A Day at the Varsity

Frank Gordy founded the Varsity, originally dubbed the Yellow Jacket, in 1928, serving students near Georgia Tech’s downtown Atlanta campus. “Frank’s uncle had a gas station on Luckie Street, and he rented out a lean-to up against it. It was big enough for a pot of chili and a cooler of Coke,” Weiser says. Within a year, Gordy bought the property on North Avenue and Spring Street where the Varsity sits now—and already had an eye on expanding to other cities. “I changed the name to the Varsity because I couldn’t very well open a Yellow Jacket restaurant in Athens,” he explains in What’ll Ya Have: A History of the Varsity.

What’ll ya have? Down by the drive-in entrance, sixteen-year Varsity vet Fred Stewart serves up the signature catchphrase. It’s credited to an even longer-tenured employee, the late Erby Walker, who joined in 1952 and stayed for fifty-five years. “He started that here at the original location,” says Terry Brookshire, operations director. “It was a great fit, because Mr. Gordy was very focused on speed of service, quality of food, and being the fun place to eat.”

Until the 1930s, all of the Varsity’s hand pies were made by a single baker and his wife in their home. To keep up with demand, Gordy invented this pie machine, inspired by the conveyor belts he saw working on his uncle’s peach orchard in Fort Valley, Georgia, and brought the production in-house.

When I arrived for my shift (above, far right), making pies was my first assignment. The Varsity’s machines can crank out 2,400 pies per hour, although that number is lower when a newbie, like me, is working one of the stations. Slipping dough through the machine to be flattened, placing the flat crust onto the molds, scooping the perfect amount of filling, or sealing up each pie to be stored until frying time—each step requires precise timing and focus to keep the line moving.

Jaida Danso has worked at the Varsity for thirty-seven years. According to her, everything has stayed the same—mostly. “We do have more politicians that come in here now,” she jokes. “But what do they want to eat? Hotdogs. Everybody loves hotdogs.” Danso is no different—her go-to lunch order is a chili dog and onion rings.

Here, onion rings are always made with fresh onions—never frozen—and Atlanta Magazine once touted “onion cutter at the Varsity” as one of the city’s toughest jobs. Now, the onions arrive pre-sliced, but they’re still battered and fried by hand.

Tossing them into the fryer from the rod is a delicate task—you don’t want the rings to “doughnut,” or stick together.

Chili dogs, fried pies (one apple, one peach), onion rings, and a frosted orange—all staples on the Varsity’s menu.

On record days, the Varsity sells up to two miles of chili dogs, so streamlining is key. The company manufactures its own custom tools in the basement of the Atlanta location to help assemble orders quickly and consistently. This chili spoon spreads the good stuff evenly over a hotdog in one scoop. The tool has been in use as long as employees can remember—some think it may have been invented by Gordy himself.

Ashley Weiser peeks into a vat of Varsity Orange, the restaurant’s house-made orange soda.

When it comes to the menu, there’s a whole other language to learn. Order a “steak,” and you’ll get a hamburger with ketchup, mustard, and a pickle. A “P.C.” is a “plain chocolate” milk, always served with ice. (Don’t knock it ’til you try it.) Order a “bag of rags” to get potato chips, or ask to “ring one” for a side of onion rings. Here, from left, are a “slaw dog,” a hotdog covered with cole slaw, and a “naked dog,” a plain hotdog with nothing on it.

“Everything is the same,” says Rebecca Dablah, a thirty-nine-year Varsity veteran, who worked alongside each of her three children at the restaurant before they went to college. “The food is the same, the chili is the same, and the customers are friendly.”

The frosted orange—known as an ”F.O.”—began as a Varsity Orange and vanilla ice cream float. Now, it’s evolved to a signature Varsity treat that tastes like a Dreamsicle milkshake. Believe me, serving it up with a perfect swirl isn’t as easy as it looks.

Although rumors abound about a “secret menu,” the Varsity doesn’t have one—most people just don’t realize they can add pimento cheese, rather than American, to just about anything. That means you can order a pimento chili cheese burger, like this one.

After “thirty-eight good old years,” Mary Seda says, “you learn how to deal with people.” Her secret is simple. “When you are happy, you transfer that to your customers.”