Prospectors BBQ & Bakery
41 W. Michigan AvenueFriday was kind of a relaxed day. I had a couple of assignments early in the morning then I spent a good chunk of the day doing some clean up work around the office.
In the middle of the afternoon, I had to run out to the Galesburg area to check up on something. I knew it wasn’t going to take me long and I was hungry.
I had been seeing some Facebook posts for a new restaurant in town with online ordering, so I put in an order before I left the building then headed towards Galesburg.
Prospectors BBQ & Bakery is a new shop right on the corner of Michigan Avenue and West Battle Creek Street in downtown Galesburg…well sort of in that location. The address is Michigan Avenue and it’s the old gas station right on the corner of that weird intersection. At one time, the building was an antique shop and before that, I hear it was a pizza shop but that was before I moved to Southwest Michigan.
If you go to that building, you’re going to be confused. There’s no way in to it. The parking area has been torn out and covered with landscaping. You need to follow the signs back down Battle Creek Street to the parking lot.
The restaurant is actually in the brown building behind the old gas station. They’re connected to each other which is why it has the Michigan Avenue address. There’s no access to the parking lot from Michigan Avenue though so you’ll need to go to the Battle Creek Street side to find your way in.
The restaurant is pretty small and has a pretty limited menu right now. They encourage online orders on their website and their Facebook page so that’s what I did. There is an order area when you walk in but it’s not a dine in restaurant at all. There are just a couple of chair to lounge in while you’re waiting for your order if you walk-in to place it.
The rest of the retail space is taken up by a bakery case.
These you can easily walk in and grab something but you can also put a sweet treat in to your online order and have it packed up waiting for you.
The restaurant is just kinda getting going and there isn’t a very big menu at the moment. Despite BBQ being in it’s name, the only barbecue option is a pulled pork sandwich.
I actually didn’t order the pulled pork. I actually ordered the Chicken Parmesan Sandwich instead. The thick, juicy fried chicken breast was topped with mozzarella cheese and marinara sauce. For some reason, there were also fried onions which I don’t remember seeing on the menu (it’s not on the menu this week so I can’t confirm). The reason I didn’t order the pulled pork is because of the fried onions and I didn’t see a way to add a note in the online ordering to take them off. I was able to get the majority off the sandwich without losing too much of the stuff I actually wanted though. The sandwich was a lot more filling that I figured it would be. The chicken was really thick yet still juicy and tender.
The sandwich doesn’t come with any sort of side so I added on a side order of Mac & Cheese. The side order on it’s own was a pretty decent size so paired with the sandwich, I didn’t have any complaints about walking away hungry. The macaroni noodles were packed in to the to-go container with a thick, creamy white cheddar sauce. They offer this as a BBQ bowl with pulled pork and the (ugh) fried onions on top and my guess this is delicious with their house made BBQ sauce and pulled pork.
I couldn’t pass up the bakery while I was there so I added a Brownie with Chocolate Chips to my order. The brownie is thick, moist, and covered with powdered sugar. The chocolate chips kind of add a surprise in the middle. My brain was telling me this was a lava cake but it’s not. It’s just a really good, chocolatey brownie.
Prospectors BBQ & Bakery has some potential. They are still tweaking the menu and only open a couple of days a week right now while they work on hiring more staff. I’m interested to see how things evolve here once they get a little more settled in. They have a really good soft launch going….except for the fried onions…and they put those fried onions on everything which…they really could not do, but hey, if you like that kind of thing, I guess you’ll really like the sandwiches here.
SW Michigan Dining 