Shake Shack (Enterprise Center)
1401 Clark AvenueThe kids’ big Christmas present this year was tickets to the US Figure Skating Championships at the Enterprise Center in St. Louis.
My kids aren’t in to traditional sports. They really don’t like football or hockey but they will watch figure skating for hours. I kept telling people that going to US Championships for my kids is like going to the Super Bowl.
I didn’t want to miss too much work or school because we will miss enough once their skating season starts in March. I got the weekend pass tickets which gave us access to all day Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
We started Friday with breakfast at Waffle House in Collinsville, IL then drove in to St. Louis for the day. The day is divided up in to two sessions with two separate tickets. The first session is shorter and only includes the teams/skaters that were in the bottom third of the standings after the short programs.
That session took about an hour and a half. I assumed we were going to get kicked out of the arena after that session was over then have to come back in for the evening session but that wasn’t the case. They pretty much just made an announcement that if you had tickets for the evening session to go check out the vendors on the concourse. No one ever scanned my evening tickets so I guess it was kind of the honor system.
We had talked about leaving and going to find dinner but by the time we did that, I couldn’t figure out how to get out of the building and it was getting pretty late anyway. We only would have had an hour or so to get dinner before the doors opened for the next session.
We decided to just eat inside the arena.
We all wanted different things and we all ended up eating at different times. I got everybody back to our seats then headed back towards the Clark Street entrance to grab something for myself.
There are quite a few options for actual name brand restaurants inside the Enterprise Center. The one I chose on Friday is on of my favorites.
The Shake Shack in the Enterprise Center is near the Clark Street entrance near Portal 4 of the arena. There are three full Shake Shacks in St. Louis plus this one at the Enterprise Center. The last time I was in St. Louis, I ate a the Central West End location. This Shake Shack looks like a concession stand because that’s essentially what it is. A concession stand with the Shake Shack branding and food.
Waffle House (Collinsville)
505 N. Bluff RoadThere’s one thing I really love about traveling south of Michigan. Waffle House.
I’ve written several blogs over the years about my stops at Waffle House on my travels for work. Somewhere along the line, I’ve gotten my family hooked as well.
Our first family experience with Waffle House was six years ago when we took a trip to Cincinnati to go to the zoo. There was a Waffle House near our hotel in Mason, OH. J liked it but the kids were still pretty young and didn’t appreciate it yet.
A couple of years ago, J and L went to Tampa for a figure skating competition. I told them there was a Waffle House not too far from their hotel. I knew that because I had stayed in the same hotel they were staying in just a few years prior to that on a work trip and ate at the Waffle House in Wesley Chapel they went to. I think that’s where L realized how great Waffle House is
Their Waffle House love was solidified last year when J and the kids went to Nashville for a figure skating competition without me. There was a Waffle House in the parking lot of their hotel and it was one of the highlights of the trip.
When we started making plans for a trip to St. Louis, I knew we’d eat at a Waffle House at least once. I knew they were in the area because I ate at the one in Maryland Heights last spring when I was in town for a work trip.
We booked a hotel in Fairview Heights, IL. I, for whatever reason, thought we had booked a hotel in Collinsville and was super excited because there was a Waffle House just down the street from the hotel I thought we booked. Fortunately, the hotel we did book was only a ten minute drive from the Waffle House I thought we were going to be next to so we went there for breakfast anyway.
The Waffle House in Collinsville, IL is right off I-55 on Bluff Road. The iconic Waffle House building is in a shopping plaza with several other businesses and restaurants but it stands alone on the northeast side of the development. We pulled in to the parking lot around 11:30 to grab some breakfast/lunch before heading in to St. Louis for the US Figure Skating Championships at the Enterprise Center.
Read more…Drake’s (O’Fallon, IL)
1160 Central Park DriveThe only thing the kids wanted for Christmas was tickets to the US Figure Skating Championships in St. Louis. As soon as the event was announced, they started their campaign. “It can be our only present!”
Ticket packages went on sale way back in July of last year. We made the purchase then had to keep it a secret from them until Christmas morning. I still can’t believe neither of us let it slip although my mom came very close to tipping off B about a week before Christmas. For once, it was a good thing he had his nose buried in his phone and didn’t hear what she said.
We bought the weekend package which included tickets for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Friday was pairs and women’s free skates. Saturday was free dance and men’s free skate. Sunday was “Making the Team” where they announced the selections for this year’s Olympic team.
The kids would have preferred we went for the whole week but we couldn’t miss that much school and work. The plan was to leave Thursday afternoon so L could at least go to her morning classes and J could get in to the office for a few hours before we left.
When we bought the tickets, we booked a cheap hotel in Fairview Heights about twenty minutes from the Enterprise Center where the championships were being held. We got to town around 4:30, just as the Rhythm Dances were starting at the arena.
We sat in our hotel room and watched some of the competition on our phones since we didn’t have access to Peacock on the hotel TV. After about a half hour, I asked J if we were going to get dinner. I had been looking at nearby places on Google and found one I thought we’d all like.
We headed over to Drake’s on Central Park Drive west of Green Mountain Road in O’Fallon, IL. The restaurant has a pretty chain sports bar look and feel to it starting as soon as you pull in the parking lot. The restaurant is in a very commercialized area right off I-64 in between a couple of hotels.
Wendy’s (Sprinkle Road)
3805 S. Sprinkle RoadLast week was a conserve money week. We had big plans for the weekend. The kids’ Christmas gift this year was tickets to the US Figure Skating Championships in St. Louis. As much as we wanted to be there the whole week, we only did the weekend pass so we wouldn’t miss too much school or work.
I took Thursday off and the plan was to make L go to school for her morning classes then pull her out right before lunch and start the drive. There was no point sending B to school for two hours and I just took the whole day off because my job doesn’t really work well with taking just the afternoon off.
As much as the kid’s wanted to leave Wednesday night or early Thursday so we could get to St. Louis in time for Rhythm Dances, it just wasn’t going to work out.
Wednesday night was a normal night for us at the rink. Both kids skated then L had some stretching classes over at The Space Dance Company not too far from Wings Event Center. L was going to get done before B was done at Wings and there was a high school game at Wings. I don’t really like showing up right before a high school game starts and trying to explain that I’m just there to pick my kid up….not watch the hockey game so please don’t charge me. I volunteered to just go get L.
I got out to the area pretty early and I was hungry. I hadn’t had time for lunch. Again, this was a conserve money week so my best options were the fast food options along Sprinkle Road.
I picked the Wendy’s on the corner of Sprinkle Road and Covington Road in Kalmazoo’s Milwood Neighborhood. The building is still in the older style of Wendy’s. The design after the sunrooms went away but before the more modern, sleeker design. It’s the same design as the now closed store on 9th Street and Texas Township.
Casey’s (Division Ave)
5437 Division Avenue SouthI volunteered to work a Friday night. Not something I do often outside of the overtime shifts I work in the fall but the boss asked for a volunteer to work Friday night the day after New Year’s. I had nothing else going on so I took the shift.
Truth be told, there was something in it for me too. L had spent the week in Florida with one of her friends and we had to pick her up at Detroit Metro Airport Friday morning. The family she went to hang out with was driving back to Michigan but they didn’t have room for her in the car and we didn’t want to make them put up with L on an 18 hour road trip.
We booked L on a 6:30 AM flight out of Orlando International Airport. She was scheduled to land in Detroit at about 8:30. J could have handled it herself if I had worked my usual day shift but it’s easier to do these things together. I dropped J off at the terminal so she could get in line to get a pass from Delta to pick L up while B and I parked the car.
Detroit has this cool thing where you can get a “Destination Pass.” You don’t need a boarding pass to get through TSA. You can get a Destination Pass from the kiosk in the terminal and get through security. B and I did that so we could join J at the gate L was coming in to.
I should have gotten a breakfast cheeseburger from Wahlburgers while we were in the terminal but I wasn’t hungry at the time. I regretted that decision as soon as we got on the road. I was hungry and now craving Wahlburgers.
We got back to Kalamazoo just before noon. I had some things to do around the house (mainly snow blowing the driveway) before I had to leave a little after 1:00 to head to Grand Rapids.
I left a early because I had to stop by my office in Kalamazoo to grab some things before heading to the Grand Rapids office. I also needed gas and food.
I got gas in Kalamazoo before leaving but food was going to wait until I got to Kent County. Friday night is pizza night. Right?
I stopped at the Casey’s on the corner of Division and 54th Street in Wyoming. This is one of the old Kum & Go stations that was bought out by Maverick and then Casey’s. The building is fairly new having been built just three years ago. It has a Division Avenue address but you can’t get in to it from Division Avenue unless you go down to the driveway for the Goodwill Store south of the intersection. Most people will come in to the business from the 54th Street side.
Read more…Sunny’s Coney Island
31290 Ecorse RoadWhat a morning.
L had been invited to spend a week in Florida with one of her friends. They went down last week to spend Christmas with family and L was going to join them this week for the second part of winter break.
We decided to put L on a plane out of Detroit because we could get a non-stop to Orlando where her friend’s mom would be waiting at the gate to pick her up.
We spent the night in Detroit Sunday night so we’d be close to the airport in the morning. We took the kids in to the city and had dinner at Mom’s Spaghetti before heading to a hotel in Southgate.
We got up Monday morning and we all headed to Detroit Metro Airport. I dropped J and L off at the McNamara Terminal then B and I went back to the hotel until L was on her flight.
J and L had to go to an “Agent Assist” desk to fill out the paperwork for the unaccompanied minor and to get J a pass to get in to the terminal. It. Took. Forever. We got to the airport over two hours early and it took almost an hour and forty minutes to get through the line. They now had about a half hour to get to the gate.
They rushed to TSA…where they got stopped again. Something in L’s backpack caused the agents to want to look more. They finally got through and had about fifteen minutes…but of course, the gate was the very last gate in the terminal….the farthest away from the security checkpoint.
J handed L the packet and told her to get to the gate. J would follow and get there as quickly as she could be get there and let the gate agents know that you were there. L got there, with J just a few steps behind with just enough time. There were five people in line waiting to get on. L was the last person on and they closed the door behind her. An absolutely stressful morning for J and L but they somehow succeeded in getting L on the plane and getting her off to Florida for the week.
Once I heard they got on the plane, B and I checked out of the hotel and we headed back to the airport. I found a park and ride lot to wait because J had to wait until L’s plane was in the air before she left the secured area. It took about another hour because it was so windy they couldn’t deice the plane. They finally got that done and L was on her way to Florida at about 9:30 AM.
I headed up to the terminal to pick J up. We were all hungry and didn’t really want to head home yet. There was a snow storm hitting West Michigan that morning and we wanted to give it a little time to clear up before we made the trek.
I did a search for breakfast places and came up with a few options in the area. We’ve really come to like finding Coney Islands when we travel and there was one not too far away.
Sunny’s Coney Island is near the corner of Ecorse Road and Merriman Road in Romulus. The small diner is in a small shopping plaza it shares with a liquor store. The restaurant is on the east side of the building. There’s a pretty good size parking lot between the building the restaurant is in and another building that make up the shopping plaza.
Mom’s Spaghetti
2131 Woodward Avenue“His palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are heavy. There’s vomit on his sweater already, mom’s spaghetti.”
Let’s just acknowledge for a minute that the guy who wrote that lyric, about half digested vomit on someone’s shirt, thought, yeah, that’s a good name for a restaurant.
Obviously, I’m talking about Eminem and his spaghetti restaurant appropriately (I guess?) named Mom’s Spaghetti.
Eminem was starting to get big when I was in college so Lose Yourself was a song I had on repeat for months. I was also in the theater the night 8 Mile opened in November of 2002.
My ten year old son found Eminem a few years ago and has come to love his music. He was kind of shocked when he found there is actually a restaurant in Detroit owned by Eminem called Mom’s Spaghetti. He’s been asking to go ever since he found out.
We haven’t had a reason to go to Detroit and we weren’t going to drive over there just to get spaghetti.
This past weekend, we were putting L on a flight to Orlando to spend the week with one of her friends. We typically do Grand Rapids or Kalamazoo for flights but since she was traveling alone, we wanted a direct flight and booked her out of Detroit.
She had a pretty early flight and I had a really good deal on a nearby hotel so we decided to go over Sunday night after the kids got done skating.
B was kind of bummed he didn’t get to go to Florida so we thought this was the time to bring him to Mom’s Spaghetti.
Mom’s Spaghetti is on Woodward Avenue near West Columbia Street in downtown Detroit. It’s right across from Comerica Park and right next door to The Fillmore. Don’t look for a building with the restaurant’s name on it though. It’s actually just a walk up in window in an alley between the Fillmore and the Little Caesar’s Global Resource Center and Corporate Office…the building with pizza slice shaped windows.
Read more…Jimmy John’s (Stadium Drive)
I literally don’t know what to do with myself when I actually have time off.
I complain all the time about not having day’s off. I’m essentially working two jobs during the fall/winter plus I pick up freelance opportunities so it’s very rare for me to have two days off in a row for about half the year.
I always try to save some vacation days for the end of the year. I hate being at work between Christmas and New Year’s so I do my best to at least keep a couple of days off.
I didn’t quite have enough to get the whole week off this year but I had four days that at least gave me Christmas Eve through Dec. 30th off….so seven full days in a row. Unheard of.
Obviously, I kept busy enough Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. The kids were back at the rink bright and early on Friday morning then we had a few days off until we had to make a quick trip to Detroit Sunday night in to Monday.
I haven’t done any grocery shopping nor have I felt like cooking dinner. Friday night, B comes in to the living room where I’m sitting on the couch mindlessly staring at the TV and said he’s hungry. I asked what he wanted and he asked what we had.
The answer was not much.
And come to think of it, I was kind of hungry too. I asked if he just wanted to order Jimmy John’s.
Of course he said yes, so I put in an order to the Jimmy John’s on Stadium Drive near Seneca Lane in Kalamazoo’s Knollwood Neighborhood. The building is the old Moe’s Southwest Grill (which before that was a Red Crown Pharmacy). The building has actually been split in two with Jimmy John’s in the front half of the building and a Smoothie King in the back half. This Jimmy John moved down the road from where the Potbelly Sandwich Works is now because they wanted a drive through and this location offered that.
Burdick’s Bar & Grill
100 W. Michigan AvenueWe’ve kind of had a tradition the last few years. Christmas Eve open skate and lunch from Old Burdick’s.
That wasn’t possible this year now that Wings West is closed and along with it Old Burdick’s at Wings West.
The kids still had skating on Christmas Eve but it was club ice and not public skate like we’ve done the last few years. And it was at Wings Event Center. We got up around 7:00 AM because L was on the 8:00 session. She skated until 10 AM but B was on two sessions from 9 AM to 11 AM.
There is no Burdick’s at Wings Event Center so we couldn’t keep that tradition alive….or could we?
After the kids got done skating and got their things packed up, we actually headed downtown to eat lunch.
The plan was to check out the new Burdick’s Bar & Grill inside the Radisson Plaza Hotel on the corner of Michigan Avenue and Rose Street. It’s still Burdick’s but it has been completely remodeled. Our Christmas Eve tradition was saved.
Ayasofya Turkish Restaurant
1528 W. Michigan AvenueIt seems like it’s been a while since I’ve blogged about Kalamazoo restaurants. Honestly, I just haven’t eaten out much. There hasn’t been a lot of new places that have opened up that have caught my attention to where I’ve felt that I’ve had to spend what little extra money I have on lunch.
We’re out of figure skating season for the moment so that leaves me with a little extra money each week to catch up on some of the newer restaurants that have opened in Kalamazoo.
Monday night was a work night for me and it was kind of slow. I actually had time for a proper dinner break but I really didn’t know what I wanted. I started searching a little bit to see if there was something I could grab quickly but also leave me full when I was done.
I picked something that that I don’t think most people would think I would pick. A Turkish restaurant…but, there’s a twist.
Ayasofya Turkish Restaurant is on West Michigan Avenue near Burrows Road near Western Michigan University’s campus. The building was Bruno’s Pizza for a really long time until they closed in 2023. Ayasofya just about a year ago in December of 2024 after doing some renovations to the inside of the building. From the street, the restaurant looks pretty much the same but without the iconic neon sign that hung outside Bruno’s for so long.
SW Michigan Dining 