Daddy Pete’s BBQ
2921 Eastern Avenue SEBBQ is the perfect take out food during this pandemic, no? It’s quick, delicious and holds up pretty well on the car ride back to wherever it is you’re going to eat it.
I picked up another shift in Grand Rapids a a few weekends ago. There wasn’t much to do so I did some housekeeping type things in the office that I don’t normally have time to do when I’m in the Grand Rapids office.
Dinner was a priority and I wanted to make sure I got something good. I had an order for Slow’s but decided to check to see if there was any local BBQ places open that I haven’t been to yet.
I found Daddy Pete’s BBQ on Eastern Avenue SE just south of 28th Street. The small brick building is shared by two businesses. The location seemed familiar to me when I set out to make the trek down Eastern Avenue and once I got there, I realized it had been a BBQ placed named Taste of Tennessee several years ago.
Read more…Wing Doozy (Wyoming)
2359 Health Drive SW #120I don’t think I’m different from most people when I say I’m always in the mood for wings…..right?
I had another shift in the Grand Rapids area and found myself in Wyoming near Metro Hospital. I met the co-worker I was assigned to work with that night so once we completed our task, we went our separate ways.
It was dinner time and there’s a lot of options in this area of Wyoming. Most of the restaurants in the area are chains but there are a couple local spots. The one with “Wing” in the name is the one that won my attention.
Wing Doozy is a small local chain of three restaurants. This one is on Health Drive SW in Wyoming but you can see it from Byron Center Avenue just off the M-6 exit. The other stores are in Hudsonville and Plainfield Township.
Read more…The Grilling Company
6231 W. River Drive NEI worked a few nights out of the Grand Rapids office a couple of weeks ago and saw a chance to find food from places that weren’t there when I worked there regularly. I was really in the mood and started looking for BBQ.
It seems like there aren’t as many options as there used to be. The ones I knew of are either closed for the pandemic or gone. I was only finding chains that were open.
I expanded my search a little bit to get away from the heart of the city. I was able to find a place in Belmont that’s really not too far away and was still open. I told the co-worker I was working with I was going to get dinner and call if she needed me.
The Grilling Company is located in a small strip mall on very busy West River Drive in Belmont. It’s about three and a half miles from US-131 just before you get to the Rogue River Bridge. The space isn’t very big but even during regular times, it’s a carry-out only restaurant. Right now, they have a sign on the door asking only two people be in the building. It’s easy to see through the large glass windows. I saw two people inside so I waited outside until one came out.
The Local
9805 E. M-89Pretty sure I tell you every year about how much I we love the Santa at Gull Meadow Farms. We’ve been going from the beginning when Santa used to be inside the market and we’d pick out a Christmas tree in the greenhouse afterwards.
Santa is now an experience at Gull Meadow. He’s moved to the greenhouse to accommodate the large lines and they’ve set up lights, photo stations, and so many other things to do.
We were concerned we wouldn’t get to see this Santa this year. We weren’t going to go wait in line with a large crowd.
I saw a Facebook post from Gull Meadow just before Thanksgiving advertising their “Dear Santa” event. It had timed entry and limited the number of people in the greenhouse at any time. This sounded good and we knew they’d have a good set-up for a socially distanced Santa…because everything they do, they do well.
We did our Santa thing. Got our pictures. Told Santa what we wanted. All while staying safe.
Our plan for the rest of the day included making a gingerbread house. You know those kits never have enough candy so I suggested going to the Hardings in Richland to pick up more candy. J told me to find a place to eat and we’d order before hitting the grocery store.
I’m pretty much picking places right now that have online ordering. I looked at a few places in Richland and the one that did was The Local….so we ordered from The Local.
The Local is just outside of the city limits of Richland in Richland Township. The restaurant is on M-89 in a small building that holds a couple of other things besides the restaurant on the east side. I should point out here that The Local in Richland should not be confused with The Local Beer Cellar & Pizza Oven in Centreville. The Richland Local was around first and the Centreville Local actually added on to their name to avoid confusion….which was happening.
(I made a mistake here. I confused The Local in Richland with a different bar I ate at several years ago. The Local in Richland opened in 2017. The Local in Centreville opened in 2014. I apologize to both businesses for my slopiness here)
Read more…Wing Heaven (Portage)
6005 S. Westnedge AvenueWings! Oh man, do I love wings. I’ve actually found a lot of good wings from bars in Kalamazoo during this whole pandemic thing.
CJ’s Pub and Waldo’s Tavern had been my go-to’s in the before time. Online ordering and curbside pickup have switched to Main Street Pub and Jac’s Pizza being my go-to places. And sure, there’s Buffalo Wild Wings and Wing Etc. but those places only get the call when I’m being lazy….which can be quite often.
I have always loved the wing options in Grand Rapids. There have been multiple Wing Heaven and Wing Kingz restaurants at different spots and I’m pretty sure I’ve hit them all. The wings are always crispy, juicy, and super delicious.
I’m told there was a Wing Heaven in Kalamazoo before we moved here in 2009. It was on Douglas Avenue in the spot now occupied by Cookie’s Creole ‘n’ Soul (previously Cookie’s Five Star Grill).
Now, Wing Heaven has made a return to the Kalamazoo area.
The new Wing Heaven location is actually in Portage on the corner of Westnedge and Milham Avenue. The building was previously a Scholtzky’s Deli. They closed back in February right before COVID shut everything down.
Read more…Capri Drive-In Theater
119 W. Chicago RoadFinding a way to celebrate birthday’s has been one of the challenges during this pandemic. It started off with J’s in March not long after the first Stay-At-Home order was issued. We thought/were hopeful, that would be the only celebration we’d have to do under pandemic rules.
Boy were we wrong. Birthday’s, anniversary’s, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Easter, Thanksgiving, Halloween, etc….we’ve had to adapt all of our celebrations.
We always knew B turning 5 would be the hardest to pull off. He had been talking about what he wanted to do for his birthday party since his last birthday party at Skyzone. He had all sorts of big plans….and none of them were doable under the current situation.
We did everything we could think of to make the day special. J took him to get his favorite breakfast from Dunkin Donuts, our families sent presents that we opened, L and I played Mario Kart with him…we wanted the day to be special even though it was just us.
We had one trick up our sleeves. For reasons we can’t explain, our kids love the movie The Croods. They have been watching that movie on long car trips for several years. It’s a fine movie…I laughed the first 100 times or so I watched it…but it’s always been funny to us that The Croods is the movie that became the car movie.
We were pretty bummed when we saw Dreamworks was releasing a sequel in theaters right now. There was no way we were going to go to an indoor theater. The hope was Dreamworks would release the movie on VOD at a higher price like they did for Trolls: World Tour.
I just said we wouldn’t go to an indoor theater….lucky for us, there was an outdoor theater that decided to open up for the holiday weekend and had The Croods: A New Age as part of their double feature.
The Capri Drive-In Theater is one of only a few drive-ins left in the state of Michigan. The two screen theater is on US-12/Chicago Road west of Coldwater proper in Batavia Township. As you drive by on US-12, it’s hard to miss the lighted marquee and the giant screens towering over the road.
Little Mexico
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3501 Stadium DriveYou have to eat tacos on Tuesday’s….right? I mean, isn’t it like a law or something.
I was craving tacos this past Tuesday. Thankfully, Kalamazoo has a lot of good, authentic Mexican places now to get tacos from. I typically stick to two of them. Either Los Brothers or La Familia…but this taco Tuesday, I wanted to branch out.
OK, really there’s just a new taco place on the way from my house to my office and I’ve been looking for an excuse to stop in.
Little Mexico is on Stadium Drive in the restaurant space that used to be Menna’s Joint. It’s right next to Sweetwater’s Donut Mill and you can get to the restaurant either through it’s own driveway or the one in to Sweetwater’s.
Read more…Two Fellas Grill (Kalamazoo)
2730 W. Michigan AvenueLate night food is definitely one of the perks of living near a college campus. Late night pizza, sandwiches, wraps,…anything typically used to soak up alcohol.
I haven’t needed the soaking up alcohol part in a long time but I work odd hours and always appreciate when there’s more than just fast food options when I get off work.
I like those places for lunch to just because I like their food.
I stopped at Two Fellas Grill new location on Michigan Avenue in the building that used to be a Wendy’s (and more recently, the short lived Yummies) next to Campus Pointe last week for lunch.
Read more…Laura’s Little Burger Joint
47141 M-51There are so many great burger places across the state. Mlive has done their best burger search. There are blogs just focused on burgers in the Detroit Metro area. There are just so many great burgers in the state of Michigan.
One of the places that comes up quite a bit when talking about good burgers is a small drive thru place just outside of Decatur. It has taken me many, many years to be in Decatur while the place is actually open but last week, I finally made it.
Laura’s Little Burger Joint is southwest of Decatur on M-51. The small blue and white burger stand is near Celery Center Road in Hamilton Township. It’s a walk up type place with a parking lot on one side and a drive thru pick up window on the other.
Read more…Burgrz
3204 Walton BoulevardOne more day in the Detroit area. I actually got to sleep in a little bit as my co-worker got up to find a coffee shop.
She texted me about 9:30 and asked if I could meet her in Rochester by 11:00. I had to get my butt moving and get my car loaded back up but I told her I was on my way.
Construction between Detroit and Rochester actually made me cut this pretty close but I made it on time. We did what we needed to do for the day and then about 1:30, we were wrapped up and heading back towards our respective homes.
I woke up pretty late so I hadn’t eaten yet and wanted to get something before I hit the road. I did a quick google search and found a quick service burger place not too far out of the way.
Burgrz is right across the street from Oakland University near the corner of Walton Boulevard and Adams Street in the University Square shopping center. There are quite a few places to eat in this shopping center including a Jersey Mike’s right next door and a Coney Island a few shops down.
Read more…
SW Michigan Dining 