D.J.'s Restaurant

3800 Sutton Way, High Point, N.C.
djsrestaurant.com
Two Thumbs Up

We decided to start this blog while eating at D.J.'s Restaurant near the corner of Eastchester and Wendover in High Point, North Carolina. D.J.'s opened relatively recently. In fact, the web site doesn't appear to list the High Point location yet.

Jon's Take
This is a quality restaurant with good food and a good atmosphere. It's a very clean place with nice furnishings and decor. It has a dining room, bar room and patio. Needless to say, we sat in the bar room. They have both the MLB and NFL networks, so it could be a solid option for watching a game. This place gets extra points for having my beloved Red Sox and Celtics on simultaneously on side-by-side flat screen TVs (without me asking).

Since it was the first time we were looking at the menu, I ordered the Spinach Dip ($6.95) to give us more time. The dip comes with tortilla and pita chips and it was all average to above average compared to other spinach dips I've had. For my meal, I got the Chicken Madera ($13.95), which is a chicken breast over linguini with a fancy wine sauce and mushrooms. The portion was huge and it was very good. I can eat a lot, but I didn't finish this. I got a side Caesar Salad, which was an extra $0.95...I found that out when I got my half of the bill. Jason has a similar story. A pint of Stella Artois was $3.75.

One complaint I had was the eclectic music selection. "Eclectic" is a nice way of putting it...it was assorted elevator music with other things randomly thrown in. At one point it went from "Fly" by Sugar Ray to John Legend to Lady Antebellum to 'N Sync (thanks for the info Shazam!). There may have been a Ricky Martin song in there somewhere too. That was a head-scratcher and took away from the overall experience, but they could easily correct this.

Overall I think this is a good restaurant, I'd go back.

Jason's Take
At first I questioned the originality of the name but when I discovered DJ's is the second location I realized they had no choice concerning the name. The restaurant occupies the building where Uno's was, near Skeet Club and Eastchester. The menu has a decent variety of food but there is clearly an Italian and Greek influence in the menu.

There was a decent draft beer selection and I got a pint of Natty Greene's Buckshot (3.75). The beer was fresh but wasn't as cold as I prefer. I like my beer in a frosted mug. Heck, I don’t care if a little ice forms when I first get it, as long as it's cold. I ordered the Chicken Souvlaki Platter(12.50) with mixed veggies instead of fries. I thought I was making a healthy choice with the veggies. Instead I got veggie scampi, some nice mixed veggies on a side dish sitting in a pool of butter and oil. They were so greasy they slid down my throat like a raw oyster sucked from its shell. The souvlaki was ok. It is hard to mess up some grilled chicken chunks on pita bread with some lettuce, tomato, and onion. The house dressing on the side salad wasn’t spicy enough for me...basically just some olive oil. It could use a little more spice...of course you will learn that I like the spice. The tzatziki sauce was good and coming from a guy who doesn’t normally like the stuff, a redeeming factor for DJ’s.

I will now dedicate a whole paragraph on dessert. The canoli ($3.25) is absolutely, positively, dank. Keep in mind that in my section of this blog, dank is the highest honor I can possibly give a food. The menu says that the baking is done on site and this isn't a lie. The canoli was nicely presented and the crust had a little crunch but also a little softness. It definitely had not been sitting in the cooler for three weeks acquiring some moisture. The filling was rich and creamy, a nice consistency. There are other homemade desserts here including 5 flavors of cheesecake...I would love to try them all...but I can't afford bigger pants.

The restaurant was clean, but shouldn't that be expected of any restaurant, especially one only open for a few weeks? The crowd was older but there were daily drink specials that college students would really enjoy. I don’t see many 50 year olds buying jager bombs with their Souvlaki. The staff was friendly. The prices were a little too high for what you get and there were extra charges that I would have like to have known about, like the $1.75 I paid for adding some feta to my souvlaki platter. That was a little irritating but since I got the check after the canoli, I couldn't complain. The souvlaki should be about 8 or 9 bucks, but I would give my right little toe for the canoli if it were the last one on earth. All in all my meal was $26.80 and I left a 5 buck tip. This place didn't break the bank, but I think it was slightly over-priced. I wish I had ordered what Jon did.

I give DJ's a thumbs up for the canoli and its potential to be a great place to hang out. When you try DJ's, get 2 canolis and pass on the Souvlaki.