Dining out was always a treat when I was a kid in Akron. My mother was an excellent cook, but we still enjoyed going to restaurants in the 1970s and 1980s. It was exciting to try something new.

Although many of those places are gone now, I have happy memories. If only I could go back for one more taste.

Mark J. Price:Pardon the grammar from this mammer jammer

Here are 10 restaurants from my youth that I wish I could revisit:

Dodie’s Dining Room, 808 W. Market St., Akron: The Highland Square diner featured home-cooked meals like Salisbury steak and liver and onions. The waitresses wore hair nets and seemed old to me, but they were probably younger than I am now. I remember gravy. Lots of gravy. And the pies were homemade and delicious.

Ce-Si-Bon, 891 Grant St., Akron: This authentic French restaurant was located in an old house in South Akron. The place was tiny — maybe 10 tables — but the food was amazing. It introduced me to crepes, bouillabaisse, quiche and onion soup. What delicacies. Up until then, my knowledge of French cuisine had been strictly fries.

Fondue Affair, 575 Carroll St., Akron: Such decadence! How fun it was to dip cubes of bread and apple slices into pots of melted cheese. Darned if I can remember the main course, but the chocolate fondue dessert, featuring bananas, cherries and marshmallows, was out of this world. Sadly, the affair ended after a few years.

The Silver Pheasant, 3085 Graham Road, Stow: This seemed really fancy when I was a kid. Located in a shopping plaza, the elegant restaurant’s menu included prime rib, crab legs and steak, but my usual order was chicken paradise, two boneless chicken breasts served on rice pilaf with drawn butter. Hope I didn’t spill too much on the white tablecloth.

Joe Gareri’s Restaurant, 44 E. Mill St., Akron: The downtown establishment was best known for its Italian cuisine, but I’ll never forget the Friday night seafood buffet. It was all you could eat for $10.95. I think my eyes bulged out of my head when I saw the mountain of shrimp on a serving table. I filled my plate to capacity and feasted like a king.

Panda Chinese Restaurant, 37 Midway Plaza, Tallmadge: We used to go here a lot because the food was always good. Wonton soup, egg rolls, fried rice, sweet and sour pork. Somewhere, I still own a little panda figurine that we bought from a glass case at the front counter. Those were good times.

Lou & Hy’s, 1949 W. Market St., Akron. I’m sure I’m not alone on this one. You couldn’t go wrong with the corned beef, pastrami, chopped liver, lox and, of course, cheesecake. I remember using tongs to grab kosher dill pickles from a container on the table. I was so happy to move a block away from the delicatessen as an adult, but then it closed!

Jack Horner’s Restaurant, 395 E. Market St., Akron: Yes, that was my stomach growling at church. I couldn’t wait to go to this family restaurant after Sunday service. The place was packed with patrons, most wearing their Sunday best. We usually ordered breakfast and inevitably ran into other people from our church who had the same idea.

Art’s Place, 20 Waterloo Road, Akron: Steaks, chops, fish … this place had it all. But the thing I remember most is the bean soup made with smoked ham hocks and served with cornbread. The sauerkraut balls were also terrific. We also used to frequent Art’s Place at 2255 State Road in Cuyahoga Falls. Ah, the bean soup.

Kraut ‘N’ Dog, Quaker Square, Akron: Anyone else remember this one? The little eatery specialized in hot dogs, bratwurst and knockwurst sandwiches. The sauerkraut was pungent and the brown mustard and horseradish took my breath away. It was a fun place to stop. Gee, I miss all the great shops at Quaker Square.

If you own vintage cookbooks, you might want to double-check the ingredients.

Reader Dick Spangler, 76, who was born and raised in Richland County, offered some food for thought regarding our ongoing conversation about Ohio sayings.

“Here’s an idiom for you,” he wrote. “The old-timers (and us too) around north central Ohio called green peppers ‘mangoes.’ And NOT the things from Florida. The produce stands even sold them as mangoes. I had friends in Holmes County and they said that was the term they used, too. I have no idea what the basis is for this strange idiom.”

I had never heard of such a thing, but it apparently was common in Akron. 

Mark J. Price:Oops! Classic bloopers from the collection of Mark J. Price

In the 1930s and 1940s, the Beacon Journal published several recipes with mangoes as the main ingredient, including “old-fashioned pickled mangoes,” “meatless stuffed mangoes,” “mango relish” and the confusing “mangoes stuffed with peppers.” One recipe for sandwich filling called for 12 green mangoes and 12 red mangoes.

Those were all peppers. In those days, the tropical fruit was rare in Ohio because it was too delicate to ship.

Indianapolis Star food writer Donna Segal came up with a possible solution to the mango mystery during a 1991 interview with food historian Karen Hess, the author of “Martha Washington’s Book of Cookery.” 

In the 18th century, Hess noted, there was a demand in England for “Indian-style pickles like fruit mangoes stuffed with spices and kept in a vinegar brine,” but the fruit wasn’t  widely available in the United Kingdom, so cooks used green peppers as a substitute.

She theorized that the recipe for stuffed mangoes spread to the United States via English cookbooks.

Choose wisely when you open the crisper drawer.

Mark J. Price can be reached at mprice@thebeaconjournal.com.

Mark J. Price:Nobody lives in North Hill or West Hill