Andrea’s Cafe and Pizza Too
10 W. Michigan AvenueDid you know Kalamazoo County has a splash pad at River Oaks Park? It’s not the biggest splash pad by any means, but it’s a nice place to spend a couple of hours on a hot day.
We took L out there a couple of times last summer and she loved it. This past Friday, we were talking about going to the beach, but decided to wait until Saturday because my parents wanted to meet in St. Joseph. As a back up, we told L we’d take her to the splash. She thought we meant Great Wolf Lodge and was starting to pack her bags for an overnight stay.
Fortunately, she was not disappointed when we got to the park and happily played with all of the other kids that were cooling off on one of the first hot days of the summer.
After about an hour, J asked me about dinner. She was thinking pizza from Cottage Inn, but I just wasn’t feeling that. I was kinda thinking burger.
I tried to look up a menu for Andrea’s Cafe in downtown Galesburg, but the EMA Enterprises website doesn’t translate well to mobile. I eventually found one not on the EMA website and took my chances that it was up to date.
J didn’t have her heart set on pizza so she was on board with ordering from Andrea’s. I handed her my phone so she could pick something out for L and herself. Once we corralled L, I called in the order. We were only a few minutes from downtown Galesburg, so we took our time getting there.
Andrea’s Cafe and Pizza too is on West Michigan Avenue in Downtown Galesburg. The building has been around for a while. I can’t find anything online, but I believe it may have been a hotel or a saloon in a previous life. The parking lot is actually in the back of the building. While there is a door on the street side and some street parking not far from the entrance, the restaurant is set up to enter from that back parking lot.
I walked in to the dining room and just after 5:00 on Friday night. The dinner rush hadn’t quite started yet, but there were quite a few people already enjoying dinner in the spacious dining room. I stopped at the cash register next to the hallway that leads to the back door and told the lady who approached me I had a carry-out order. She grabbed it off the window in to the kitchen and rang up the check.
I grabbed the bag and headed back to the car. It’s about a twenty minute ride home and we were all really hungry. It didn’t take long for us to get the boxes open once we got everything to the kitchen table.
J ordered two meals and let L decided which she wanted when we got home. L picked the Grilled Cheese sandwich, so L took the Chicken Strip Basket for herself.
The Grilled Cheese is a simple, classic grilled cheese served on Texas Toast. The metly, gooey American cheese comes between two perfectly toasted slices of thick bread. L grabbed half of the sandwich as soon as I got the box open and had it gone…except for the crusts, very quickly. The sandwich also came with choice of sides. We got her (and all of us actually) french fries and apple sauce. L only ate a couple of the fries but loved the apple sauce. She finished off all of hers and some of J’s as well. The fries were golden brown skin-on fries, but they were a little soggy from the drive home. I still ate all of mine and some of L’s. Things like that don’t always bother me.
With L taking the Grilled Cheese, J took the Chicken Strip Basket. These were a little underwhelming only because they were just right out of the bag chicken strips. There were three big strips in the box alongside the same skin-on fries and a small cup of apple sauce. J ate about half and shared a strip with L and I.
My eyes sort of lit up when I was scrolling through the menu and came to a section titled “Signature Burgers.” I had never seen these at an EMA restaurant. They have a Grilled Cheese Burger (meat between two Grilled Cheese sandwiches), Texas Burger (topped with pulled pork), and the Clubhouse Burger (triple decker) just to name a few. All of those are burgers I would have ordered, but the one I couldn’t pass up they call The Mac Attack.
The Mac Attack isn’t too hard to figure out. It’s a 1/2 lb burger topped with Mac ‘n Cheese then smothered in cheddar cheese and topped with bacon. I’ve tried burgers like this a few times and they’re almost always delicious. How can that much cheese be anything but delicious? If they would improve the bun and maybe make it a pretzel roll or something a little heartier, this sandwich would be close to perfect. The bread really weighs this one down because the simple white bread doesn’t hold up very well to the messiness created by the juicy burger and creamy cascade of cheese.
Our bill for dinner at Andrea’s came out to exactly $22 before tip. We have always had really good luck at the EMA restaurants for breakfast, but lunch and dinner have always been pretty average. J and L’s meals were still pretty average…good, but average, but the addition of the Signature Burgers to the menu really changes the outlook of what the EMA restaurants can do.
Grilled Cheese w/French Fries
Chicken Strip Basket w/French Fries
The Mac Attack w/French Fries
SW Michigan Dining 