The 350 Cafe and Convenience Store

Highway 350 runs between Big Spring and Snyder. About midway between the two cities is a small place called Vincent, founded in 1892 and named for an early settler, Vincent Vinson.

Steve Wolf, whose family has ranched in the region for generations, built a fine café and convenience store a few years ago. It’s easy to spot as you drive along. A big sign reads HIGHWAY 350 CAFÉ. Steve says it’s 25 miles to Big Spring, 25 miles to Snyder. “We sit right in the middle. I still live on the old home place. I grew up about five miles northeast of the café.”

When I visited the place the cooks were passing out samples of fresh peanut butter cookies. A customer had just been delivered his special sandwich. “It’s just scrambled eggs,” he said. “I get one every Tuesday and Thursday.” He said he drinks about 26 glasses of iced tea every day and is never thirsty.

I was there mid-morning so I missed the early morning round table discussion which draws a number of locals and a few curiosity seekers, truck drivers, oil field hands and cowboys. “This is the table of knowledge,” says Steve. “We gather here at 7 o’clock every morning and solve all the world’s problems. If you sit down here, you can expect to get smarter. We once had a rule that if you didn’t know what you were talking about you didn’t need to bring it up. We had to change the rule or we wouldn’t have anything to talk about.”

Steve built the facility because he felt the community needed a place like this. “My grandparents were the first ones that opened a store here, so it’s kind of history repeating itself.” It’s a busy place. Around mealtimes there are pickups and different kinds of rigs and vehicles parked nearly all the way around the building. Steve says business is better than it has ever been. “The oil field is good to us out here. You would not believe how many people live in the Snyder and Ira area that travel all the way to Midland to work.”

Customers appreciate the quality of the food served at the café. “When we set this up we wanted to try to make everything ourselves. We cut our steaks and tenderize them in the back; nothing is pre-breaded until we get ready to cook it. One of our favorite menu items is chicken fried steak.

Sometimes on Wednesdays we have Mexican chicken fried steak. Chicken strips are good and all our desserts are homemade.”

I could not resist. I had to have a piece of the millionaire pie. Delicious.

Steve opened his café and store five years ago.

“There’s a lot of stuff that goes on here that I had to learn about. But one thing for sure, I’ve met a lot of good people and they become family, so we now have a larger family.”