Subway (Martin)
1190 M-222Sometimes things just work out.
J and the kids were in Dallas for a figure skating competition last weekend. I stayed home because I am running out of PTO and the flights to Dallas were just really expensive.
They left early enough Thursday morning that I could take them to the airport before work and were coming home late enough Monday night that I could pick them up.
My plan was to work my normal evening shift, get off at 11:00 then head up to Grand Rapids to pick them up.
Without even realizing it, I took an evening shift working out of the Grand Rapids office that night. One of my co-workers was off and they needed someone to fill in up there. I took the shift then realized later that it was actually going to work out really well for me. I would already be in Grand Rapids at midnight when they got home so I wouldn’t have to rush up there from Kalamazoo after work. I could just hang around.
I slept in pretty later on Monday morning just because I could. I got up and moving around noon. I took a shower, watched some TV then started heading towards Grand Rapids a little after 1:00.
I had planned on grabbing something to eat on my way to the office. As I was putting my shoes on, I noticed some coupons laying on the counter for Subway. I don’t normally eat Subway but if I could get lunch for under $10, I figured I could eat Subway this time.
I put in an order for a footlong sub for the Subway in Martin. I needed gas too so this would kill two birds with one stone.
The Martin Subway is right off the highway on M-222 right at the interchange with US-131. It’s inside the Marathon gas station. There isn’t a lot of great signage for it on the outside. The sign near the road is broken on the south side and there isn’t a sign on the building. You just kind of have to know it’s there.
Blazin’ Coop’s Nashville Hot Chicken
47182 Michigan AvenueEvery time I go watch my nieces play softball, I’m a little bit grateful that my kids chose an indoor sport.
It was a hot day at the Canton Sports Center for the USSSA Great Lakes National Championship. My niece’s game was supposed to start at 1:00 but rain moved through right before that and set them back a couple of hours.
The second game started around 4:45 and after a couple of comebacks, the won their game and advanced to Sunday.
It wasn’t the end of the season so as soon as the game was over, the team kind of all split up and went their own way. My brother asked if I wanted to join them for dinner and asked if I had anything in mind.
I noticed a hot chicken place right across the street. I figured that would be easy if they liked hot chicken. My brother said he was up for it as long as there was something that wasn’t spicy for my niece.
We headed across Michigan Avenue to Blazin’ Coop’s Nashville Hot Chicken. The restaurant is in the Crossroads Village Shopping plaza on Michigan Avenue east of Beck Road. The restaurant got it’s start a few years ago as a food truck in the area. They opened this brick and mortar building last year in what used to be a diner.
Read more…Angie’s Hamburger Stand
47417 Michigan AvenueI didn’t get to go to Dallas last week for my kids’ figure skating competition but that doesn’t mean I totally missed out on youth sports.
My niece, who lives about an hour south of Chicago, was in Canton this past weekend for the USSSA Great Lakes National Championship at the Canton Sports Center.
They got to town Wednesday night and played games on Thursday but were rained on Friday. That ended pool play and they were seeded number one in their bracket so they didn’t play until Saturday afternoon.
I don’t see my nieces very often. Usually just once or twice a year. Last year, my other niece played in this same tournament at a different level but she switched teams and played her Championships July 4th weekend near Indianapolis.
I had nothing else I needed to do Saturday and since I was home alone, I decided to head over to the East Side for some softball.
I ran through a pretty heavy rain shower between Jackson and Ann Arbor. I knew it would eventually catch up to me and the games would get delayed so I stopped and grab lunch on my way to meet my brother and niece at the complex.
I stopped at Angie’s Hamburger Stand on Michigan Avenue near Beck Road in Canton Township just west of where the sports complex I was headed to is located. The building is an old style 50’s shiny metal diner with simple signage that just says “Hamburgers.” While it *looks* like it could actually be a 50’s diner. That’s not the case. The building was actually buillt in the early 2010’s. There was some kind of commercial building on the property but it had been vacant for a while. This restaurant cleaned up the area, added the parking, and built the retro diner as it looks today.
Read more…Joe Shmoes’s Bar & Grill
7454 N. 6th StreetFriday night is pizza night even if I’m home alone.
The rest of my family was in Dallas for a figure skating competition. I didn’t have enough time off work so they had to go without me.
We don’t eat out at restaurants as a family very often anymore just because it’s gotten way too expensive. Most bar’s cost us close to $100 by the time you factor in a decent tip. We do a lot of Jimmy John’s and Culvers during the week as we leave Wings West or Wings Event Center which effects how much we eat out on weekends.
Thursday night was my first night home alone. I went to Dave’s Bar in Alamo Township. Friday night, I wanted pizza and I ended up, again, heading to Alamo Township.
Joe Shmoe’s Bar & Grill is on North 6th Street north of DE Avenue. The building will be very familiar to a lot of people as it’s the same building Fricano’s of Alamo was in for many, many years…45 to be exact. When the building went up for sale, two friends, including one guy who owned Wayside West and Y Bar bought the place and turned it in to Joe Shmoe’s.
Krispy Krunchy Chicken (Columbia Ave.)
4647 W. Columbia AvenueTell me if you’ve heard this one before. I stopped for gas station chicken.
It seems like there are A LOT of these Krispy Krunchy Chicken’s popping up at gas stations all over West Michigan.
Thirteen years ago, I wrote my first blog post about the chain. At that time, it wasn’t in gas stations in West Michigan. It was a stand alone store in a shopping plaza in Grand Rapids that was incorporated into another food business. There was only one other store in Michigan at that time, it Ypsilanti. Now it seems like there’s a new one popping up every other week.
I was in Battle Creek the other day for a job assignment near the Air National Guard base. My colleague and I were running pretty tight on time when we got done but I needed gas before heading back to Kalamazoo.
I stopped at Arlene’s Truck Stop on West Columbia Avenue right near the I-94 interchange. I needed gas and I needed a pop. I knew Arlene’s had undergone a major renovation not too long ago and I had seen the signs for Krispy Krunchy Chicken when I drove by. I needed to go inside anyway, so I thought I’d grab something.
Dave’s Bar
6225 D AvenueOn my own for the weekend.
I could be good knowing my family is going to be eating out a lot while they’re in Dallas for a figure skating competition but being home alone means I have some opportunities to eat out at places my family wouldn’t really be interested in going to.
I got off work Thursday night after a long day. I was up at 4:15 AM to get my family to the airport in Grand Rapids. I then worked a full day, most of it outside and without a lunch break. By the time I clocked out, I was hungry and kind of wanted a beer.
I headed north of Kalamazoo to Dave’s Bar in Alamo Township. The restaurant is attached to the former Club Car Grille on D Avenue east of Owen Drive. That restaurant closed in early 2024 but Dave’s Bar lives on at the back end of the property. You can’t see it from the road but there is a Dave’s Bar sign covering the old Club Car Grilled sign along D Avenue and there’s a large sign next to the drive that leads you to the parking lot in the back where the bar is.
Read more…Clippers Cafe
1566 10th StreetWe’re doing a little bit more traveling for figure skating this year than we have in the past.
J, L, and B headed to Dallas for the Dallas Classic in Plano. I still have to work and plane tickets are expensive so I had to stay home.
The cheapest flights we could find that would get them there when they needed to get there and get them home when they needed to get home were out of Gerald R Ford International Airport in Grand Rapids.
It worked out that I could take them to the airport and pick them up so they didn’t have to leave a car there for five days. The unfortunate part of that was their flight was at 7 AM.
We got up early on Thursday and headed to Grand Rapids. I dropped them off at the terminal a little before 6 AM. I didn’t have to be at work until 9:30 so I wasn’t in a big rush to get back to Kalamazoo.
I could have went for breakfast somewhere in Grand Rapids but I decided to start heading home. There are some breakfast joints along the way that I’ve never been to and this was an opportunity to stop at one.
My pick for an early morning breakfast was Clippers Cafe in Martin.
This small town diner, named after the town’s high school mascot, is just south of the main intersection in town on 10th Street not too far from Templeton Street which leads to Martin High School. The building actually looks like a barn because at one point not too long ago, it was known as the Red Barn Family Restaurant. It was B & B Family Diner for a while before becoming Clippers Cafe in 2017.
Read more…Time to Wing It
1567 W. Michigan AvenueThe next few weeks are going to be rough. J is traveling with the kids for figure skating competitions. I need to stay home and work because I’m running out of PTO. I’m also losing my officer colleague for a few weeks due to a commitment he has outside of work.
I’m already getting in to that fend for survival mode when it comes to meals. Being alone gives me time to go to restaurants I normally wouldn’t have time for.
I was in Battle Creek on a job assignment earlier this week by myself. The task was completed by about 11:30. Before leaving town, I wanted to grab lunch.
I picked Time To Wing in Battle Creek’s Urbandale neighborhood. The restaurant is on West Michigan Avenue and Geiger Avenue. The building is a standalone at the edge of a parking lot for a shopping plaza that includes a Family Fare. This uniquely shaped has been a donut shop for the better part of the last two decades. It was a Dunkin’ Donuts, Tom’s Donuts, Rock & Roll Donuts and now it’s a wing joint.
Read more…Willow Run Barbecue Company
FOOD TRUCKHoliday weekends are for relaxing.
We spend most holidays at J’s parents in St. Joseph County. We’ll always do some grilling but lunches are a lot of leftovers are pre-made meals.
We headed to the lake Friday morning for the holiday weekend. Not long after getting there, J’s mom asked if we wanted to head over to Klinger Lake to pick up lunch from Mamazzoni’s Italian beef. I never turn down an Italian beef.
Saturday was kind of the same. J’s mom always makes breakfast but for lunch, she said there was another food truck nearby that she wanted to go to. It was BBQ and just like Italian beef, I never turn down BBQ.
The food truck was Willow Run Barbecue Company out of Ypsilanti. They were parked at The Parlor on M-66 south of Finley Road in Sherman Township north of Sturgis. Being from Ypsilanti, we had never heard of this truck but the kids wanted ice cream from the Parlor and J’s mom and I wanted BBQ so it was a win-win for everyone.
Read more…Louie’s Lake Bar & Grill
8946 Sprinkle RoadUPDATE 7.13.25 – I wasn’t the only one who found the sound to be a little too much. Louie’s posted on Facebook earlier this week that they will be adding some features to absorb sound and hopefully bring the decibel level down some.
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My mom called me last week and said they had some paperwork that I needed to sign. She had the week off so instead of mailing it to me, they decided to drive to Kalamazoo and drop it off.
They had never been to Shipshewana so they wanted to see what that was all about. They dropped the packet off in the morning, went to Shipshewana then came back to Kalamazoo to stay the night.
J and I found a notary on my lunch break and we got their papers signed so we were able to get it back to them. Since they were in town, they wanted to take us to dinner. They didn’t have a preference but I, of course, wanted to go somewhere new.
I started driving down Portage Road which was the totally wrong way to get to Louie’s Lake Bar & Grill. By the time I realized I was a dumbass, I was almost to Vicksburg. We turned around, avoided some construction, took the scenic route then finally got to where we wanted to be.
Louie’s Lake Bar & Grill is on Sprinkle Road at Long Lake Road just a stone’s throw from Long Lake in South Portage. The restaurant is the third Louie’s restaurant in the area joining the original downtown Louie’s Trophy House location and the Texas Corners’ Louie’s Corner Bar. This location is a remodel of Long Lake Tavern which closed last year.
SW Michigan Dining 