Artisan Sandwich Company
348 S. Kalamazoo MallThe thing I’ve really noticed after working downtown for a few months is there is not a lot of grab and go places for lunch. There are a lot of great restaurants and lunch deals, but I’m not really an office worker who actually gets to take an hour lunch break everyday. I’m lucky most days if I have time to grab a sandwich as I run out the door.
We’ve been pretty frequent flyers at Irving’s Market and Deli and Totally Brewed Cafe because both places are quick and have mostly healthy take out options, but now a new place has opened up on The Mall that will give us another option.
Artisan Sandwich Company is in the Peregrin Square building on The Kalamazoo Mall north of Lovell. The space that the restaurant now occupies was Exquisite Hair Designs right next to Pop City Popcorn.
Rykse & Co. Market & Eatery
7141 West Q AvenueAlright, let’s get back to some Southwest Michigan blog posts, huh? Vacation was fun and I blog about the places we eat and places we go because this blog works like a journal for me. I’ve documented the last 9 1/2 years of our lives together from the move to Lansing, to getting married, to buying a house, the having kids with J through our food adventures.
My first night back at work after a week off saw me paired up with a co-worker I don’t normally work with anymore out of the Grand Rapids office. She had a task to do in Kalamazoo and the normal guy I work with was off, so the bosses paired us together on her task.
We headed out to Texas Corners just before dinner time. We were in separate cars because she met me there, so when we were done, she headed back to the Kalamazoo office to do some work while I took advantage of being in Texas Corners and stopped to get dinner.
Rykse & Co. Market and Eatery just opened in Texas Corners on Q Avenue just to the west of 8th Street in the Texas Square Shopping Center. The building is new construction on what used to be a big grassy lot between the road and the parking lot.
The Irish Legend
8933 Archer AvenueAnyone who has ever moved away from home knows the struggle. Whenever you’re back in town visiting, everyone you know that still lives there wants to see you. It’s hard to juggle longtime friends, family, and whatever the actual reason for your visit is.
We did the best we could to make time for everyone we could on this last trip home. We spent two nights at my parents house. We spent four nights at J’s parents. We spent the afternoon with one of J’s friends. We met my buddy and his fiance for dinner. We met another one of J’s friends and her family for lunch. We had a busy week, but it was nice to hang out with people we don’t get to see all that often.
Our last meeting was on Saturday afternoon for lunch. One of J’s high school friends and her family wanted to meet for lunch somewhere between their house in Darien and J’s parents in Oak Lawn. We told them to pick a place and we’d meet them at noon.
They picked The Irish Legend on Archer Avenue just outside of the main business district of the Village of Willow Springs. The restaurant is along a very busy Archer Avenue, which doubles as IL-171, just to the southwest of the intersection with Flavin Road. Read more…
Garrett Popcorn Shops (Millennium Park Plaza)
151 Michigan AvenueChicago is known for so many things. Pizza. Hot Dogs. Popcorn.
Popcorn? Yeah. Popcorn.
We had a fantastic day in Chicago with a friend of J’s who just moved to the city. We spent some time at the Crown Fountain in Millennium Park. We played in the Slide Crater at Maggie Daley Park. We went to see the “Big Fountain” as L called Buckingham Fountain on our way in to town. All in all, we spent almost six hours in the city.
Early in the day, I spotted a Garrett Popcorn Shop across the street from J’s friend’s apartment. We passed it a couple times on our way to and from the apartment throughout the day, but I was waiting until it was time to go before grabbing some delicious popcorn to take with us.
Garrett Popcorn Shops has stores all over Chicago. On Michigan Avenue alone there are five shops in the downtown area. There are ten total shops from about Water Tower Place down through the Museum Campus.
The Michigan Avenue shop we stopped at is the one between Lake and Randolph Streets in The Loop in the Millennium Park Plaza building. It sits right next to a Lids store in the middle of the block which is just north of Millennium Park in part of the city’s busiest area. Read more…
Nutella Cafe (Chicago)
189 N. Michigan AvenueWhen we left the Chicago Suburbs on Wednesday afternoon, we headed towards my parents house about an hour south. We don’t eat out a lot when we go there because…simply, there aren’t many choices. My home town is about the size of Climax and has about as many restaurant options. There’s a Subway in the gas station and a pizza place on Main Street.
We spent two days there then headed back into Chicago to meet up with one of J’s friends. The two of them worked together in Idaho about fifteen years ago and they’ve stayed close ever since. J’s friend just moved to Chicago from Atlanta so we wanted to see her new place and hang out since we haven’t seen her in over two years.
We got into the city just after noon. We found a parking garage right next to her highrise then went to hang out in our 40th floor apartment looking over Michigan Avenue. Once the kids stretched their legs and put their grubby little fingerprints all over the floor to ceiling windows, we ventured out for the first time to go get something to eat.
Our first stop was Shake Shack. We were hoping to grab a quick bite to eat, but there was a line out the door so we passed. J’s friend suggested a bar near the river, but B has been such a pain at restaurants lately and I didn’t want to fight him at yet another sit down place.
On our way to Shake Shack J noticed the Nutella Cafe across Michigan Avenue from the apartment. We started heading back that way and J asked if that would work for lunch. As long as there wasn’t a huge line, I was fine with it.
Nutella Cafe is right on the corner of Michigan Avenue and Lake Street in downtown Chicago in the Millennium Park Plaza building in The Loop. This location is the first Nutella Cafe by the Ferrero who own Nutella.
Vito and Nick’s Pizzeria
8433 S. Pulaski RoadThe first thing we usually do when we get to Chicago is start planning our first couple of meals. I need Italian beef and we need pizza from our favorite pizza place. I got my beef at Pop’s, but pizza wasn’t going to happen.
We go to town late on Monday night and pretty much just went to bed. Our first full day in town was Tuesday and Palermo’s 95th is closed on Tuesday’s. We were going to have to wait a few days because we were leaving J’s parents and heading to mine on Wednesday, so it would be Friday before we could get there.
I’ve explained several times how there are two separate pizza cultures in Chicago. There’s the famous one that outsiders think of when they think Chicago pizza. That’s the thick crust and stuffed crust pizza with cold marinara sauce and a crust that’s loaded with fat. That’s your Giordano’s, Malnati’s, and Gino’s East pizzas.
Those are mostly north side chains. On the south side, there’s a completely opposite type of pizza. The crusts are crispy and cracker thin. The sauce is cooked down and usually sweet.
The most famous of those south side pizzerias is Vito & Nick’s Pizzeria on Pulaski Road right at 84th Place in the city’s Ashburn Neighborhood. Most people, including me, got their first look at Vito & Nick’s on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives back in January of 2009, but the neighborhood joint has been serving Sicilian style pizza in one form or another since 1946. Read more…
Pop’s Italian Beef & Sausage (Chicago)
10337 S. Kedzie AvenueWe were all over the place for this vacation. Columbus, Ohio back to Kalamazoo, to Silver Beach, to the south suburbs of Chicago, to even further south of Chicago back to the city then back to the suburbs before we finally make it back to Kalamazoo. It’s a long week with a lot of things to do and people to see, but something we all needed.
We got to J’s parents in the south suburbs on Monday night after a quick sunset swim at Silver Beach in St. Joseph. We figured we were already almost halfway to Chicago, what was the point of going back to Kalamazoo just to sleep.
We woke up in the suburbs Tuesday morning. The first meal I have to have when going to Chicago is an Italian beef. I have to make sure I get one before we do whatever it is we’re going to do the rest of the week.
My favorite Italian beef place near J’s parents went out (for the second time) quite a while ago so I’m moving around a bit trying new places.
There’s one chain in Chicagoland that I keep putting off. Pop’s Italian Beef & Sausage keeps popping up in lists for Chicago’s best Italian beef, but we had one in Kalamazoo for a while and I only went there once. I wasn’t a huge fan despite it was an authentic Chicago chain. I loved the beef itself, but the peppers left me a little disappointed.
I finally decided it was time to see if things are done differently in Chicago. I picked the lone Chicago location on Kedzie Avenue just south of 103rd Street on Chicago’s southside in the Mount Greenwood Neighborhood. This building looks like it could be the original store in a franchise, but it’s not. The chain started in Palos Heights and still has a presence there in the same spot. This one on Kedzie has a much simpler sign and doesn’t have the franchise logo on any exterior sign. If you didn’t know any better, you’d really think this was an independent beef shop. Read more…
Dickey’s Barbecue Pit (Coldwater)
445 E. Chicago StreetColumbus to Kalamazoo is a pretty long drive. It’s easy, but it’s long.
We left Columbus around 2:00 after hanging out with some friends at North Market. That put us back in Michigan just before 6:00. As we were driving north along I-69, I saw a billboard for a BBQ place in Coldwater. We hadn’t eaten yet and I figured we probably should before we got all the way home….and you know how we like BBQ.
We pulled in to Dickey’s Barbecue Pit right around 6:00 on Sunday. There were no other cars parking lot for the small, stand alone building on the corner of East Chicago Street and Michigan Avenue just west of I-69. Read more…
Market & Boar
59 Spruce StreetThe North Market in Columbus, OH has so many options when it comes to prepared food.
We met some friends who now live in Dublin at the Market for lunch while we were in Columbus for a trip to the Zoo.
We sort of split up to get our food with the plan of meeting in the dining area on the second floor of the market. We had already gotten the kids pizza from Serafino’s Pizzeria & Italian Deli, but I had passed a BBQ place while walking around and you know I’m not going to pass up BBQ.
Market & Boar is the North Market’s resident BBQ shop. It’s located on Park Street side of the market right near the middle entrance. Read more…
Sarefino’s Pizza & Italian Deli
59 Spruce StreetOur first task once arriving at North Market was to find food for the kids. We had skipped breakfast to make sure they were hungry for lunch. We were meeting up with friends in Columbus who we hadn’t seen in a long time and we really didn’t want meltdowns because they didn’t want to eat.
I had done a little research before we got to the market so I knew where to go once we got there. We sort of started walking around and our path took us right to the pizza place. Pizza is never a bad option when it comes to my kids.
Serafino Pizza & Italian Deli is the pizza option at the North Market. They take up a space sort of near the back of the market not far from the middle Park Street entrance.
SW Michigan Dining 