Big Mama’s & Papa’s Pizzeria (Downtown LA)
657 S. Flower StreetThere are probably a lot of high end pizza restaurants in Los Angeles. Heck, I think we even passed a few in our daily travels, but sometimes, the carry-out counter service pizza is just what sounds good and after three days in L.A., that’s exactly what sounded good to us.
Our workday got over a little after 8:00 local time. We started to head back to the hotel when my co-worker said he just wanted pizza for dinner. I pulled out my phone and started looking for a quick carry-out kind of place. It wasn’t too hard to find something in downtown L.A., but if we were going to do a chain, I wanted to at least do a regional chain.
We picked Big Mama’s & Papa’s Pizzeria on South Flower Street near Willshire Boulevard in the heart of downtown. The restaurant is on a busy street and parking was an issue. I didn’t want to pay $15 at one of the nearby lots just to pick up a pizza so I drove around the block several times until I found an open meter only to find that meter reverted to a 5-minute loading zone from 6 PM until Midnight. I decided to chance it because it was raining and we were only going to be about ten minutes. My gamble paid off.
Tacos Mexico (Broadway Theater District)
913 S. BroadwayTwo things I love. Tacos. And 24-hour restaurants. I’m a night owl. I like being able to grab something to eat at 11:00 at night that isn’t McDonalds.
When we checked in to our hotel in downtown Los Angeles, one of the first things I noticed was a small taco joint just on the other side of the valet. As we were walking to dinner one night, I noticed the 24-hour sign.
Tacos Mexico is a regional chain of tacos stands that got it’s start in the 1970’s as a food truck. The first brick and mortar store came along in 1980 and that just happened to be the location that was next to my hotel. It’s sort of located in a parking lot next to The Blackstone Building on Broadway Street south of 9th. The building is a walk-up taco stand with a couple of tables on the sidewalk nearby to sit and eat. Read more…
Umami Burger (Downtown L.A.)
852 S. BroadwayOur first full day in Los Angeles was also our busiest. We got our start at about 9:00 AM and worked straight through until 4 PM. We didn’t even noticed we missed lunch.
We headed back to the hotel to work on some more things just after 4:00. Along the way, my co-worker asked about dinner. I figured we could take an hour break and still get done what we needed to get done and I noticed a restaurant just down the street from our hotel that I wasn’t going to miss on this trip.
Umami Burger is a Los Angeles based group of restaurants that specialize in serving amazing burgers. They call themselves a “group” and not a “chain” because the food is not designed to be the same from location to location. Each restaurant is supposed to be unique based on the location and the culinary team in place. There are locations with stores in California, Chicago, Las Vegas, and New York. The original location was on La Brea Avenue but has since closed due to the size and lack of liquor license. The flagship store is now on the corner of Broadway and 9th in downtown L.A.
Mikkeller DTLA
330 W. Olympic BoulevardEvery so often, an opportunity to travel for work comes up. I love taking the opportunity to go to places I normally wouldn’t go on my own but hate leaving my family home for several days at a time.
The most recent work trip was six days in Los Angeles. I had never been to LA before so I was somewhat excited about this one.
We got into Los Angeles at about 6:30 local time. By the time we got our luggage, our car and got to our hotel in downtown LA, it was a little after 8:30. Neither my coworker or I had eaten as we made our way through the airports so we wanted to find something once we got settled in our rooms.
Wouldn’t you know it. I’m in LA two hours and I found a brewery. It’s like I have a “Brew-Dar” or something.
Mikkeller DTLA is one of two West Coast bars for the dutch based brewery Mikkeller. The US-based brewery operation is in San Diego while there is another bar as well as a tasting room and bottle shop in San Francisco.
Mikkeller DTLA is on Olympic Boulevard in downtown Los Angeles at the corner of South Olive Street in a building that used to be a Discount Tire Center. Read more…
Gina’s Pizza & Deli
301 N. Clinton StreetJust like Niles in my last blog post, Albion isn’t a place I get to very often. In fact, I can probably count on one hand the number of times I’ve gotten off the highway in the small town right before the Jackson County Line.
I had a work assignment in Albion recently with a co-worker from Grand Rapids. She met me in Kalamazoo then we drove the forty five minutes east on I-94 to exit 121. We accomplished what we needed to accomplish for the day then started talking about lunch. We didn’t have a lot of time and I noticed a familiar name in an unfamiliar location. I assumed it was the same shop I stopped at a few years ago but moved to a downtown location.
Gina’s Pizza & Deli is on Clinton Street just north of Michigan Avenue on the edge of downtown Albion. The restaurant is in the old freight house of the Albion Train Depot. The freight house was restored several years ago and became a sports bar called Davan’s, but that place went out of business about six years ago and has been vacant every since.
Hardee’s (Niles)
734 S. 11th StreetI don’t get to Niles very often so I’m not very familiar with the restaurant scene. One day last week, I got sent to Niles for a task. My co-worker had called in sick so I was on my own and I kind of drove around aimlessly for a little while looking for something quick.
I couldn’t find any sandwich shops or quick take-out spots and I was about to give up and just order something to go from one of the pubs. I probably should have just done that but then I noticed a rare fast-food chain in these neck of the woods.
I was heading south on 11th Street when a somewhat familiar red and yellow sign caught my attention. Niles had a Hardee’s.
Hardee’s is on 11th Street, which is also M-51 at Silverbrook Avenue in Niles just south of the downtown just across the street from Thomas Memorial Stadium. The fast food restaurant is in the parking lot of a Martin’s Super Market.
Latitude 42 Brewing Company (Oshtemo)
6075 W. Main StreetI love it when new restaurants open on the west side. It seems to be happening a lot lately. There’s some kind of growing boom on this side town. There’s a lot of empty land in really good areas so new businesses seem to be flocking to Oshtemo.
Five years ago, a new brewery opened in Portage and they did a really good job on social media of creating a buzz. We were there on opening day and have been back several times since. That brewery, Latitude 42.
Last summer, I was scanning through planning commission agendas for Oshtemo Township. We live in the township and I like to know what’s going on. I hate people that claim ignorance to things because they don’t pay attention to local government. I like to know what’s going on and I don’t have time to go sit through the meetings so agendas and minutes posted on the township’s website fill me in on what’s happening.
It’s always exciting when I see site plans for new businesses opening but one really got my attention. Latitude 42 was going to open a second location.
The Oshtemo location of Latitude 42 opened at the end of February on West Main (M-43) just west of the US-131 interchange. It’s a new construction building that’s designed very similarly to their location in Portage.
20 Monroe Live
11 Ottawa Avenue NW- Grand Rapids, MI 49503
- (844) 678-5483
- Website
I grew up in the 80’s & 90’s and when I say I watched a lot of MTV, I don’t mean I watched a lot of Teen Mom. MTV was still actually Music Television then. I used to sit in my living with my VCR remote in hand hoping to record my favorite videos but only if I could recognize them before the little graphic in the corner of the screen that identified it.
I was kind of in to hair bands in those days. I’m still a huge fan of Bon Jovi. I’ll be one of those guys still going to concerts (as long as Richie is part of the group) when those guys are in their 80’s and barely able to stand up.
The one guy that wasn’t a hair band that always made me click the record button was Weird Al Yankovic. I loved his parodies. I would wear out the cassettes in my Walkman listening to the Even Worse.
Fortunately, I never really matured and when the CD age entered, I wore out CD’s in my Discman instead. Off the Deep End, The Food Album, Alapalooza, Bad Hair Day…..I think I bought second copies of some of these because I listened to them so much they scratched or broke.
Surprisingly, I have never seen Weird Al in concert. I’ve had opportunities but they always involved me going alone. My appreciation of parody was not one that was shared by many of my friends.
This past winter, Laughfest announced Weird Al would be a performer during their comedy festival. I clicked on Facebook that I was interested and that popped it up in one of my friend’s feed from back home in Illinois. He asked if I was serious about going and said he’d drive up here and join me if I was.
I figured it was time I finally saw Weird Al, so I bought two tickets for the show.
Weird Al is not really a sell out an arena kind of guy anymore. The shows typically take place in smaller in venues. In the past, he has performed at DeVos Performance Hall when playing in West Michigan, but there’s a new small venue in town and this would be my first chance to see a show there.
20 Monroe Live is on the corner of Fulton Street and Ottawa Avenue in downtown Grand Rapids. It was built in the parking lot of The B.O.B. and opened in early 2017. The 2,600 seat venue quickly became a go-to place for shows that would feel empty in Van Andel Arena across the street.
Atwater Brewery in GR
201 Michigan Street NWIt’s not very often I do a night out with friends. I don’t have a lot of guys that I really hang out with and do things with in Kalamazoo. Having not grown up here, most of our friends are either co-workers or parent friends.
The guys I grew up with back in Illinois have all kind of spread out. Some have stayed near home. Some have went south towards St. Louis. With the help of Facebook, I’ve managed to stay in touch with most of them.
There were two guys growing up who I’d consider “best friends.” One of those guys I see once a year when we go to a White Sox game. The other I see occasionally when I go to visit my parents. Up until recently, he still lived in the town we grew up in.
That friend was in to a lot of the same wacky stuff I was growing up. We’d go see shows no one else would go to just for the experience. We saw a lot of independent wrestling in college just for the hell of it.
Late last year I saw a Facebook event for Weird Al Yankovic at 20 Monroe Live. I marked that I was interested in it and right away, my buddy asked if I was going. He said if I got tickets, he’d come up for the show. I’d never seen Weird Al so I said, “What the heck?” and got the tickets.
The night of the show, we got to Grand Rapids a little before 6:30. We had time for dinner but I knew the restaurants in the heart of downtown would be packed. I headed for City Hall instead and parked in the municipal lot underneath the city and county building.
We walked over to Atwater Brewery in GR for dinner. The Detroit-based brewery is on the corner of Michigan Street and Monroe Avenue in the newly remodeled Rowe Hotel building. They’ve been open since the fall of 2016 on this highly visible corner.
Rocket Fizz (Kalamazoo)
125 S. Kalamazoo Mall- Kalamazoo, MI 49007
- (269) 888-2588
- Website
Candy and soda pop…..are there two better treats? Candy for the kids. Pop for me. Sounds like a perfect combination.
This past Saturday, we went to Old Dog Tavern for the first time in quite a while on Saturday morning. We always love the brunch and the children’s entertainment provided by Benjammin. We’ve been so busy on Saturday’s that we just forgot about it, but while planning our weekend last week, J brought it up.
We did the brunch thing and the music thing then started to run a few errands. Before heading back to the west side of town, J brought up the new candy shop downtown. I can always use more Cola and the kids never say no to candy.
Rocket Fizz is a chain of candy stores based in California. The Kalamazoo location opened up late last week and is one of three in Michigan. There are locations in both Wyoming and Novi in addition to this one. The Kalamazoo store is on the Kalamazoo Mall next to The Union where Plata y Oro once was. Read more…
SW Michigan Dining 