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It’s been offering “a taste of summer” to generations of Southwick residents year-round since 1990. But the iconic summertime menu featuring hamburgers, hot dogs, fries and ice cream isn’t what’s given the roadside eatery on College Highway its seasonal moniker.
That, second-generation co-owner Steve Grimaldi shared, was bestowed on the restaurant by local town folk.
“It was a Friendly’s outpost,” Grimaldi said of the original structure, which housed a seasonal ice cream shop owned by the company’s founders, S. Prestley and Curtis Blake. “A lot of people called it the ‘Friendly’s Summer House’” when the Blakes owned it, Grimaldi explained. Over the years, he added, the “Summer House” part of the name simply stuck.
The Blake brothers decided to sell their seasonal shop in 1979. Grimaldi said, his parents, Anthony and Dorothy, saw an opportunity and purchased the business.
“My dad came along, saw the sign and put in a bid,” Grimaldi recalled. The family did some renovations to the tiny shop and opened it as a seasonal, May to September roadside eatery in 1980. More renovations followed, including the purchase of adjacent land for parking, the addition of an indoor dining room and an expanded outdoor picnic area.
In 1990, Grimaldi and his brother Rick, took over the business from their parents, continuing the comfort food menu that helped give the restaurant its iconic name.
“People have called us a lunch spot, but I think we come to mind for the ice cream and the comfort foods people expect at this time of year,” Grimaldi shared during an interview as the weekday lunch crowd wound down. Despite being after 2 p.m., there was still a line of patrons waiting to order hamburgers, fries, grilled cheeses and the special of the day — a roast beef melt.
“We try to keep prices reasonable,” Grimaldi continued. “And we’ve never gotten real fancy or added a lot [to our menu], but we do have those traditional comfort foods” all year round.
Those foods are “what you would find at any traditional roadside stand,” Grimaldi shared. “We have hamburgers, hot dogs, grilled cheese, french fries, clam strips, onion rings, egg salad and tuna salad sandwiches — our turkey club is very popular — and over the years we’ve added wraps [ sandwiches] and soups. For the soups, the base comes in and we make them here. And we have rotating specials including today’s roast beef melt — plus a barbeque pork sandwich and a corned beef sandwich. On Fridays, we have a clam strip boat and fish and chips.”
“We have people that we see in here three and four times a week and we know how bored we get with the food, so we try to mix things up,” Grimaldi said of the daily and weekly specials. In keeping with current dietary requests, Grimaldi added the shop now has available gluten-free hamburger and hot dog rolls and gluten-free bread for sandwiches.
But, as Grimaldi stated, ice cream is still the star at The Summer House.
“We have soft serve, and we have hard scoop, a variety of sundaes, milkshakes and slushies,” Grimaldi said. Frozen yogurt and smoothies are also on the ice cream menu.
“Our most popular sundae is our hot fudge brownie,” Grimaldi continued, adding that the restaurant makes its own brownies, as the scent of freshly baked chocolate goodness floated through his tiny office. “There’s also the strawberry shortcake sundae and in the fall, we make an apple crisp sundae.” Again, he said, the apple crisp is homemade.
Grimaldi said he credits the restaurant’s commitment to its traditional menu of classic sandwiches and ice cream treats for its 45 years of success.
“We have generations of customers — we have customers who came here when they were kids who are now bringing their kids and sometimes, their grandkids,” Grimaldi said.
One of his favorite things to do, Grimaldi shared, is to go out in the evening and watch his customers enjoying their food on the family-friendly picnic grounds around The Summer House.
“Kids are playing on the train … people are sitting at one of our picnic tables with their dog beside them … the whole family is there, and the kids are having fun,” Grimaldi said. The welcoming, family-friendly atmosphere of The Summer House is “why we’ve grown as we have and we’re successful,” Grimaldi added.
Looking to the future, Grimaldi said he and his brother Rick have no plans to change things at The Summer House.
“We would like to keep going the way we are because it has worked so well for 45 years,” Grimaldi said. “There may be some slight changes to the menu — some new items — but when you have a formula that works, you stick to it.”
The Summer House is located at 955 College Hwy. in Southwick. The restaurant is open year-round from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m., daily.
To view their menu, visit summerhouserestaurant.net, or find them on Facebook and Instagram.
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