My baby’s on the Level

An ode to the High Level Café

by Ryan A. Bunch

published September 17th 2008

It is with great sadness that I make this announcement — the High Level Café is no more.

A moment of silent please.

No, wait. Make that a moment of drunken yelps and explosive laughter. That was the song of the High Level.

In a way, the High Level Café was a musician. It sang songs through the truckers, neighbors, and drunken vagabonds who wandered into its infamous 24-7 humble kitchen, replacing the music of the long-silent juke boxes on the wall with the hoots and hollers of those welcoming the crack of dawn with a louder crack back. And, if nothing else, the High Level at one time or another fed most of the musicians in this city.

One of the last true “greasy spoon” brands of unchanged ‘50s diners left in the Toledo area, the High Level was a unique place. In a city filled with economic uncertainty, morale ups and downs, and job loss, poverty, et al, the shabby green joint was a safety net, like mom’s house at Thanksgiving. It was something worth depending on. Its lights never dimmed. Its grill never cooled. Its menu never changed.

The High Level’s signature cuisine, aside from its tasty sandwiches and breakfasts, was a dish simply known as Frito Pie – Fritos, chili, cheese, and onions. Genius in its simplicity. The perfect late night snack. Frito Pie was the last branch in the family tree of bastardized spaghetti. If Chili Mac (another Toledo signature) is white trash spaghetti — substituting chili for marinara, shredded cheddar for parmesan, I think qualifies it so — then Frito Pie was white trash Chili Mac, calling on the old hillbilly mantra: For when yer outta of noodles, use chips. And no one made it better than the High Level Café. To say this signature Toledo delicacy saved me from a few hangovers would be an understatement. To say it became bragging rights and a cultural staple, as valid a thing to know about Toledo as the Zoo or the Museum, to my out-of-town visitors, maybe even more so.

See, in my mind the High Level was the cultural underbelly’s Mecca, a destination whose yellowy light glow and shabby booths held in them something beautiful about Toledo’s rich past; something this city will never get back. It could be an idea or an aesthetic, maybe a promise that hadn’t quite been broken, just forgotten. I’m not sure what it was exactly. I’d be surprised if anyone could tell you. Maybe it meant something different to everyone. Maybe that’s what was so beautiful about it.

But, inside the glass-walled fish bowl, looking out onto a forgotten corner of Toledo at the once great, now trumped High Level Bridge, things that define this city in the sunlight melted away. Racism, classism, anger hardly existed. Instead, just people vibing over good food, celebrating, capping off a good night out with their friends. It was a feeling, and a comforting one. For that, we thank you High Level Café. Sing yourself to sleep now, the growl of our drunken bellies seeking late night bacon and eggs will pick up the harmony.

Rest in peace.