Like at any good diner, you can order breakfast all day, and the menu was interesting, including blintzes, crab cakes Benedict, and hoppel poppel. We ordered their house specialty, the oven-baked onion soup, and although it wasn’t even 1pm, they were sold out. Al and I had planned to share the soup and a platter called triple peaks. It has three salad scoops, one each of chicken, shrimp, and tuna. Without the soup, we had to quickly change our order. I chose the Caesar salad with grilled gulf shrimp and homemade Caesar dressing.

Al surprised us all by ordering a California Reuben. Joe had Savannah’s (according to their menu) best black bean soup, served with a scoop of sour cream and chopped onions.

All of the food was delicious. My salad had eight grilled shrimp and the Caesar dressing was loaded with anchovy flavor. Joe was very happy with his black bean soup, but I think the real winner was Al’s fabulous Reuben.

It was real sliced roast turkey, not cold cuts, real turkey. The coleslaw was a little sweet and absolutely yummy.

We decided to try their famous jumbo éclair for dessert. I don’t have enough words to describe this éclair. Imagine a behemoth big enough to feed three people and have as much leftover as was eaten.

Now you are beginning to get the idea of the size of this thing. I knew it was going to be big, as the menu says that it feeds two or more, but big doesn’t half describe it. It was almost the size of a loaf of Italian bread. It could feed six, and I am not exaggerating. It must have weighted, according to Al, 2.5 pounds. Now, I wish I could honestly say that the taste matched the size, but it was only okay. Buy it anyway; it is worth it just to see it.

Clary’s has two locations now. We tried to have dinner at the location on Abercorn and were surprised to discover that they close at 4pm. If you plan to dine late, you need to visit their location at Habersham and 61st Street.

I read about Clary's in some on-line restaurant reviews of Savannah and I hadn't read anything bad about it. I was reading "The Book" while in Savannah and I had already come across the part where the author dines next to the eccentric Luther Driggers. Driggers is a bit of a mad scientist-type, who carries around a bottle of poison, that if poured in the town water supply would kill the populace of Savannah. Luther also fastens houseflies to strands of string and tapes the other end to his lapel, so that he may walk around with his flies on leashes as if they were dogs. The clientele of Clary's is always concerned with Driggers' mental well-being because they want to know whether it is safe to drink the water at night (i.e., if Driggers is upset, he might poison the water). We when entered Clary's, the soda counter was the first thing I noticed. It has a bar with a long mirror, malt machines and a soda fountain.

We opted for a table in a side annex to the original building. In this room are the two famous pieces of glass art in the restaurant: One is a colorful stained glass sign saying "Clary's" and the other is a stained glass depiction of "The Book" icon, "The Bird Girl".

We sat to a meal of malted waffles, biscuits and gravy, ham biscuits, and my favorite, green-colored grits. They were stained green for Saint Patrick's only for the weekend. The food was good; I enjoyed the waffles and the ham biscuit.

Better than the food is the selection of drinks that you can get from the soda counter. Itwill seem as if you have traveled back in time and are having a malted at Al's with Ralph Mouth, Potzie, the Fonz, and Richie Cunningham. I ordered a vanilla coke and Toni ordered a chocolate phosphate. They were both delicious.

The service was poor in terms of taking your order, busing the tables, and keeping everything spotless, but you generally get what you pay for. The wait staff, when they actually find their way to your table, are truly apologetic and very hospitable, even charming, so you don't really care that you may have been already been sitting there ready to eat the napkins from the dispenser in desperate hunger.

You can get all kinds of "The Book" souvenirs at the register where you pay on the way out. All the wait staff model the famous "Bird Girl" t-shirts, so you can get a good look if this is something that you are interested in buying.

This place is only open for breakfast and lunch - no dinner.