TLDR: Best fried food in Kirksville. Great burgers. Homestyle American classics. Large portions at…read morea more-than-fair price. Another restaurant called a "grill" with no grilled food.
MENU: Mainly burgers and sandwiches. The specials are your typical homemade dinner type stuff, like meatloaf or pot-roast. No desserts.
FOOD QUALITY: Everything is well-made with care. They tend to be busy, and the methods they use to compensate for that can reduce the quality of some menu items. For example, they make the fried chicken in batches and let it sit; this means that the quality of your yardbird can be hit or miss depending on when the last batch was made: if it's been sitting for a while, it will tend to be dry, but if you catch it when it's fresh, it's juicy, tender, crispy, top quality. Not that the owners have a reason to care what I think, but: I'd rather wait twenty minutes and have fresh chicken than have it come out immediately and the meat be dry and chalky.
MENU FAVORITES: Best restaurant burger in town. Best fried food in town. You can get a whole half of a handmade fried chicken for under $20. (Also, if you order a piece meal, you can choose the cuts you want.) I'm a big fan of fried catfish and here you can get it either of two ways: fillets, or nuggets. The portion size relative to the price seems to be larger with the nugget version. Tasty sauces. Try the macaroni salad.
MENU FAILS: It seems to me that the food here tends to be a tad over-salted, but it's not a dealbreaker. Pass on the coleslaw, it's watery and way too acidic. (Save the distilled vinegar for cleaning your windows.) I get a chuckle out of some of the eccentricities of the menu. Like, their main burger option is called the Waddlin' Chuck - named after a famous hobo, I assume - but the menu has a typo and lists it as "waddin chuck" without the L. No doubt I'm more smooth-brained than you, and I mispronounced it several times on different occasions before one of the host staff mentioned the correct name. Waddling makes a lot more sense than "waddin". Doh! Everything on the menu is "famous", but the restaurant was open for several months before I had even heard about it.
FRONT OF HOUSE SERVICE: I've never eaten inside the restaurant, because I always get my food to go. But all the folks I have interacted with are friendly and helpful. Have your phone number ready if you're making a takeout order. I've also never had a drink here, but the bar looks legit.
KITCHEN SERVICE: You're gonna get your food quick, fast, and in a hurry. Guaranteed.
COMPETITION: Maxwell's is the most similar restaurant. The burgers are cousins, and the chips exactly the same - so much alike that I wonder if someone at Hobo's used to work there. If you're a catfish fan like me, the difference is at Maxwell's you'll get one large fillet, with the option of making it a sandwich; while at Hobo's you'll get two medium-sized fillets with the option of a third. You can get a fried chicken tender sandwich at Maxwell's, but not at Hobo's - minor differences like that. Some of the fried items at Hobo's are adjacent to what you'll get at the Wooden Nickel, and the quality here is way better.
ATMOSPHERE: Freezing cold air conditioning in the summertime. Every time I've ever been to Hobo's it's hopping busy. The parking situation is a mess, too.
