Best of Athens 2010, Vol. 1

Here are the winners of the first half of The Athens NEWS Best of Athens 2010 Readers' Choice Awards. The second half will be posted Thursday morning.PEOPLEBest Politician We Hope Will Go FarJimmy StewartThe same three local politicians appear in the top three spots in the "Best Local Politician We Hope Will Go Far" category this year, though they're placement is scrambled from last year.
While state Rep. Debbie Phillips, D-Athens, got top honors last year, state Sen. Jimmy Stewart, R-Albany, gets the top spot in 2010. He edged Phillips by 10 votes.

Athens Mayor Paul Wiehl, like last year, takes third place.

Others that got multiple votes, in order of how well they did, include Athens City Council Elahu Gosney, Athens Law Director Pat Lang, Athens County Auditor Jill Thompson, county Sheriff Pat Kelly, and then a bunch of others who got five or fewer votes.

Sen. Stewart, a likeable and genial dude for a Republican (couldn't resist), managed to win this category, despite a vote against the state budget compromise that didn't sit well with the editor of this paper or a lot of other Democrats in his 20th Senate District. On the other hand, he's done a lot of things to make his constituents happy, and maybe most of them don't pay any attention to our editor anyhow. Our theory, however, is that many of our readers, while good-hearted folks, are easily confused and thought they were voting for the famous actor Jimmy Stewart. Yes, that's it.

Best Local Politician to Go Far Away

Susan Gwinn

Who woulda thunk it? We ask our readers to name the local politician they would most like to ship out on a slow boat to the Hebrides, and they tell us former Athens County Democratic Party chair Susan Gwinn, of all people.

Calling into play our keenly honed reportorial skills for digging out the hidden truth, we are going to crawl far out on a limb here and suggest that this outcome may have had a little something to do with the months-long saga of Gwinn's indictment on multiple misdemeanor and felony counts; her trial in Athens County Common Pleas Court before an appointed judge and a special prosecutor (for whose services the county is presumably paying); her conviction on two campaign-finance related misdemeanors; and her resignation in the wake of the verdict.

The ordeal has created some nasty fissures in the Democratic camp, and the party may be a while getting over it. On the plus side, however, while the drama lasted, Gwinn did guarantee that we journalists could always count on having something to write about.

Second place goes to state Sen. Jimmy Stewart, who oddly enough also won first place as "Politician We Hope Will Go Far," which in marked contrast to this here category, is sort of a compliment rather than a catty little dig.

Third place goes to Gwinn's arch-rival, nemesis, bête noire and evil male twin, county Prosecutor C. David Warren. Hey, what's say we all hold a fundraiser and send them both on a nice Caribbean cruise on Terry Anderson's leaky yacht? Oh, wait " he already sold it.

Also pulling double-digit duty in this category were state Rep. Debbie Phillips, Athens Mayor Paul Wiehl, county Engineer Archie Stanley and Sheriff Pat Kelly.

Best Community Organizer

Art Gish and Keith Wasserman

(Editor's note: In our print edition, we mistakenly stated that Art Gish was the sole first-place winner. However, Gish actually tied with Keith Wasserman of the Good Works homeless shelter. Second place goes to Wendy Jakmas of the Athens Area Chamber of Commerce, with third going to Melissa Wales. Apologies for the mistake.)

Always tweaking away at this contest, we are. Last year we featured a category called "Best Community Activist," but our Best of Athens brain trust has decided this simply won't do. So this year we have this totally different new category called "Best Community Organizer." (This category is also known as Best Sarah Palin Target for Ridicule.)

We have fooled no one. One of the two top finishers is Art Gish, who in his free time between raising organic okra and Jerusalem artichokes out in the boonies of Athens County, likes to jet off to some of the most dangerous spots in the Middle East to preach peace, love and understanding, and also stand in front of the odd Israeli tank. His wife Peggy does the same; hey, why don't you vote her into first place next year? What are you " patriarchal?

Tying Gish is Keith Wasserman, whose name, and that of the Good Works shelter, have long been synonymous with housing the homeless in Athens County, mainly because they're the only ones who do it on a regular basis.

Bringing up second is Wendy Jakmas of the Athens Uptown Business Association. Yes, a business promoter can be a community organizer.

Third place goes to Melissa Wales, with Emily Prince and Jonathan Holmberg also receiving multiple votes.

Best Athens County Public Figure

Paul Wiehl

Three years in office and three wins in a row as our readers' choice as best Athens County public figure. That's right, Hizzoner Athens Mayor Paul Wiehl takes the cake yet again. And never mind his confectionary thievery; he has also taken the gold in this category again this year.

Whether he's strolling up and down Court Street, hobnobbing with City Council, spitting wisdom at press conferences or helping the elderly cross the street, readers agree, Wiehl is tops. Give the mayor a harrumph!

First runner-up for best public figure in the county goes to Athens County Sheriff Pat Kelly. A crimebuster nonpareil, Kelly makes Dirty Harry look like Deputy Dawg.

And in third place is Jimmy Stewart, who moved up from the Ohio House into the state Senate last year where he continues to make more moves than a U-Haul.

Others who won a respectable number of votes include state Rep. Debbie Phillips, Athens Law Director Pat Lang, county Auditor Jill Thompson and a bunch of others who pulled in six or fewer votes.

Coolest Person in Athens County

George Smalley

Jazz great Miles Davis gave us the birth of the cool. And People's Bank's George Smalley is apparently giving the people of Athens County a rebirth.

Smalley wins the title of coolest person, and we hear that it's for good reason. The man is cool as a cucumber. The Athens avant-garde like to tell a story about Smalley. Legend has it that back in the day an unknown and frantic James Dean approached Smalley to ask for advise. Dean was behaving aggressively, shuffling his feat and pleading with Smalley in a whiny voice. Smalley nonchalantly told Dean to, "be cool," a word of advice that inspired Dean to form his now signature persona.

First runner-up as the coolest of the cool in Athens County is Maplewood Inn & Drive Thru owner Michael Hodgson, a man who once casually brushed off a dinner invitation from an English lord in order to wrestle alligators for sport. Pretty cool.

And the title of third coolest person goes to Hilarie Burhans, co-owner of Salaam Restaurant and a local musician. You just have to take one look at the inside of Salaam to know that Hilarie deserves this one. (And we apologize for spelling Hilarie's first name wrong in the past. We believe we got it right this time.)

Most Annoying Athens County Public Figure

Susan Gwinn

Ohio University President Roderick McDavis should thank former Athens County Democratic Party Chair Susan Gwinn. She saved him from a repeat appearance as Most Annoying Athens County Public Figure, and did it by a landslide.

Gwinn has had an eventful year, and we're using the term "eventful" the way it might be used to describe the first year of World War II. No need to go into all the gritty details but suffice to say that the local papers had some easy front-cover decisions this past year. Of course, it's possible that our discerning readers chose Susan for this dubious honor because they're annoyed at seeing her face in our paper all the time, which, granted, it partly our fault, but who's to say.

President McDavis places second (we're not sure why he keeps appearing on this list), and Athens County Prosecutor C. David Warren (who's been an antagonist of Gwinn's) places third.

Others who got multiple votes, in order of appearance, include longtime York Township Trustee Jim Pancake, Deputy County Engineer Mike Canterbury (who's been a target of our online commenters wrath lately), former Chauncey Mayor Ginger Mender, Athens County Sheriff Pat Kelly, Athens Mayor Paul Wiehl, and some others who garnered six or fewer votes.

Best Radio Personality/DJ

Robin Barnes

For the second year in a row, Power 105's morning jockey Robin Barnes wins as Best Radio Personality/DJ. With a cadence at once warm and inspiring, Barnes has got it all " style, verve and that extra pluck that puts the listener in just the right mood to listen to the tasteful musical selection sure to follow.

The next best personality goes to Power 105's Jason Stone, "narrator" of The Stone Age. This guy is a request-fulfilling machine, with a voice like honeydew and the good taste to match.

WOUB's Chris Riddle comes in third in this category. Riddle is all over WOUB morning radio like white on rice, to turn an old cliché.

Others who won multiple votes in this category include Mark Hellenberg (a repeat past winner), DJ Barticus (whose rule-breaking Facebook campaign didn't work like he hoped it would), Aaron Thomas, Rusty Smith/Mark Hellenberg (our readers' decision to put the two names together rather than voting for just one ruined Mark's chances of placing in this category), and Keith Newman.

Best Local K-12 Teacher

Pam Vogt, Meigs Local Primary School

Is there anything more important to society than molding young minds? Well, OK, there's Wii golf. But we here at The NEWS believe the children are our future. Teach them well and let them lead the way. Just make sure they look both ways before crossing the street.

Our readers tell us the top instructor of wee bairns in our area is Pam Vogt, who was rendered nearly speechless with delight, or something very much like it, when she learned the news.

"Oh, I'm shocked," gasped Vogt, who professed to have not even known she was a nominee. (After all these years, some people apparently still don't understand how this contest works.)

Vogt is a kindergarten "title teacher," which means she teaches in multiple classes every day, working to help kids who are a little behind their peers academically "get over that hump," so they can graduate into first grade and not have to carry that awful black mark on their permanent record of being held back an extra year in kindergarten.

Second place goes to Jeanna Sycks of Morrison Elementary, and third to Kathy Berry of East Elementary.

Other local pedagogues highly esteemed by our well-educated readers included John Barrington, April Stewart and Gordon Gilford, among many others.

Best doctor

Dr. Lance Broy

Some people hate going to the doctor's office, but family practitioner Dr. Lance Broy's patients obviously don't mind going to his. He'll fix you up and get you healthy. And his stethoscope is never cold. Broy wins Best Doctor for 2010.

Second place is a tie between Dr. James Sammons and Dr. Peggy Lionberger. And third place is a tie between Dr. Imber Coppinger and Dr. Penny Shelton.

Best Youth Sports Coach

Dan DeLuca

We need to start requiring that people who fill out our survey include identifying information with their answers in categories such as this one. We always get a bunch of names, and not being involved in youth sports ourselves, don't have any idea what these good folks coach.

Well, anyway, Dan DeLuca, who we learned coaches several youth sports teams in the community, gets top honors as Best Youth Sports Coach this year. (He's the owner of Red Brick Tavern.)

Second place is a combination of Mike Merkle/Mirkle (some of our readers can't spell very well but the phone book suggests it's spelled "Merkle").

Tied for third are Andrew Chiki (of the Athens Parks and Recreation Department), Lance Broy (a family doc at Holzer Clinic) and Rick "DARE" Crossen, all apparently youth coaches.

If we didn't have a newspaper to put out, we'd take the time to figure out what all these people coach, but we do hope you appreciate that we have priorities, and reporting the news is the top one.

PLACES

Best Renovation

Restaurant Salaam

Athens' favorite Middle Eastern restaurant (and no, we're not talking about Middle Eastern Maryland or Delaware) wins top honors for Best Renovation this year. With the move from an alley off of North Court Street to a big wide-open space on West Washington Street, Restaurant Salaam seals its position as one of Athens' most diverse and interesting spots to eat. The food, of course, is the main thing, but the interior decorating adds a lot, too. For high-quality ethnic dining, this is the spot.

Second place goes to Jackie O's Public House, a big airy beer hall that Jackie O's Brew Pub expanded into last year. The Public House " originally called the Annex " has already gained a reputation as one of Athens' top live-music venues.

Third place goes to BW-3, aka B-Dubs, which just completed a renovation.

This category tends to change wholesale every year since, obviously, new renovations occur every year, too. Last year, the University Mall's transition from an ugly duckling to a beautiful swan, The Market on State, won Best Renovation. (Yes, that was an example of an analogy gone wild.)

Other renovations that captured multiple votes, in order of success, include Shively Hall, The Market on State, the Athens New Market, the College Bookstore, the Peoples Bank Building, OU's Baker Center at OU, the Carpenter Street brick paving, Kroger, the Union Street Market, the Eclipse Company Store, and Passion Works' new gallery, with a bunch receiving four or fewer votes.

Best family entertainment

Athens Grand

A family that goes to the movies together walks on sticky floors together. And once again, the Athena Grand movie theater on East State Street takes first place for Best Family Entertainment. This is the fourth year in a row the theater takes its place as Grand champion. (If they could just tell us how to apportion the DIY faux butter equally throughout a bag of popcorn...)

The next best place for the 'rents to spend some leisure time with the kiddies is at the other movie theater in the county, Movies 10 in Nelsonville. This movie house also features a "fun barn" for additional amusements.

Third place goes to Rollerbowl Lanes in Athens, where they set 'em up and the fam' comes in to knock 'em down.

Best Place to Work

Ohio University

Oh, sure, our top finisher Ohio University is a great place to work if you live in Athens. There's the good pay, and the generous benefits, and the tuition waivers, and so forth. But do OU employees get to write up little blurbs about the Best of Athens winners once a year? Huh? Do they? We rest our case.

Next-best local place of employ, say our industrious readers, is Holzer Clinic in Athens, followed by Donkey Coffee and Espresso.

Where else is a good place to work? According to our voters, working "at home" is nice. You know " puttering, dusting the credenza, that sort of thing. Also Diagnostic Hybrids (did these votes come in before or after the big corporate buyout?), BellaVino (for some of us, working in a wine store could prove problematic), Casa Cantina (though the pace is a mite hectic over there, we understand), and the Red Brick Tavern.

Worst eyesore

Clear-cut hillside

Clear-cut hillside wins again this year as our area's least attractive area to behold. The so-called "Brent Hayes hill" has been voted the most unfortunate-looking thing in the county pretty much every year since Hayes, a local developer, and business partner John Lavelle purchased the land and leveled the trees.

The howls from many in Athens were audible, and apparently a good number of people are still unhappy about it. Grass and brush have now grown back on the hill, but apparently the green stuff wasn't enough to make up for the awkward gap in the tree line. Not yet anyway.

Next up for most unaesthetic around is that big-box retail goliath Wal-Mart. Whatever one's personal feelings about the business inside, the large brown-bricked superstore just doesn't please the eyes. The 20 years boarded-up former Woolworth's location on South Court Street comes in as the third most repugnant local visual prospect, according to readers.

Other spots that "won" multiple mentions in this category include: new Baker Center, Broney's Alumni Grill, Summit at Coates Run, Graffiti, all of the East State Street retail strip, BW-3's new renovation, Jefferson Hill, Palmer Street, the old Blue Gator building and the old Baker Center building.

Best Shopping Area in Athens County

Uptown

Our acquisitive readers tell us the best "area" in which to shop in this county is uptown. More precisely, "uptown!" This probably refers to uptown Athens, with its plethora of quaint and diverse shops, though it could conceivably mean Nelsonville, or even New Marshfield. Well, OK, it's probably not New Marshfield.

Second best shopping "area" (do you see how cunningly we fashion these categories?) is the Athens Farmers Market " now with two locations! Inside and outside!

Third place goes to Wal-Mart, which we suppose is big enough to qualify as a bona fide "area."

Other large vote-attractors include The Market on State and Nelsonville's historic square (OK, forget the first paragraph).

We find it little short of astounding that "yard sales" got not one measly vote.

Best Residential Neighborhood

East Side

We can only imagine the barbaric shrieks of ecstasy, the salty tears of joy, that will erupt from Athens' east side when its residents learn they've snagged the coveted "Best Residential Neighborhood" title in our BOA voting.

Extra police patrols over in the volatile Utah Place/Strathmore Boulevard area, with mounted officers and rubber bullet launchers, might not be a bad idea for a week or two - just in case anyone decides to set a couch on fire or tip over cars to celebrate.

The east side " or as its super-bad denizens prefer to call it, "the only side" " really nailed this category, pulling more than four times as many votes as the second-place finisher, the so-called "west side." What's their story, anyway?

Third place goes to the "near east side," demonstrating that the east side is so thoroughly superior as a residential neighborhood, that its greatness must be subdivided into multiple categories to make room for all of it.

Also pulling significant numbers of votes " though laughably small totals compared to the utterly dominant east side " were Five Points Road, Oakmont subdivision, and Albany. (Pssst. Albany is a village. Honest. They've got a mayor and a sewage treatment plant and everything.)

DINING

Best Breakfast

Casa Nueva

If Jim Morrison were alive today and living in Athens " and are you sure he's not? " he might well sing the following:

Well, I woke up this mornin' and got myself a waffle

Yeah, I woke up this mornin', made myself a waffle

Cause the eggs are uncertain, and the oatmeal's always awful

Then the troubled, charismatic "Lizard King" would probably head straight to Casa Nueva, which is once again our winner this year for Athens' Best Breakfast. Once there, "Mr. Mojo Risin' Early" could order up a big plate of huevos rancheros, or perhaps a deluxe with marinated tofu, spicy cajun homefries and wheat toast. But whatever he chose, we bet he would "love it madly!"

Second place in the most-important-meal-of-the-day competition goes to Casa's perennial breakfast rival, Bob Evans, followed in third by the Union Street Diner.

Honorable mentions and a tip of the syrup pitcher go out to Court Street Diner, Janas, and the Village Bakery.

And once again this category makes us whimsically wonder, "Why no IHOP or Waffle House in Athens?" Well, some of us anyway.

Best Hamburger

The Pub

Yawn, The Pub wins this category in 2010 just like it has since British Duke Beauregard Hamburger, IV, invented this meaty sandwich back in the mid 16th century. (This is why it's called a hamburger rather than a cowburger or a beefburger.)

Seriously, though, The Pub, a fine drinking and eating establishment on North Court Street, puts together a memorable burger, and adds some of the best fries in town.

Second place this year goes to the burgers at the Red Brick Tavern, and third goes to Larry's Dawg House (why'd they get rid of those cool little tabletop TVs?). None of Athens' many fast-food joints placed in this category this year, though all showed up pretty quickly after third place.

Best Vegetarian Cuisine

Casa Cantina

Why is it "vegetarian cuisine" instead of "plant chow" or "leafy vittles" or "botanical provender"? Just making conversation here; we don't really want to know.

Whatever you call it, our nearly omniscient readers tell us the finest place in Athens to obtain fodder composed of roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits or seeds is Casa Cantina.

This confuses us a bit, as we would have thought Casa Nueva was the place. Of course, nachos and salsa are vegetarian cuisine; it's just that the menu in the restaurant part of Casa is a little more extensive.

Next comes Salaam. The grape leaves there are to die for, girlfriend. Third place goes to Lui Lui, which is to tofu and veggies what Lourdes is to cures. In fact, the actual lyrics of the Kingsmen's 1955 hit "Louie Louie," recently deciphered for the first time, are as follows:

Lui Lui's, oh, oh, we need to go

Aye yi yi yi I said

Lui Lui's, oh baby

They have lightly fried tofu in a spicy hunan sauce and Caribbean tofu smothered in papaya marinade and vegetables with garlic sauce and grilled organic Portabello mushrooms and it's all really savory and delicious so

Let's go!

(raucous guitar solo here)

Also doing well in this category were Star of India (two words: lunch buffet), the Village Bakery, and Purple Chopstix.

Best Family Restaurant

Bob Evans

How many times has this happened to your family? Mom says she doesn't feel like cooking tonight, because Dad's a jerk who doesn't appreciate her, and the kids are destructive, sociopathic little hellions who never give her a moment's rest, plus she's been drinking since 8 a.m.! Sounds like it's time to pile into the station wagon and head on out to a nice family restaurant!

If that's what you're looking for, say our readers, you can't do better than Bob Evans. They specialize in what you might call Middle American comfort food, and the waitpersons are all real nice and attentive and "need a refill, hon?" and you can just put on a good family feed for a very reasonable price. There's a reason that parking lot's usually pretty darned full!

Second place goes to Applebee's, which tied with Athens' own Casa Nueva.

Also doing respectably in this category were Ruby Tuesday's, Abrio's, Kiser's BBQ, and Casa Lopez.

Best uniquely Athens restaurant

Casa Nueva

Casa Nueva takes honors once again as Best Uniquely Athens Restaurant. This is really no surprise. Casa is always at the top of the list when showing out-of-towners the crème de la crème of Athens eateries. And Athenians can always talk up the all-organic, local menu.

Formed in 1985 by a group of recently unemployed restaurant workers, Casa has been from the start a worker-owned collective enterprise; it has expanded over the years to include the Casa Cantina. Both the restaurant and bar are popular social gathering spots for locals.

Second place goes to O'Betty's Red Hot, which specializes in all different kinds of hot dogs. The campy hot dog décor is certainly worth a stop inside, and the late-night line is always an entertaining place to meet some characters.

Third place goes to Salaam, while a number of other restaurants did well in this category, including Stephen's, Purple Chopstix, Bagel Street Deli and Larry's Dawg House.

Best Chicken Wings

Buffalo Wild Wings

This must be a gruesomely disturbing category for any of our readers who happen to be barnyard fowl. For them, it would be like a person voting for "Best Severed Human Arms." It also seems more than a little discriminatory " like, what if your restaurant serves only delicious condor wings? (There's a lot of meat on those, by the way.)

But enough of this piffle. Our winner is Buffalo Wild Wings, for whom chicken wings are a true speciality. Before the white man came, the great herds of buffalo chicken used to darken the plains like a flood of barbecue sauce. BW-3 won this category last year, too. (While writing this, we started wondering where the "BW-3" came from, and Yahoo Answers was kind enough to cite the restaurant chain's own Web site FAQ, where they explain that when they opened the first BW-3 in 1982, it was called Buffalo Wild Wings & Weck, with weck signifying "kimmelweck," a seasoned and topped Kaiser roll that was popular on the East Coast at the time.)

Red Brick Tavern comes in right behind, followed by the Maplewood Tavern. These establishments got their names from... Oh, never mind.

Other places where our readers like to "wing it" include Miller's Chicken, Hungry Howie's, and Avalanche Pizza. Avalanche probably offers a "chicken coop" pizza with de-boned chicken wings, fox meat, hard-boiled egg slices, and little bits of gravel to peck at.

Best Buffet

China King

Like last year, China King on South Court takes the top spot for Best Buffet this year. You know, my favorite thing to do at China King is to dip my hand into the big aquarium at the restaurant entrance and snag a big fat goldfish. They're great on the lo mein!

Anyway, if you want a full selection of sumptuous Chinese Food, laid out on a mile of buffet table space, this is your spot.

Second place goes to Star of India, that tasty East Indian restaurant on West Union, and third goes to Ponderosa, which has been serving buffet-style food in Athens since Major Cutler first rounded the bend on the Hocking and saw the Hayes clear-cut.

Best coffee

Donkey Coffee and Espresso

An old Turkish proverb states that coffee should be "black as hell, strong as death and sweet as love." But however our readers prefer their coffee, they prefer to get it from Donkey Coffee and Espresso on West Washington Street in Athens. The place is a hip and laid-back java joint, featuring the occasional stage act and a fine place to kick back with some quality beans.

Second place for best cup o' mud goes to Perk's Coffee House and Roastery. Like Donkey, Perk's has a nice, laid-back, comfy, collegiate, just-sitting-here-on-the-couch-with-my-laptop-working-on-my-novel-over-a-steaming-cappucino atmosphere.

Third place goes to Starbuck's at Kroger. And honorable mentions include Brenen's, Brew du Soleil, Court Street Coffee, Speedway and Spice of Life.

Best Ethnic Restaurant

Salaam

For the third year in a row, Salaam, that cozy little Middle Eastern restaurant on West Washington Street, takes top honors as Athens' best ethnic eatery.

Actually, Salaam's menu is - to quote their Web site - "inspired by the foods of the Middle East, North Africa, and the Indian subcontinent." With a new location, the atmosphere is more robust and the food just as delectable.

Second place goes to a perennial contender, Casa Nueva, whose menu leans South of the Border, down Mexico way. Third place goes to Casa Lopez, another Mexican joint.

Honorable mentions go to Star of India, Lam's Garden, China Panda, and Lui Lui's.

Best Pizza

Avalanche

Avalanche Pizza wins once again as Best of Athens' Best Pizza. Avalanche is used to winning awards, even internationally, and each year churns out a couple new recipes sure to surprise and intrigue pizza lovers. Not only tasty, Avalanche is also relatively cheap, and certainly socially conscious, using organic ingredients and now local King Family sausage.

Second place goes to Courtside Pizza, with that 'za that'll make ya go "ahh." Goodfella's comes in third. It's been said that students flock to Goodfella's late night like the salmon of Capistrano.

Honorable mentions and a complimentary plastic slicing wheel go out to (in descending order of votes): Hungry Howie's, Donato's, Papa Johns, Della Zona and Jackie O's, among many others.

Best Sub

Subway

You know, since the top three finishers in this category are the same as last year, we're just going to borrow last year's write-up. It was a good one, and why mess with success, right?

Here goes:

In this always volatile category, a handful of elite sandwich shops battle year after year for the top prize, which goes now to one, now to another. We would subtly submit that all our top finishers have substantial claims to sublimity, though of course this is purely subjective.

Winning this year is Subway (locations uptown and on East State Street, as well as in The Plains, Nelsonville and Glouster).

Second place goes to Jimmy John's Gourmet Sandwiches on South Court Street, followed in third by Quizno's (also on South Court).

Best Burrito

Big Mamma's Burritos

In a returning category this year, the "other" burrito joint on Court Street, Big Mamma's Burritos, wins the whole enchilada (to mix our Mexican food metaphors). It's probably a mixture of manager Big Nate's hospitable nature, the wonderful employees and the top-notch burritos. But I warn you, don't even think about cutting in line when you're awaiting your burrito at 2:20 a.m. (Full disclosure: My kid works there, and I play softball with Nate.)

Second place goes to the Burrito Buggy, which has taken a tropical vacation this winter but will be back in the spring, and third, of course, goes to Chipotle.

Last year this category went to nobody since we didn't have it.

Just to fill space and entertain any geezers in the audience, do any of you old timers remember The Hungry Mouth, a burrito joint on West Union back in the mid '70s? Best bean burritos anywhere.

Best Fine Dining

Stephen's

Want to impress all your friends and family with your rich taste and discretion? Just carry around the latest copy of The Athens NEWS. Oh, sorry, we're talking about fine dining here. OK, how bout this: If you utter the words "fine dining" in a word-association test in Athens County, you'll likely get the response, Stephen's. And that's why once again this year, Stephen's uptown Athens restaurant takes first place in this category.

Stephen's also won the last three years. Coming in second and third are Zoe's in Athens and Restaurant Salaam.

Honorable mentions go to a whole slew of restaurants that got multiple votes, including Lui Lui's, Cutler's, Latitude 39, Casa Nueva, Rhapsody and a bunch of others.