The Chips Fall

I received an e-mail the other day from someone at the Canyon Café (4626 Broadway) with an earth-shattering news update: The old yeasty breadsticks — which had been served with a pink, cream-cheese-based dip that reminded me of Kraft pimento cheese spread — are out; the new predinner snack is a basket of corn chips, sweet-potato chips and wonton chips with salsa.

I dutifully made a mental note to check out those chips. But I still had to remind myself that the Canyon Café isn’t the Cactus Café (4115 Mill Street), which isn’t a restaurant but a nightclub.

But the Cactus Café sounds so much like the Cactus Grill (11849 Roe in Leawood), which isn’t a drinking venue but rather a restaurant that offers free baskets of corn chips and salsa with dinners — unlike the similar-sounding Coyote Grill (4843 Johnson Drive in Mission), which charges $2.99 for them. And neither of them should be confused with Cozymel’s Coastal Grill (6700 West 135th Street) in Overland Park, which I plan to visit one day, after I get a passport to drive south of 119th Street. There’s also a Guacamole Grill (11134 Holmes) and a Lucky Brewgrille (5401 Johnson Drive in Mission). The latter is the only one of six local restaurants with the word Lucky in its name that doesn’t serve Chinese food.

And don’t bother grilling me on the difference between the China Buffet (2030 East Santa Fe) in Olathe, which offers wonton, not chips, and the China King Buffet (6000 N.E. Antioch Road) in the Northland, though one clearly has more of a connection to Asian royalty, like the King Buffet Chinese Restaurant (8136 N.W. Prairie View Road). I once called the latter restaurant to ask how late it stayed open, and the dignified lady at the other end of the line patiently spelled out the name of the place instead. When you’re a restaurant queen, honey, hours mean nothing — just spell the name right!

On the subject of names, I don’t mix up my Maxes. Even when I’m muddled, I remember that Max’s Autodiner (8240 Wornall Road) serves cheeseburgers, whereas Max’s Noodles & More (1728 Main Street) has cheese-filled crab rangoon. Sometimes you can find both at Calypso’s Buffet (I-35 and Front Street) at the Isle of Capri Casino. Ditto for the Ameristar Casino’s The Buffet (8201 N.E. Birmingham), where you can also get chips and salsa. Which is how I got into this mess in the first place.