Craftsman Chop Company
6905 Sears Drive- Portage, MI 49024
- (269) 327-2000
- Website
- No Online Menu
- (they have a “Coming Soon” on a domain…I’ll update the link if they ever put up a permanent website)
I’ll tell you what. I have good timing. For Christmas, I decided I was going to get J a remote start. She goes to work before I get up and I really didn’t want to have to get up and scrape windows. Last week, I went to Dashworks in Portage and set up an appointment for today to get it installed…..right as we’re getting a “blizzard.”
J called from work and said she would just meet me at Dashworks instead of coming home. I went to pick her up and as I was driving home, she mentioned she was hungry. I didn’t want to go too far because the roads were starting to get wet. I remembered a restaurant near the mall that I thought looked good and since we were close, that’s where we headed.
Craftsman Chop Company is on Sears Drive in Portage which is sort of an access road to the mall. The road is most easily accessible from Romence Road, but you can also get to it from the mall pretty easily.
As we pulled into the parking lot, I was really happy to see that there were quite a few cars there. Places like this always scare me for lunch. It’s not a chain, but it sort of looks like a chain and since it had the word “Chop” in the name, I’m never quite sure what I’m getting in to.
Like I mentioned, Craftsman Chop Company is not a chain. It’s locally owned and operated. According to their Facebook page, they opened in 2005 “with the goal of being different from any other dining establishment.” They try to accomplish this with a relaxed, yet somewhat upscale atmosphere that includes a fireplace and a lounge area with leather sofas. Read more…
Taco Bob’s – Milwood
4121 Portage RoadThere’s something about being married. All your furniture has to match. It’s like you instantly grow up or something. J and I have lived together for a couple years and just merged the best of our furniture when we moved in. Most of her stuff won out, but I got my ugly, comfy chair.
Over the last two years, we’ve slowly started buying stuff together. Since the wedding and moving to Kalamazoo, there’s seemed to be more of an urgency to get nicer stuff. The first item was a couch which was desperately needed. After the couch, we got ottoman’s to replace the end tables turned coffee tables J made during the whole Trading Spaces craze. The coffee tables returned to their former lives as end tables, but they were huge and didn’t match anything, so last night while we checked out Kmart’s going out of business sale, we found an end table that perfectly matched our kitchen table (also purchased from K-Mart a few years ago), ottoman’s, and couch.
Today, I was left with the chore of getting rid of the old end tables. J suggested I take them to Goodwill since we had a couple bags that needed to go anyway. Since I was leaving the house, I figured I’d just stop somewhere for a quick meal. I’ve been curious about Taco Bob’s and I thought there was one on my way to Goodwill.
I’m not sure where I actually thought Goodwill is, but when I put it in my GPS, it took me the opposite way of where I thought it was. I was thinking it was more out by the airport, but it was actually in Portage just off Westnedge. Still, I had Taco Bob’s on the brain and didn’t feel like going in the mall, so I headed back to the Milwood neighborhood. Read more…
Penn Station
4630 W. Main StreetWhere to go when I don’t want a burger? Tough question. To make matters worse. I really wanted fries. If we go to a bar, I’m tempted to order a burger even though I go in there thinking I don’t want one. I have no will power.
J had a rare Monday off and since we didn’t get to spend the weekend together, we decided to go out, do some shopping, and pick up lunch. A co-worker told her about a place that’s co-owned by Portage resident and Major League Baseball umpire Tim Welke. I had read a review in the Kalamazoo Gazette that raved about the fries a few weeks ago. On the surface, it seemed to offer everything I wanted.
Penn Station is a chain of sandwich shops based in Cincinnati, Ohio. They have over 200 locations mostly in the Midwest and South. There are five locations in Michigan including the Kalamazoo store which is on Main Street in a strip mall near the Drake Road intersection.
The store takes up a corner spot in the building. Penn Station prides itself on the fact that you can watch your sandwich being made. The restaurant is set up with a small dining room that runs the length of the space along the front. In the back is the order area, kitchen, and pick up window.
The shop isn’t much different from other sandwich shops. You order at one end of the counter. If you choose to, you can watch your sandwich being built along the middle part of the counter. At the end, you pay the cashier and pick up your cup for drinks. The difference between Penn Station and most other sub shops is that the subs are toasted. Oh yeah, and the fries. Read more…
Harding’s Marketplace- S. Westnedge, Portage
6330 S. Westnedge Avenue- Portage, MI 49002
- (269) 327-6733
- Website
This weekend has been wierd. J usually works Monday through Friday, but this weekend, she was asked to work a weekend shift. They gave her Friday off so she would get at least one day off this week. Normally, that’d be great, but this weekend, I worked Thursday, Friday, Sunday. So when I was off on Saturday, she was working.
I finished up our Christmas shopping with a trip to Best Buy then started towards home. I was contemplating stopping somewhere for dinner, but I spent quite a bit dining out in East Lansing, so I got the idea to stop at a grocery store instead.
Since I haven’t checked out the Harding’s in Portage yet and I was driving by it, I made the store on South Westnedge in the Southland Mall my stop.
My only experience with Harding’s is the store on Cork Street in Kalamazoo. I wasn’t super impressed. I mean, I liked the store, but it was cramped and looked to be an older building. This building in Portage is the exact opposite. Read more…
Cottage Inn Pizza – Milwood
4025 Portage StreetWhen we lived in Lansing, we had a helluva time trying to find a good pizza place. We tried almost everything from the few local places to the regional chains. We weren’t having much luck.
One of the first weekends there, we tried Cottage Inn. It was ok, but it wasn’t great. It was typical chain fare.
A few months later, I was out-of-town and J wanted pizza. She called Cottage Inn and they offered her a choice in crust size. That was an option we didn’t know was available. J got a thin crust and from that moment on, we had our pizza place in Lansing. I don’t think we even ordered from anywhere else after finding Cottage Inn’s thin crust.
I was coming home pretty late from East Lansing last night and when I called J to let her know I was leaving, she asked about dinner. I said I was fine, but I could eat if she wanted to order a pizza. I suggested she just call Bilbo’s again, but she got the idea to see if there were any Cottage Inn’s near us. She found one not too far away. Read more…
Bell’s Greek Pizza – M.A.C., East Lansing
225 M.A.C. AvenueAfter spending the afternoon killing time before work, I was now faced with a longer than usual lunch break. Now, I had another couple hours to kill. Since I had just eaten an hour or so ago, a big lunch was out of the question. I wasn’t even really sure I wanted anything at all.
I went to Barnes & Noble first to look for a couple things then I just started walking around downtown East Lansing. Didn’t really know where I was going, but when I ended up on M.A.C Avenue, I figured I could use a slice of pizza..
Bell’s Greek Pizza has two locations in East Lansing and they’re not very far apart. I’ve eaten at the Grand River Avenue location before, but never the location on M.A.C. Avenue near Albert Avenue.
The downtown location is a small street front building. There are a handful of tables in the front of the space. The order area and kitchen is in the back.
I’m a huge fan of pizza-by-the-slice locations. It’s one of my favorite things about college campuses. You can get just a couple slices for under five bucks. I love it. Read more…
Taco Bell – Grand River, Okemos
2030 W. Grand River AvenueTime to kill and no place to go. It can be a dangerous thing. I had to check out of my hotel at noon, but I didn’t have to be to work until two. I decided to hit up the Meridian Mall in Okemos. I thought maybe I could kill some time, but I was wrong. Mall’s don’t do anything for me.
After I left the mall, I headed to Best Buy. Since it was the middle of the afternoon, I thought maybe I could actually play their display DJ Hero. I hung out with a pretty popular Chicago club DJ while I was in college and he taught me a little bit about mixing. I don’t want to buy DJ Hero, but I wanted to see how the game worked.
It wasn’t all that fun, so I only played a couple songs then checked out some other Wii games. Scoped out some titles for myself and for my in-laws for Christmas.
After I left Best Buy, I still had over an hour. I was a little hungry and not in the mood to go hunt something out. In the Best Buy parking lot was a Taco Bell and a Burger King. I picked the less of two evils. Read more…
The Original Big John Steak & Onion – Okemos
3490 Okemos RoadBack in East Lansing and there’s a little bit of nostalgia this weekend. I had to be in town a couple days, so I went looking for the cheapest hotel I could find. Usually, the two Red Roof Inn’s are the cheapest and recently, I’ve been staying out in Delta Township because it’s five bucks cheaper. This weekend, however, I decided to stay at the East Lansing Red Roof Inn.
I say there’s a little bit of nostalgia because two years ago, J and I made a frantic, last-minute trip to Lansing to find a place to live. We had been in Bristol, TN for the Nextel Cup Race the weekend before. She got the phone call on Tuesday that she had been hired in Lansing. We were at her parents in Chicago because we didn’t have to be back to work in Peoria until Thursday. We packed up the car again on Tuesday and drove to Lansing to find a place to live. We only had a week and a half to make the move.
We had stayed in a Red Roof Inn in Johnson City, TN and were happy with it, so we found one in Lansing and we spent our first night in what would become our new home at the Red Roof Inn on Dunkel Road. This recent trip was the first time I had stayed at that hotel since that first night.
We were given a pretty long lunch break, so I decided to go check in and drop my stuff off. Before that, I wanted to grab a sandwich or something somewhere so I could eat while watching ESPN in my room. I couldn’t really think of much other than fast food chains along Jolly Road so I started driving towards Okemos. Read more…
Jaspare’s Pizza & Fine Italian Foods – Portage
5000 Sprinkle RoadYesterday, when J and I went Christmas tree hunting, we passed a pizza joint on the corner of Sprinkle and Kilgore in Portage. I remember seeing it when we moved to Kalamazoo, but J said she doesn’t remember seeing it. For some reason, seeing pizza on the way to get a tree made J hungry for pizza. I’m always hungry for pizza so we decided to go back for dinner.
Jaspare’s Pizza & Fine Italian Foods is fairly new to Portage. The original location is on Main Street in Vicksburg. This location is right on the corner of Sprinkle and Kilgore Roads in Portage. There is access to the parking lot from either street.
We stopped in for dinner on a Thursday night around 5:30. There were no cars in the parking lot and not much activity inside. By the time we got inside, an employee was waiting for us at the cash register. He pointed out a couple specials which were written on a dry erase board and handed us a paper menu to look over.
When it comes to pizza, J and I are pretty easy. We like thin crust. She likes plain cheese. I like pepperoni. We’ll go for a specialty pizza every now and then, but more often than not, it’s a half cheese/half pepperoni. Read more…
Press Release – Tickets on Sale for Winter Beer Fest
From the Michigan Brewers Guild website…
5th Annual Winter Beer Festival – February 27th, 2010 – Fifth Third Ballpark – Grand Rapids, MI
The 5th Annual Winter Beer Festival will take place Saturday, February 27th, 2010 at the Fifth Third Ballpark in Comstock Park, just north of Grand Rapids. The Winter Festival is a unique opportunity to sample some of the best beers in the world, all brewed in Michigan. We are expecting more than 35 Michigan microbreweries and brewpubs to participate and there will be more than 200 different beers available to sample. The event is open from Noon to 5:00pm. Enthusiast Members of the Michigan Brewers Guild will be allowed to enter the Festival an hour early at 11:00am. The Festival will take place in the outfield parking lot at the ballpark this year and breweries will be located within several large tents. The tents, combined with body heat will help take the edge off the temperature, but please recognize that the Festival is an outdoor event and dress accordingly. Hats, mittens, boots and long-johns are recommended to keep you warm. We are planning to have a central bonfire, but only if the weather cooperates with low wind conditions. It would be helpful if everyone could hoist a Michigan beer and do a fair weather dance. We are hoping for good weather for a late February day in Michigan, but the Festival will take place snow, rain or shine.
The cost to enter the Festival is $35 in advance and $40 at the gate if tickets are still available. Last year’s Festival sold out in advance and we have allowed for more attendance but advance ticket purchase is suggested. Tickets can be purchased here on our website, at the Whitecaps website, at participating member breweries and at select retail outlets. Please see the related post on the MASH (our blog) for an updated list of ticket outlets. 15 drink tokens are included with a ticket and each token is good for one 3 ounce beer sample. Additional tokens are available for purchase inside the Festival for 50 cents each. Local West Michigan bands will be the featured live entertainment. Food will be available for purchase.
Festival attendees must be 21 years of age or older and have ID to enter. Designated Drivers are encouraged and DD tickets will be available for $5 each.
Please look for information to be posted on the MASH regarding hotels, participating breweries, ticket outlets and other information. The MASH will be updated as new information becomes available. Please feel free to make a post of your own if you are organizing a bus or have something else to share.
SW Michigan Dining 