Here I’m cooking with Clements. We have been all over the Tri state, east side, west side, Northern Kentucky. Heck, we’ve even crossed over into the Hoosier State. But today, I wanna take it to a place that I used to go to when I was growing up. And this is Teelside Diamond.
It’s a nice little like homey diner. I mean, it’s not a chain restaurant. It’s not anything like that. Love the people. They’re great.
The food, obviously.
Service is exceptional. And then just the atmosphere. Whether it’s a hot cup of coffee to start your day or a nice juicy burger for lunch, you can’t go wrong at Teal Side, this east side favorite nestled in the heart of Claremont Counties. Union Township has quickly become the talk of the town.
Hey, Julie, we’re gonna be stuck back here for about five minutes.
Late. David comes from a long line of restaurant tours, so he knows a high bar when he sees one. He’s setting it even higher, putting his own spin on a classic concept. We.
Try to call this concept an elevated diner. So basically, it’s everything you love about a diner, but we try to elevate the food, elevate the atmosphere. A little bit more upbeat, fresh food, modern spin and just good neighborhood, great service. We know 80% of the people that come in this place. We know their name. You said.
You want your eggs ever medium.
Cash brown. Your staff makes people feel welcome. You’re walking around making people feel welcome and the food look amazing.
Yeah, yeah, huge. That’s it. If we can do those little things right, make sure people come in and have a good meal and have good conversation and smile on their face. We think we have a chance of, you know, being here for a long time for the community.
This mom and pop diner also happens to hold a special place in my heart. I used to ride my bike up to this place. We go next door, get a pack of baseball cards, come over here, sit right here. It was a booth back then. We get a burger. Back then it was called Hungry Bear Diner. But I gotta say, love what you’ve done with the plate. Turns out I’m not the only fan. So Zach.
Taylor came in on a Saturday. Nobody knew he was even here. Honestly, I didn’t. We were a packed house. He is the nicest man. So nice. And I even ask, I was like, can I get a picture with him? He’s like, yeah. I mean, honestly, I was shaking so.
Bad, you know, starstruck. I really want right back in the kitchen with late. What are we gonna be making.
Today? Okay, so today we’re gonna be making you a couple of items. We’re gonna be making you our special southern style burger. It’s called the Southerner. We use Wasler’s Local Meats for that. They make an absolute excellent quality burger.
Fresh, not frozen.
Fresh. Yeah, never frozen. First thing we’re gonna do is get our bun toasted up on the grill and then we’re gonna get our locally sourced meat from wafflers on the grill. So the secret with these is you wanna get them really nice and flat. So we’re going smash. This is a smash burger style. Then we’re gonna saute up some onions that are going gonna go on love. So while that’s going on, we’re gonna get your sides going. Tanya here is our assistant chef. She’s gonna drop one order of Saratoga chip.
Look at that beautiful color.
Absolutely. We’re gonna go ahead and start cheese in this. Very nice. So we cook our Saratoga chips every day in house, slice them up on our slicer. Here’s some.
Prepared earlier.
Looks like we’re just about ready on our Southerner.
Beautiful.
And this is our sauce we make specifically for our burgers.
The burger.
Sauce and our fries.
I’m so glad you just did that with the pickle, big pickle guy.
Here. Then our homemade barbecue sauce for our chip, the.
Southerner. Let’s do it. You’re eating with me.
Alright, let’s do it. Look.
At that. Look at how juicy. That’s beautiful. Alright, let’s go. Cheers. Boom. It’s excellent. It’s juicy. You can taste the char, the crispiness from the onions from being on the grill. What I love the most about it is that I saw how it was made simple. That’s all you need. Don’t need to add all the bells and whistles. No. Or the soft in your dark beard right there. Oh, so it looks great. Look at that right there.
We also have our fresh Atlantic cod. This is our hand breaded onion straws. So our onion straws are gonna go into our buttermilk batter and then it’s gonna go into our handmade seasoning. We do this seasoning every single day. We make the spices from self. They’re actually my grandmother’s recipe. So our beer battered cod is, we actually use a Modelo, a buttermilk and our secret blend of spices in the batch. And then we also use that same flower recipe as well. She did these just like this is exactly what we want every single time. Those are perfect. Personally, I think besides us, the best cod language is at McDonald’s. So we throw a little American cheese on there for harder stock, just like McDonald’s.
I love when we can admit the guilty pleasure. Oh, gosh.
Absolutely. There we go.
Flaky. We lost a little bit, but that’s okay. Man down. We’re good. Check it out. I’m definitely getting golden arch vibes in the best way possible. You’re right.
Yeah, that’s a good combination with the American cheese and the pickle up.
What do we have? I have.
A butcher’s omelet. So it’s just a meat lovers omelet with potato cakes and biscuit.
Usually in an omelet, everything is on the inside. This is like exploding with meat. It’s on the outside. That’s why there’s only a few bites taken of it cuz I am overwhelmed and full. And cat. I.
Grew up in Kansas on a farm ranch and my wife also grew up on a farm and we had all these country cafes and country diners in a small town. Yeah, cafes. And so that’s what I look for, real home cooked food and, you know, stuff that’s done low and slow and really homemade.
So this gets right to your Kansas art. This is right to my Kansas art.
I do think we take a little bit of extra time and do the little things right. We’re not so much worried about the margins, we’re not so much worried about squeezing pennies. We wanna make sure every person that walks in here has an incredible experience.
You know, as much as I love checking out places all across the tristate, I gotta say it’s good to be home. We’ll see you next time on cooking with Clemons. You.
Say what, Karen? Go ahead and flip the script. There we go.
You know what? Sometimes the camera guys got to eat, too, right? Thank you. Have a bye, dad. Drive. Come on to this guy. Just go all in. Just, there you go. Like a slob. Do it. How is it? Excellent. That’s good fish in it.
There we go. Well, he made that look delicious. Sydney. That could be on an actual commercial.
So great. Look at.
That.