark also offers a special, including a blue cheese cheeseburger, which is made up of ground beef, apple wood smoked bacon and caramelized onions, and then topped with homemade blue cheese dressing.

The Westside also sells soft serve ice cream. The drive-in offers vanilla and chocolate and twist cones daily and each day features a fourth flavor. The list of 20 flavors includes traditional ice cream flavors such as rootbeer, hot fudge and butterscotch and more exotic flavors such as banana, coconut and blueberry.

Busy days

Stark typically arrives at the Westside at 7 a.m. to prepare for the restaurant's 11 a.m. opening. The drive-in closes at 9 p.m. and by the time clean-up is finished it may be 11 p.m.

"It's constantly, constantly cleaning things here," Stark said. "When I worked in Minneapolis, we had someone to wash the floor. We had prep cooks. We had dishwashers. Here, you're looking at him," Stark said with a smile. "The payroll and the taxes and the bills, I do all of that.

"I love it though."

Reach Bailey at (701) 787-6753; (800) 477-6572, ext. 753; or send email to abailey@gfherald.com .