Beans & Barley Brews
852 East Illinois 116Going home was not in the plans for this past weekend.
My aunt has been sick for a while and she passed last Monday. She already had her services planned out so all my mom had to do was pick a date and time. The funeral home was available Friday evening so we packed up the kids up and headed to Illinois for a couple of days.
The wake and funeral were all Friday night. We got back to my parents place around 11:00 and we just decided to stay there instead of getting a hotel just to sleep. I told my mom the kids would probably want to go to breakfast when we got up on Saturday.
I, of course, was the last one up. By the time I made my way downstairs, everyone else was ready to go eat. I put my jeans on and we headed out the door.
The town I grew up in is very small. There is only one breakfast option in town (other than donuts at the gas station) so that’s where we went for breakfast.
Beans & Barley Brews is just outside of Ashkum on Illinois 116 right at the interchange with I-57. The building has been there forever. For most of my childhood, it was a restaurant called The Loft and it was owned by my aunt and uncle (which is why I never blogged about it). It’s a pretty classic highway pit stop restaurant. I know it was part of a chain when it was first built but that was way before my time. The building still has the old “Restaurant” sign on top that I’m assuming was original to the building.
I haven’t been in this restaurant since The Loft closed and my jaw dropped when we walked in the door. The bones are still there but this space under went a drastic reconstruction before becoming Beans and Barley Brews.
The changes start right as you walk in the door. The front area is not a patio area that was built during COVID. There are garage doors that open up on nice days. The floor out here is a concrete slab and there are heaters to keep things warm. The furniture is those metal chairs that are slightly uncomfortable but also pretty common in all seasons patio settings like this one.
We headed inside and headed to a table in the dining room. The space is actually split in to two areas. There’s a dining room off to the right where the dining room for the old style family diner used to be and there’s another room with a bar off to the left. We went to the bar seating area and grabbed a table for the six of us. The decor here can kind of be described as industrial chic. The floors are still concrete and the chairs are still those metal chairs but there’s kind of a homey feeling with wood paneling on the walls and ceiling. The space is lit with hanging bulbs and a little bit of natural light coming through the patio.
The menu at Beans & Barley Brews is something pretty unique for the area. It’s a lot of locally sourced, scratch made food. These highway off ramp diners always kind of had a reputation as being greasy spoon kind of diners and that is not what’s happening here.
My pick for breakfast was the 3 Egg Omelet. The omelet is a cheddar cheese omelet that you can choose one meat and any/all of the veggies. I chose sausage and no veggies. The omelet was huge and full of chunks of tasty breakfast sausage. Omelets aren’t usually a go-to for me at breakfast but whenever I do order one, I remember how much I truly enjoy them. This one was super light and fluffy and had chunks of sausage in every bite. The plate came with delicious pan fried home fries that were crispy in all the right spots and scratch made white toast. It’s weird to get so excited about toast but everyone at the table commented how great the toast was with their meals.
J ordered Mrs. B’s Banana Split. Like I’ve mentioned a few times. A lot of the food is scratch made including the yogurt used in this dish. The yogurt comes with a banana, homemade granola, and berries with a cherry on top. J loved this. It’s such a simple breakfast. It’s one you can get in a plastic container from a grocery store but this one was so much better. She said it was obvious how much of this is home made and how much better that makes it taste. There was a huge stack of strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries surrounding the yogurt.
Both of my parents ordered the B’s & G’s Special. This dish is a pretty classic biscuits and gravy. You can get this with either biscuits or breakfast potatoes. Both of them chose the biscuits. The key to this dish is the home made sausage gravy. The plate doesn’t look very big but there is a lot of big flavor packed in the dish.
The kids do what the kids always do. There was some combination of pancakes, bacon, and toast for each of them. I didn’t grab pictures but their breakfasts looked just as delicious as the rest of ours. B got the Sunrise Platter which came with two pancakes. He ate one. L just did the a la carte thing and ordered toast and bacon. We figured she might take one of B’s pancakes but she didn’t.
The cost for breakfast was a little over $63 before tip.
Beans & Barley Brews is the kind of scratch kitchen J and I like to seek out. It is really kind of surprising to me to see this kind of place in the small town I grew up. I’m a little bummed we didn’t go later in the day as they have a huge craft beer selection that I really wanted to dive in to. When I go home, I’m usually relegated to drinking Budweiser at best or Busch Lite at worst. Having a place with a massive craft beer list is unheard of in this town.
As I mentioned before, I grew up in this building when it was The Loft. We ate breakfast, lunch and dinner there. This place isn’t The Loft. It’s a totally different vibe with a totally different type of menu. The food is fantastic and the made from scratchness of most of the menu truly makes it worth a detour off the highway.
SW Michigan Dining 