Freddy’s Frozen Custard & Steakburgers (Kalamazoo)
4615 W. Main StreetFriday was another one of those long days with a short night.
I got up around 4:30 AM to head in to work to help out a couple of co-workers. The good news with that is that my shift ended at 12:30 PM instead of the usual 6:30 PM.
I took my “lunch break” pretty early and got breakfast at Parkview Perk in Richland. I got kind of busy when I got home so I didn’t really eat much for lunch. I wanted to get some chores done around the house otherwise, I would have laid down and went back to sleep. I knew I’d be up all night if I did that so I tried to avoid the nap.
I had almost no energy by the time dinner rolled around. Friday is usually pizza night but no one was in a pizza mood. J has been wanting to try the new Freddy’s Frozen Custard and Steakburgers for a couple of weeks now. I said I was up for that.
Freddy’s Frozen Custard & Steakburgers is a national chain of about 600 locations headquartered in Wichita, KS. The Kalamazoo location is on West Main Street near the very busy corner with Drake Road. The location is familiar as it was a longtime home for Fazoli’s but that closed not quit a year ago. It didn’t take long for a sign to pop saying Freddy’s was moving in. It took a little bit longer to actually happen because they did a very extensive remodel so the building almost isn’t recognizable if you had saw it a few years ago. Last month, the same family that owns the Elkhart, IN Freddy’s franchise cut the ribbon on this first location in Southwest Michigan.
The bones of the building are still the old Fazoli’s but that’s about it. There is no hint that this building used to be something else. The order counter is right inside the door and unfortunately, they don’t have order kiosks. You actually have to talk to a human. We were pretty unfamiliar with the menu so it took us a few minutes to try to find what we wanted. J has never been to a Freddy’s and my experience is limited to one visit to the Plainfield Township store 10 years ago and grabbing burgers at the Enterprise Center in St. Louis during a break in the action of the US Figure Skating Championships.
It took a little while but we eventually settled on what we wanted. For the time being, we only ordered food. We figured we’d go back and order custard on our way out.
We all grabbed our drink cups then we headed to the dining room. The big difference between what this space was and what it is now is the openness. Fazoli’s used to have walls up separating space in the dining room. Now, it’s just one big, bright room with a 50’s diner throwback theme. It kind of gives off Steak ‘n Shake vibes with the red leather chairs and booths. The theme is very tight with only red, white, and black anywhere in the room. We sat down at a table and waited for our number to be called over a loudspeaker like it is at a Portillo’s.
It took maybe five minutes for the number to be called out. When I got our tray of food to the table, we all began unwrapping excited to see what the burgers tasted like.
My pick was the Jalapenos Pepper jack Double Combo. This burger is two steakburger patties topped with pepper jack cheese, grilled jalapenos, and spicy Jalapeno fry sauce. The two burger patties are just covered in the cheese that melted almost completely around them. There was quite a bit of spice to this burger but it wasn’t an overwhelming spiciness. I appreciated the subtleness of it where I got a little bit of spice in each bite but I wasn’t reaching for my drink. The steakburgers themselves actually got a little bit lost in the sandwich. Because they’re thin, the patties are cooked really well done leaving them without much flavor. There is some seasoning came through but for the most part, these are the type of patties that really benefit from the sandwich toppings as they kind of fade in to the background.
I picked the fries as my side and these are very thin shoestring fries very reminiscent to Steak ‘n Shake’s fries. J and L really loved these. I’m not as big of a fan as the shoestring fries as they are but they were still tasty and none of them went to waste in my tray. J was bummed she didn’t order the fries and even more bummed once I pointed out Freddy’s has fry sauce to dip them in. I did not dip them anything as they were tasty enough on their own with just a bit of salt and pepper seasoning.
J had a little bit harder of a time finding the burger she wanted. She just wanted something simple. One patty with lettuce, bacon, cheese and pickles. That wasn’t really an option as everything on the menu was a double. She asked if she could just do a create your own type option. The cashier was able to do that even though it’s not really a menu option. J likes fast food burgers but doesn’t like doubles. She does the same thing at Five Guys and specifically orders just a single. She got exactly the burger she wanted with a couple of slices of really crispy bacon and some long, crunch pickles.
She chose the cheese curds has her side. I think we both probably would have been happier had we switched sides. I liked these way more than the fries and she liked the fries way more than the cheese curds. The curds are batter fried so they taste more like actual Wisconsin cheese curds than Culvers. These will definitely be on my order next time we go to Freddy’s.
L just wanted a grilled cheese. When we asked about it, the cashier said there was one on the kids menu. She decided to just do that. It’s a simple grilled cheese on white bread with American cheese in between. L picked fries as her side and these are the kind of fries she really likes. She asks occassionaly just to go to Steak ‘n Shake to just get the fries so this is another great option for us when she wants that.
The kid’s meals all come with a scoop of ice cream. L asked if she could upgrade her plain scoop to a dirt cup. She was planning on ordering that anyway and we didn’t need two things of ice cream for her. The dirt cup is vanilla custard topped with gummy worms, crushed cookies, and whipped cream. The boy would have eaten this first and not eaten his dinner but L has a little more self control and waited until she at least ate her sandwich. When we went back to order custard after our meal, J also ordered a Dirt Cup for herself.
B didn’t come with us. He said he wasn’t feeling good and didn’t want to go sit in a restaurant. We brought him home a kid’s cheeseburger. He did not get his custard upgraded. We just got him the scoop of vanilla. He ate most of the sandwich and a few of the fries but like I figured, he really only wanted the custard.
I couldn’t leave without getting some kind of custard myself. I didn’t really know what they had and I was having a hard time pulling up my phone. There was an advertisement for the Reese’s Royale. I like Reese’s so I just told J to get me that. I guess there is a choice between a shake and a sundae. She got the shake which is vanilla custard, Reese’s Peanut Butter sauce and Reese’s Peanut Butter cups topped with whipped cream and a cherry. In my mind, I was thinking this was more of a concrete mixer thing and I ate it like that. It was a little too thin to do it that way. I guess that’s why they also included the large straw. My brain just wasn’t working that way when I saw it.
Freddy’s Frozen Custard & Steakburgers is another good option to have in town. The menu is pretty similar to a couple of places we already have but options are good. This won’t be a place we go to often but it will be more of a place we’ll go to for something different from time to time.
SW Michigan Dining 