Crown Candy Kitchen — Restaurant in St. Louis

This review is based solely on my experience and my personal opinion.

this was my first time at the "Candy Crown" (8/24/21).

WARNING/BE AWARE OF: as soon as you get in there is a sign that says "This Ain't No health food store.... home of the heart stopping BLT". All of the staff T-shirts have the same message on 'em, so you know what you are getting and you know that here you cannot get any healthy food. I like it when they are upfront and honest. SO, IF you are a healthy food only kind of person, IF you are Vegetarian and Vegan, or IF you like open spaces, with plenty of space between you and the other customers I recommend you move on to another place as this is definitely NOT the place for you. ONE last thing, if you decide to walk in, MAKE SURE that health wise you are fit to eat their sandwiches and drink their Malts, as they have ALOT of calories, fats and sugars!

FOOD: We ordered a BLT Sandwich, cheese sandwich, Roast beef Sandwich, Grilled ham & cheese sandwich, two Hot fudge Malts, one fresh banana Malt and one Vanilla Malt. Overall the ingredients quality is good and the flavors are all there, so you wont get any artificial or unexpected flavor. Simple sandwiches, few ingredients, good flavor. I just wish they had more bread options. you can only get white bread or sourdough bread. Everything tastes just like a homemade sandwich your mother or grandmother would make. BLT sandwich= flavor is exactly what you would expect from a Bacon based sandwich, nicely seasoned, Bacon is crunchy and warm, cooked right, Lettuce and tomatoes sort of compensate the natural greasiness of the Bacon, of which this sandwich is fully loaded. What you expect is what you get. It takes some time to go thru the entire sandwich as you Lettuce and tomatoes enhance the flavor of the other ingredients. CHEESE Sandwich= a classic American sandwich, the cheese flavor is there and if you ask for some lettuce and tomatoes in it, it is gonna taste even better. Lettuce and tomatoes enhance the flavor of the other ingredients. they use a blend of cheese that I found delicious. GRILLED HAM & CHEESE sandwich= one more American classic... you can definitely taste the grilled ham, nice and tender with it's distinctive smoky taste. The flavor is balanced and all there. no surprises. The cheese in the sandwich creates that flavor contrast that your mind is waiting for. ROAST BEEF CHEDDAR MELT sandwich= it has the flavor of a good Pastrami sandwich that has been smothered with molten cheddar cheese, if that makes sense to you. very good indeed. They serve 24-ounce Malts. I liked all the Malts flavor except for mine that had a strong artificial Banana flavor. Here you can buy handmade Candies and Ice-cream and they have a pretty big candy shelf/counter. I did not try them, so I cant judge.

STAFF: All the stuff is very friendly and nice and again, they are very honest and straight forward when it comes to let you know "this is not a health food store", so you can decide whether to stay or go.

CLEALINESS: overall clean and neat.

PLACE: It is a very small store, Vintage looking, with many photos of the old St. louis, many memorabilia kind of Décor and many other frames and "objects" that are straight from the 50's and 60's. All the Boots are very small, 4 people max, shoulder to shoulder kind of small. The place can host 50 people at a time as they have 50 seats only. between two rows of boots is a 2 feet wide isle. so, yes, very small. it is a bit crowded with furniture and Décor, and also because in the same store they make and sell Candies and Ice cream. my pictures will give you a better idea. I loved the Vintage Vibe the place gives. My photos will give you a better idea.

LOCATION: Unsafe at night.

RESTROOMS: very small and old, but clean.

PRICE: I think they have fair prices and I think their prices are proportional to the Quality and Quantity of the food you get.

CONCLUSIONS: While it is true that their store has quite a few cons, it is also true that all the cons are visible. so, the cons cannot be used as a criticism. I...

May 23, 2025

16:00 hrs

Dear Andy,

I wanted to take a moment of your time to describe my experience at your place of business, Crown Candy.

On May 23, 2025 around 4pm, I placed an order to go for pickup. The order consisted of an egg salad sandwich, strawberry banana shake, an order of chili mac and a chocolate banana malt.

Upon my arrival at Crown Candy I was met by an unknown female employee from behind the counter. She greeted me and asked where me and my friend J.D would like to sit. I advised her I had placed an order for pickup a little while ago, however since there were many open seats and I had the time I asked her if it would it be ok to eat in instead of to go. She said of course no problem let me just see if your order has been boxed to go already, please have a seat wherever you want. We sat at an open seat, and then a few moments later heard a loud voice from behind the cash register yell out across the restaurant, “ hey you gotta pay, you gotta pay first” This he quickly repeated again as he looked at me. This person was later I.D as employee Joe X. I found this to be rude and embarrassing as if I wasn’t going to pay. Note I was in a police uniform and so was my associate, both whom have patronized this establishment many times before. I quickly went to Joe X and paid for the food. Joe X grabbed my boxed food and put it on or table and walked off. He never offered a plate, bowl, utensils or anything else as he walked away. Looking at the food I thought how are we supposed to eat this. I got the attention of a passing waitress and simply asked for a bowl, plate and some silverware. I saw the owner Andy working behind the counter he sees me makes eye contact and motioned to Joe X to our table. Joe X comes over grabs the chilli mac box with the chily dripping out of yhe bottom of it, and says loudly “ don’t ever do this again, don’t do it, don’t just sit down we have customers here! Speaking of customers the people next to us looked as shocked as I must have looked by the volume, tone body language from this scolding. Joe X returned with the chili mac in a bowl and said I spiced it up a bit for you. Odd to say the least to say to a customer, dont you think? JD took one bite and said, wow I can’t eat this. I found the experience very poor and the service especially this employee very rude and unprofessional. Knowing you for may years I wanted to reach out to you, Andy first, as a professional courteousey rather than immediately posting one star on social media. I know you value your customers and take pride in your family business. I would hope you would speak to this employee and remind him that each customer deserves respect. I will await your response. Sincerely, J. C.

Follow-up Well I did get a phone response, not from Andy the owner however instead regrettably from the cashier Joe X who told me Andy had forward the message to him. In a nut shell it was all our fault. He admitted that Andy saw there was a problem and instead of addressing it motioned him to go to our table. Joe X said if we would have picked a seat near the register and counter he would of brought us some silverware and waited on us. He said the yelling across the restaurant was just a culture thing. Also he thought we said we were ok with eating out of the cardboard box. In the end there was no apologies just excuses. I replied to Joe X with a suggestion that he had an opportunity to up sell, perhaps by bringing our food on transfer dishes, with utensils and ask if we wanted anything else before he closed out our bill. It was very lame that the owner did not personally reach out, after all it is his business and the buck stops there and so does mine as we will not return. Guess we will just add this to the bucket list. (trash) Times are tough money is tight, and there are plenty of other family owned businesses to patronize.

This once bright star establishment gets a generous 1 fallen...

Crown Candy "St. Louis' oldest soda fountain" is one of a kind in the heart of St.Louis, established in 1913. This place has an old school vibe located at the corner of 14th street and St. Louis Avenue, downtown. If it's your first time to this part of St. Louis, you might find the area to be a little sketchy. Don't let that deter you from checking this place out. You should be fine as long as your visit is during the day time. There is ample street parking near the restaurant.

The staff are friendly and helpful. The booth were we sat in was deemed "cleaned" but we both had to wipe off our seats before sitting down to remove left over food remnants from the previous guests. The floors were very dirty and the customer seating areas just looked like it could use a good deep cleaning.

The bar area where they make all of the drinks, malts, ice cream, etc. was very clean. Its an open area and we had a good view of the owner making our dessert, which was very cool to see. While the decor was very nostalgic, it could definitely use some sprucing up. The penny juke box on our table was not functional and needed to be repaired and cleaned.

Food The Heart Stopping BLT was recommended so I gave it a try. It came with two slices of regular bread, nothing fancy. The inside was massive, loaded with tons of BACON. The portion was so huge that I split it with my wife and yet we had left overs. There was not a whole lot of flavor for the sandwich. It could have used more tomatoes, and maybe some spicy mayonnaise instead of the miracle whip which would have given it more flavor. The sandwich comes with chips, that are not homemade (Ruffles potato chips). It also came with a pickle spear. While the sandwich was very large it lacked in overall flavor.

Desserts The desserts on the other hand is a whole another level. The Fire house special had the perfect mixture of nuts, real ice cream, chocolate sauce, and fruit. loved it

The 24oz. Oreo milkshake was very creamy for my taste.

The malt challenge is still on the menu if you want to give it a shot!

Overall desserts were definitely the best part of our meal. They also have a variety of delicious candy and chocolates.

We saw many locals come and order dessert to go and leave. In the future I would take a cue from them. If you are famished and have a sweet tooth definitely hit this joint.

Location - 3/5 Cleanliness- 2/5 BLT - 3/5 Parking - 5/5 Staff attitude - 4/5 Fire chief special - 5/5 Oreo milkshake-...