Date Night goes for the art deco splendor of the Buckhead Diner.

This place is gorgeous. We have enjoyed other Buckhead Life restaurants such as Pricci, Kyma, and Bistro Nikko, but believe it or not, we have never been here.

Every surface of the restaurant is curved in the proper art deco style. I wish we could decorate our home like this.

We wouldn’t mind a full length bar at home either, but we have no place to put it. Tonight, we are celebrating the 23rd birthday of our solo offspring, who joins us along with his grandparents. What magic will come out of the Buckhead Diner kitchen?

The kitchen is open and across from the bar. It’s a busy place. They start you off with cornbread muffins and bread.

They had us at “cornbread muffins”. The muffins are hot and the butter melts as soon as it touches. You don’t want to eat the entire basket, but you certainly could. You might want to save room for some blue cheese chips, which have been on the menu since 1987.

The manager brings this over even before we order because the grandparents are regulars here. I am not a big fan of blue cheese, but I wanted to lick this plate. The fresh, hot, and crunchy chips are covered in the cheese. Somebody is an expert in shaving potatoes in the kitchen. You can see why this appetizer has been around for so long.

There are five of us at the table and evidently, we are in a “salad” mood. Four of us must have eaten too much this week and go for the green stuff. The birthday boy gets crab cakes.

They come with mashed potatoes and three huge asparagus the size of baseball bats. This must be very good as he eats the entire thing.

Now, let’s get to the salads. You might call the following pictures “lettuce porn”. Let’s start out with Eve’s dish, the Tuscan kale salad.

This greenery comes from the “big entree salads” part of the menu. You can have shrimp, chicken or salmon with your kale. Eve gets the fried shrimp. The shrimp are small and crunchy and add a lot to the salad. Maybe there should have been a few more as the portion looked kind of paltry.

The grandparents both get the same salad. I guess that’s what happens after you have been married for 58 years. Here’s the salmon cobb salad, also from the big salad part of the menu.

I have a feeling that this is not the first time they have had this salad.

Mine is the best salad of the night. Check out their take on the classic nicoise.

Rare ahi tuna, green beans, lettuce, egg, fingerling potatoes and tomato grace the plate. Isn’t that a nice looking salad? The tapenade on a hunk of French bread tops things off. I don’t usually order salads on Date Night because they don’t really show off the prowess of the kitchen. This salad at least had some cooking to into it as someone had to make the rare tuna and the excellent tapenade.

Burgers go by. Sandwiches go by. I try not to drool. This isn’t really a salad place and I would have loved some meatloaf or fried chicken, but we have been overindulging lately and I behave myself. Now we have an excuse to return.

As with our earlier reviews, we should probably throw in another compliment about the staff at Buckhead Life restaurants. These people are professionals. Their training is excellent and they have been doing this a long time. It’s so nice to know that you can still get service this good in Atlanta.

Before we go, we should wish Elliott a happy birthday.

We all share the banana creme pie. Everybody likes pie. Good thing we had the salad. The pie is sinfully delicious.

The Score Factor (how likely you are to “score” if you bring a date here): We will give Buckhead Diner 4 out of 5. The decor alone is worth two points and the service and food add another two. Get a drink from the bar and people watch. The prices are surprisingly reasonable for Buckhead. Unfortunately, you have to valet park, but Date Night always gets a kick out of seeing our minivan or Prius parked near all of the Porsches, Mercedes and Jaguars in the lot.