Salt Lake City Restaurants Featured on the Food Network and TLC

Salt Lake City restaurants have been getting quite a bit of national attention lately with both Ruth’s Diner and Pat’s Barbecue featured on the Food Network’s popular TV show Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives and the owners of the Hatch Family Chocolate shop scoring their own reality TV show, The Little Chocolatiers on The Learning Channel.

Check out the clips from these shows and make some room during your visit to check out each of these unique places.

Hatch Family Chocolates

TLC premiered The Little Chcolatiers with an hour long special on December 21, 2009.  The show literally follows two little chocolatiers, Steve Hatch and his wife Katie Masterson’s, as they make chocolate in their shop located in Salt Lake City’s Historic Avenues District.  Both have forms of dwarfism, a genetic condition that affects their bones and joints and according to an interview with the Salt Lake Tribune, the couple was apprehensive about committing to the show but decided that the publicity would help their store as well as continue to educate people about dwarfism.

Visit Hatch Family Chocolates during your trip to Salt Lake City not only for the chance to view some now famous faces but to taste some of Utah’s best hand-dipped chocolates – the dark chocolate cinnamon bears are my favorite.

In this clip, The Hatch family chocolate shop whips up some interesting chocolates to pair with beer, including chocolate covered limes and onion rings and also features the brewmaster from Squatter’s brewery.

Ruth’s Diner

Ruth’s Diner was established in 1930 and is a Salt Lake City institution.  Good ole home cooking American style food dominates the menu and this old school diner features a cast of characters that have been regulars for decades.

Located up beautiful Emigration Canyon, Ruth’s is the go to place for breakfast in Salt Lake City.  All breakfasts are served with Ruth’s famous mile-high biscuits and after putting one of those away with Ruth’s homemade jam I can barely make a dent in my meal.

Pat’s BBQ

Pat’s is by far the best BBQ joint in Salt Lake City if not the entire American West.  I wish they could bottle up the amazing smell radiating from Pat’s, which you get a whiff of when you are still blocks away and sell it as a room freshener.

This unpretentious smokehouse serves up killer meats on paper plates to customers seated on picnic tables.  Well known and loved by locals, Pat’s has made it onto the map for some of the best BBQ in the US due to Guy Fieri’s rave review.

[Photo: The Author with an Order of Pat's Ribs, by Greg Maxwell]