This weeks gang with Diners and Dives, shown from left are Tricia Gall, REMAX Jeff Owens, Shari Benyousky, Karena Wilkinson, Ron Baumgartner, Lynn and Jeff Murphy, Waitress Megan Metzger, Sierra Clark-Kern and Brittany Lyon. Photo by Paul Finley.

Text and Photos
By Shari Benyousky
Guest Columnist

Column Note: This is the 40th column in the Diners and Dives series in which a small group of Warsaw Breakfast Optimist Club members and their guests road trip to explore the restaurants of Kosciusko and the surrounding area.

Congratulations

You Inkfreenews readers have kept this column going for ONE full year as of Jan. 12. To celebrate, my boss Ron Baumgartner and I designed a special Diners and Dives T-shirt combining the Inkfreenews and Warsaw Breakfast Optimist logos. Check out some of us modeling them and thanks for all the great recommendations and comments. Keep them coming.

Where Does The Name Rocksteady Come From?

Close up of the new Diners and Dives T-shirt.

“You know who Rocksteady is, right?” Wildcard guest and Pinball Wizard Jeff Murphy asked the woman across the table. Wildcard Karena Wilkinson, owner of Harvest Coffee of Milford, shrugged. Rocksteady was the mutant rhino henchman from The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Remember how the turtles shared an intense affinity for eating pizza? NOW you get the name.

The new Rocksteady Pizza Parlor at 108 E Market St. (old Rua building) in Warsaw offers what one of the three partners, Joel Squires, calls “a kind of hybrid New York-style pizza.” In Manhattan, you buy a plate-sized piece of pizza with thin dough that you fold over and eat like a sandwich. Rocksteady Pizza has what Joel calls “more structure to the dough. And you get the whole pizza pie. Not just a slice.”

We had 11 people present for this Diners and Dives. That’s a lot, so my brain, notebook, and camera kept busy. Rocksteady Pizza prepared a long table and several waiters brought out garlic knots, tomato soup and pizza with awesome names (the Bebop, the Limon Picante, the Midwest Club anyone?). I picked up a tender, steaming garlic knot. Garlic!

“Perfect for your meetings with people later in the afternoon,” deadpanned REMAX Jeff Owens to guest Sierra Clark-Kern of Milford.

“I’m the boss of the office,” Sierra shrugged and took a big bite.

Milford — The Cowabunga of Kosciusko Economics

Our guests included four from Milford including my boss, Ron Baumgartner, publisher and president of the huge media company The Papers Inc. which produces Inkfreenews.com. Ron brought three of the four available masterminds behind the amazingly successful Milford Food Truck Friday program. “This is Tricia Gall, the Milford Clerk treasurer, aka Mayor of Milford,” Ron introduced us over a bowl of tomato basil bisque (that’s a fancy word for soup, but a tasty bowl will run you only $5).

Rocsteady and Bebop on the side o one of the arcade pinball machines.

Food Truck Fridays open again in June, but like Meet Milford on your Facebook social media for awesome winter stuff too. Hurry. You can still sign up for the Jan. 18 “How to Make Soup from Scratch” class. I asked them how they had managed to get tiny Milford on the map with events. Sierra grinned at Tricia, Karena, and Ron. “We are little, but we make it work.”

Tricia carefully held half of her cheesy Carne sandwich. “We find a way to make things work. We cooperate.’

“Tricia writes grants,” Karena told me proudly. “And she gets them.”

“It’s a skill that I didn’t know I had,” Tricia admitted. “One day I wrote a small one and I got the grant, so I just kept going. I’d also like to shout out to K21 for their small-town $200,000 grant. That grant allowed Milford to dream bigger.”

Sierra told me they had hoped for 200 people for the first Food Truck Friday. “But now, depending on the event, we get 1,000 or even 1,500!”

Think about that. Milford, has 1,599 residents, and yet sometimes 1,500 people show up for one of their downtown events. Mind-blowing. They’ve done pumpkin carving and tie-dyed T-shirts to name a few of their creative endeavors. “The vendors keep all of their profits, so they love coming,” Sierra told us. We love this idea too. Cheers, Meet Milford.

Turbuloso Pinball

Our other wildcard picked up a piece of his favorite Bebop pizza. Bebop was Rocksteady’s mutant warthog friend, of course, but in pizza world, a Behop pizza means mozzarella, bacon, pepperoni and sausage. The Rocksteady pizza includes mozzarella, salami, olives, red peppers, shallots and mushrooms.

Pinball wizard Jeff Murphy in his element.

Pinball Wizard Jeff Murphy is “partially retired” from being a biostatistician. He collects and fixes up pinball machines for fun. After we finished licking our fingers from pizza and one amazing gooey chocolate cookie cut into lots of little pieces, Jeff pulled out a roll of quarters and led us to the Arcade room. “We thought that downtown Warsaw needed some more family-friendly spaces,” he and his wife Lynn told us. Jeff and Lynn also coach cross country as a feeder group of elementary kids for the high school programs.

Baumgartner immediately popped quarters into a World Cup Soccer pinball machine and won a game. I promptly lost a ball and tilted my Star Wars pinball. Brittany Lyon’s face lit up at a different arcade game. “I LOVE Ms. Pac-man!”

Murphy smiled at the group of eager adults. “We held a tournament here for New Year’s Eve. I hope to have many more. We can do parties back here too.” So, if you’ve got an upcoming birthday or shower to plan, let animated characters from Star Trek, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, or the other worlds give you a hand. Bogus!

TIP – There’s a change machine in the room if you forgot quarters but have $1s and $5s.

Speaking of change, REMAX Jeff Owens wanted me to remind you of an upcoming event.

Radical Optimist And 2024 Sprint Triathlon Series

I’m not a runner. You might even call me a turtle, but you’ll find this turtle and many of her Optimist friends helping to run the Warsaw Breakfast Optimist Annual Triathlon at Winona Lake Park on Saturday, June 22. This year we have something more radical — a triple crown event that combines our event, the Wawasee Triathlon on July 27, and Goshen’s Rock the Quarry race on Aug. 10. Interested? Check everything out here and come say hello. Keep an eye out for the silver hair of REMAX Jeff Owens if you have questions.

Thanks, Rocksteady. You were efficient, tasty, and hip. We like the change.

TIP – Rocksteady intends to create a house recipe soft-serve ice cream for dessert soon. Cowabunga dudes!

Do you know of an interesting place, restaurant, nonprofit, or person that you’d like to see featured in Dives and Diners or in Profiles behind the scenes someday? Send SB Communications LLC an email at [email protected].