It may be worth an anthropological study one day to see how the notion of selling onion rings by the inch on a wooden peg originated and spread, though my first encounter with the concept was at the famed Clementine’s in South Haven. Sold by either the foot or the half-foot (I opt for the latter), the onion rings make an impressive display when they arrive.
They are large, thick, and a light orangish brown, demonstrably battered by hand. The whole experience is oddly homey and reminiscent of a past age of hospitality, complete with what I would describe as an aggressive amount of plates, including one beneath the purpose-built wooden stand on which my half-foot of onion rings solidly rests.
Completing the presentation are two plastic cups of ranch, sharing the plate with a few crispy remnants of batter already starting to slough off of the proud tower of rings like the leaves starting to fall just outside.
The Stable Inn is just within the borders of Ottawa County, where a sizeable portion of Michigan’s onion rings are grown. Though I doubt these onions are from one of the many surrounding farms, the quality is nonetheless high. They are cut thickly and are just the right height, holding up well to frying and eating alike.
Strength can be a weakness in itself, and it is so here. The thickness of the onions, combined with the need to preserve a delicate batter from the rigors of cooking, makes them undercooked and somewhat lacking in flavor, though what’s present is excellent.
The batter is buttery and greasy, well salted and incredibly easy to eat in rapid succession. As the source of most of the flavor in the onion rings, they absolutely deliver. The ranch is a good accompaniment, rounding out the grease with a cooling, creamy sauce that doesn’t quite mesh with the firm onion.
I think it’s fascinating to look at onion rings that fit all of the necessary preconditions for greatness but don’t quite take it over the top, and those from the The Stable Inn check nearly every box. The onion rings are tall, thick, and coated in a fresh, flavorful batter, with a dipping sauce that neither overpowers nor underdelivers. It’s the particularities of execution that keep these onion rings hovering below perfection, mostly in texture.
The fine, flaky better sheds easily, evidenced by the flakes already on the plate before I started to eat. The onions are too hard and undercooked to really give, making the whole structure inflexible and rigid. Given the delicacy of the batter, this is inevitable. Either the onions are undercooked, or the batter burns to a charred mess.
For $5.99, these onion rings come at just under a dollar per inch, and they are worth every cent. Even with some inherent contradictions of interest between onion and batter and their potentially derivative origin, they are confident, simple, and just right for where they are.