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Mike "Benny" Miller, owner of Benny's Bar and Grill in Snellville, hesitates to call his 4-month-old restaurant Cajun. When you're battling chains in Gwinnett County, you have to be careful about being pigeonholed and passed over on the drive to Joe's Crab Shack. Instead, Miller makes shrewd compromises by balancing his mostly Cajun menu with smatterings of Southwest and family-pleasing favorites that aim for all palates.

But with a shrimp po' boy this good, he wouldn't be out of bounds staking his restaurant's name to this one remarkable sandwich. There are other strengths, too. Miller has amended beloved recipes from his family file or edited favorites from his 12-year restaurant management career.

GAVIN AVERILL/special (ENLARGE)
Kim Hammett serves a beer, possibly the perfect complement to a Benny's Bar and Grill appetizer of tater tots or crab cake fritters.
GAVIN AVERILL/special (ENLARGE)
Kids' meals come with a top-shelf fruit salad of strawberries, pineapple, mandarin oranges and bananas. Children eat free Tuesday evenings.
GAVIN AVERILL/special (ENLARGE)
The Key lime pie sticks are covered in chocolate ganache and served at a soft freeze with a dollop of vanilla whipped cream.
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Po' boy pleasures

A good po' boy is nothing fancy. It relies on the quality and ratio of its ingredients and only suffers under tweaked batters or fussy sauces. With a dearth of accessible, streetwise Cajun food in the metro area, the po' boy here is worth a drive to Gwinnett no matter where you live. Shrimp dipped in egg wash, dredged in flour seasoned only with salt and pepper, and deep fried are tucked into a Leidenheimer's French roll smeared with Tabasco mayonnaise and topped with shredded lettuce and chopped red onions and tomatoes. Oyster po' boys are also available.

The Leidenheimer roll — the only type of bread to be found in the restaurant — is flaky, slightly soft French bread sent from the famous bakery in New Orleans that's been supplying muffuletta bread and po' boy loaves for more than a century. It's just as important to the sandwich as is the simple, spicy mayonnaise and no-nonsense batter.

Other sandwiches sport nice details, too. The Southwest beef sandwich is a hamburger jazzed up with fried jalapenos and chipotle mayonnaise, a popular condiment base here. The steak sandwich and wrap come with the chunky house mayo, a family recipe made with garlic, onion, jalapeno and cayenne pepper. And the horseradish sauce on the spinach wrap and tuna melt adds a kick that prevents pedestrian sandwiches.

Before and after

Appetizers are generous and indulgent, like a mound of tater tots covered in chili, cheese sauce, onions, tomatoes, salsa and cheddar or the crab cake fritters dipped in a spicy red pepper remoulade. The nachos are filling and comforting, offset nicely by one of the bar's signature martini flavors, like sour raspberry or Key lime. Eye-catching desserts include the mammoth brownie banana split, a warm brownie at the bottom of a large goblet topped with vanilla ice cream, homemade whipped cream, bananas, strawberries, pineapples, caramel, chocolate sauce, pecans and a cherry.

Key lime pie sticks — homemade graham-cracker-crusted pie dipped in chocolate ganache and frozen with a side of vanilla whipped cream — are a successful recipe renovation that isn't overly frilled. Bread pudding with rum sauce was recently added to the menu and is Miller's great grandmother's recipe.

The little people

With warm jewel-toned paintings accenting red walls, and white linen napkins folded neatly at each table, Benny's is aiming for class. But walk in with a brood of noisy children, and no one will cringe. So comfortable are they, in fact, about hosting children, that the kids' menu/placemat coloring pad comes with magic markers instead of the safer and more common crayons. Children's menu items are not mere add-ons or reheated fish sticks. Selections, such as the juicy hamburger served on Leidenheimer bread, are all accompanied by un-spiced tater tots and a top-shelf fresh fruit salad of strawberries, pineapple, mandarin oranges and bananas. Children eat for free on Tuesdays beginning at 4 p.m.

Pleasing families is important in Benny's ZIP code. But as Miller tries to get his legs among Gwinnett's sea of chain restaurants, here's hoping he won't sacrifice his fine Cajun recipes.

• Hours: 11 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Sundays to Thursdays; 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays
• Reservations: Yes, but not necessary
• Recommended dishes: Shrimp po' boy, crab cake fritters, Key lime pie sticks
• Entree prices: $7-$14.
• Verdict: It may not change your life (unless you order a po' boy), but what's no to like? The service is laid-back and accommodating, the bar is well-stocked, desserts are enormous, and kids are so welcome that hosts hand out permanent markers instead of crayons.