Welcome to our photo series Eater Scenes, where Eater photographers visit some of the city's great restaurants and bars to capture them at a certain, and very specific, point in the day. Today, in honor of Classics Week, Eater photographer Bradley Schweit pays a visit to Albie's Beef Inn at 9 p.m. on a Friday.
Peer inside the iconic Albie's Beef Inn during a bustling Friday night and glimpse a place mainly unchanged by time; current proprietor Ted Samouris is only the second owner since the restaurant and piano bar first opened in 1962, along with the adjacent Adam's Steak 'N Eggs, on a Mission Valley lot that also houses a Travelodge.
Most infamous here are the painting of nude ladies (reportedly of stewardesses-turned-models) that hang throughout the bar, where mature folks and hipsters alike gather to croon a song, shuffle across the dance floor or eat from a throwback menu that includes Steak Diane, shrimp scampi and their signature prime rib.
In an Eater Interview, longtime bartender Fred Graslie called Albie's "the last dinosaur bar of its kind"; let's just hope that this beloved dinosaur doesn't go extinct.
