Berries Famous Pancake House (Downtown)
234 W. Michigan AvenueTheo & Stacy’s was always my go-to downtown for lunch when I was in the mood for a great diner burger.
Sadly, Theo & Stacy’s closed at the beginning of the year. The building didn’t sit empty though. There was a plan to take over right away.
Berries Famous Pancake House was up and running in the same spot about six months after Theo & Stacy’s closed. They do a lot of the same things Theo & Stacy’s did and even kept a lot of the Greek favorites. It took me a while but I finally got back over there last week.
Berries Famous Pancake House is on Michigan Avenue just to the west of Rose Street in downtown Kalamazoo. This is their second location as they also took over another Theo & Stacy’s location on South Westnedge in summer of 2022. The downtown location, as mentioned above, has been a diner in downtown for several decades. Berries just took over the spot and added their own twist.
One of the big reason I always used to order from Theo & Stacy’s was the online ordering. When I ordered from Berries, I called my order in. There was no online ordering option that I could find but as I write this blog about a week and a half later, I easily found an online ordering option via GrubHub. That will greatly increase the frequency from which I order from Berries in the future.
There’s not a lot of different with the way the restaurant is laid out. They pack in tables down the middle with booths on either side of the restaurant. The only thing that has really changed is the pictures on the wall that are no longer the Skartsiaris family. There are some other cosmetic changes. Booths have been recovered. There is new paint on the wall. Stuff like that, but if you remember Theo & Stacy’s, Berries will look very familiar.
I walked in to the restaurant about 15 minutes after ordering. The hostess still takes carry of to-go orders right up front where the cash register is. She went back to the kitchen to check on the order and came back with a bag. Since it was a call-in order, I still had to pay before grabbing the bag and heading back to the office to eat.
Last time I ate at Berries, it was at the Westnedge location and we went for breakfast. I was really excited to try out lunch this time.
I ordered the Sunrise Burger. This sandwich is a 1/2 lb burger topped with bacon, cheddar cheese, and over easy egg, and a garlic maple aioli. The burger is everything I like from a diner burger. It’s not super fancy. It’s cooked longer than I would cook it at home but somehow still delicious. The over-easy made things a little bit of a mess but that’s a big part of the reason I order burgers like this. I love how the egg yolk kind of runs in to everything. It mixes with the aioli that has a little bit of maple in it as well as the grease from the bacon. Such a solid sandwich.
The fries were pretty simple restaurant fries. There were some packets of mustard included with the fries but luckily I had a bottle of mustard in the fridge at work. These needed just a little something extra. They were perfectly good fries…..they just needed a little something more.
The cost for my meal was a little over $13 before tip.
Berries Famous Pancake House is such a great replacement to Theo & Stacy’s downtown. We liked the breakfast at the Westnedge location and the lunch from this location was well worth the price as well. They’ve hired a lot of the staff so you’ll see a lot of the same people if you were a regular. I love that there’s online ordering now so I expect to eat there a lot more regularly.
SW Michigan Dining 