Ruth’s Keystone Café

I reported the other day on Twitter that I had drove by Ruth’s Keystone Café, and for a nice change of pace, saw some good news—it was re-opening after being closed suddenly in July. It was a place I ate several times, and I guess I sort of took it for granted, so I wanted to make sure and support it once it re-opened. So the BFF and I met there for lunch on what was their 4th day open.

The menu is very similar to what it was before, many of the same items, and certainly all the favorite ones (at least for me). It is paired down a bit, and has been re-printed on nice new shiny laminated cards. One of my favorite changes is that they have a nice section of combos (e.g. soup and salad, soup and sandwich or salad and sandwich) and you can get a petite portion of ANY of their salads with the combo. This is exactly what I needed at this place because there is a salad I really like (the warm wild mushroom) and several sandwiches I like as well. So I had the sandwich/salad combo with the mushroom salad and half of their Cobb sandwich. Perfect.

The salad is a salad of spinach leaves topped with warm mushrooms (mostly the brown button type), blue cheese and walnuts and served with a yummy truffle vinaigrette. There was so much of the toppings that I didn’t even end up eating all of them after going through all the spinach. But it is a really nice, hearty salad. And it is nice to be able to get something warm when the weather is starting to get a little cold.

My sandwich was the Ruth’s Cobb with shredded chicken breast, avocado, aioli, bacon and blue cheese. They have changed the style of this sandwich (and quite possibly all of them I think) to be panini type sandwiches—sliced bread with the ingredients inside and then pressed and toasted in the panini press. I found it nice to have all the ingredients slightly warm and the bread nice and toasty and not too thick, but if you are looking for the buns they used to have, you might be disappointed. I also liked that they have put more of the choice ingredients on the sandwiches, as that was my big gripe before. There was much more blue cheese and avocado, and this makes me happy. And the bacon was really tasty too. Let’s hope they keep it up!

The BFF had one of her old time favorites—the potato omelet and said she thought it was even better than before as well.

I talked to our server who said they have been quite busy since re-opening and hope that it continues this way. If this is a place you liked before and neglected, or a place you have never been to, give it a try. Support one of our better local lunch spots!

Ruth’s Keystone Café
3443 East 86th Street
Indy 46240
317-466-0770