Buddy’s Pizza (Grand Rapids)
4061 28th Street SEGood news! Buddy’s Pizza is moving to Kalamazoo…er Portage actually. The Detroit pizza chain made the announcement in August not long after Old Chicago closed. Pretty much everyone assumed another Credit Union would go into that building…but surprise! It’s gonna be a Buddy’s!
That reminded me, I haven’t been to the Grand Rapids Buddy’s Pizza yet.
I spent a couple of days on Mackinac Island for work and had to stop in Grand Rapids on my way home. I asked J if she wanted me to bring home pizza. We hit the 11:00 AM ferry back to Mackinaw City so it was going to be right around dinner time when I got home.
I saw Buddy’s uses DoorDash for their online ordering which made my life easier. When I dropped my colleague off at the office, I put in an order for a four square cheese pizza and a four square Motown Museum.
The drive across town was about twenty minutes and that’s how long my pizza ordered was predicted to take.
The Grand Rapids Buddy’s Pizza location is on 28th Street just east of East Paris Avenue. The stand alone store used to be a Carrabba’s Italian Grill but that closed down abruptly at the beginning of 2017. Buddy’s dropped the Italian countryside decor and went with their own blue, red, and yellow color scheme. Read more…
Broken Picture Links
I’m aware the pictures aren’t working on the blog right now…and that’s kind of a problem. Photobucket changed up their hosting plan and now none of my photos work. I’m trying to figure it out with Photobucket and get the site back to normal soon. The pictures are all still on their site, they just changed their hosting terms while I was on vacation….we just got back from Puerto Rico so I have a lot of cool things to blog about but I would like to get the photos back online before I get going on those.
Sanders Chocolate & Ice Cream Shopped (Mackinac Island)
7330 Main StreetMy family doesn’t even ask anymore. It’s just expected I come home from my work trips to Mackinac Island with fudge.
I went for a walk Saturday night just because I haven’t really spent much time in downtown on any of my trips there. In the past, we’ve always stayed either at Mission Pointe or in Mackinaw City. This time, we stayed downtown at the Lake View Hotel so it gave me some more time to just enjoy downtown Mackinac Island at night.
A few of the fudge shops were already closed and a few were starting the closing process but I found one shop that still had the light on and doors open..plus, it was one of the shops I haven’t bought fudge from before..so they were the ones that got to make my family happy on this trip.
Sanders Chocolate and Ice Cream Shoppe has a pretty rich Michigan history. The Sanders name dates back to the 1870’s in the Detroit area. Over the last 140 years or so, the Sanders chain grew to as many as 57 stores in the Great Lakes area. By 2002, almost all of them had closed and the company name and recipes were bought by a competitor who chose to keep the Sanders name on some of the stores in Detroit. There are nine Sanders stores now. Eight of those in Metro Detroit. The other is on the corner of Main and Astor Streets in downtown Mackinac Island.
Island Slice Pizzeria
7248 Main StreetMy Saturday work day on Mackinac Island was long. I got to the Grand Hotel about 8:30 AM and left a little before 8:30 PM…and I still wasn’t done but I decided to work in my hotel room back at the Lake View Hotel because I could get a bottle of Pepsi from the vending machine there for $2 compared to buying a CAN of Coke for $4 from the Grand.
I was still on a pretty tight deadline but I was hungry. I didn’t eat all day because, again, everything is expensive at the Grand and even though it’s company money, I still feel bad spending that much on lunch.
I decided just to see if there was a pizza place I could pick something up from and eat while I was finishing up my work for the day. I quickly found what appears to be the only pizzeria on the Island and put in my order.
Island Slice Pizzeria is on the north end of downtown across from The Pink Pony. The restaurant is a classic counter service pizzeria tucked in between a fudge shop and a cafe in one of Mackinac Islands classic vintage buildings.
Goodfellow’s Wings and Things
1359 Hoban StreetJ and I have lived in Michigan for a little over ten years now. We’ve been to Mackinac Island for pleasure once. I’ve been there several times over those ten years for work. This past weekend, I took another work trip to the Island and this time, I actually got to stay on the Island.
We go to the Island around noon and Friday and worked until almost 9:00. My colleague headed back to the hotel about a half hour before I did. He said he was going to head to the bar in the hotel and if I wanted to go to dinner, to meet him there and we’d figure it out.
I joined him at Goodfellow’s Wings and Things..which is one of three dining options at the Lake View Hotel on Main Street. The sports bar is around the corner on Hoban Street but you can access it from the hotel lobby by going through Goodfellow’s Italian Chop House.
Market on Michigan Avenue
119 E. Michigan Avenue- Kalamazoo, MI 49007
- (269) 775-1445
- Website
- Menu (Posted on Facebook page weekly)
It wasn’t too long ago downtown Kalamazoo had Irving’s Market and Deli. I would go there a few times a week and either get something off their hot bar or pick up a salad.
Then, Irving’s closed…..and for several months, there was no market downtown.
About the same time Irving’s closed, it was announced that a new market was opening on Michigan Avenue. It took about eight months, but late last month, Market on Michigan Avenue held their Grand Opening.
Market on Michigan Avenue…or MOMA..is on Michigan Avenue right next to the Subway in downtown Kalamazoo. The business takes up two storefronts. One used to be the Biggby Coffee. The other has been empty for quite a while.
Breakfast at Tiffiny’s (Oshtemo Township)
5222 W. Main StreetThere’s nothing better than getting up on Sunday morning and going to breakfast.
We don’t do it nearly enough because we have a hard time getting moving in the morning. Weekends at home are “veg” days.
J was craving breakfast last Sunday when I got up around 9:00 and asked about going out for breakfast. She mentioned the new Breakfast at Tiffiny’s location in Oshtemo….she had me at “breakfast.”
Breakfast at Tiffiny’s recently opened a second location in the Maple Hill Pavillion on West Main Street in Oshtemo Township. The restaurant is sandwiched between Five Below at Cato Fashions. It’s in the storefront that used to be Maurices.
The Dawg House
402 E. Highway StreetThere’s nothing like delicious quick fried chicken. There are so many days I go to the Shell station on the corner of Michigan and Westnedge because they have Chester Chicken. It’s always ready. It’s always hot. It’s cheap and it’s quite tasty.
My colleague and I were driving through Vicksburg last week on our way back to Kalamazoo. We didn’t plan on stopping in Vicksburg but I was thirsty and I got an idea for lunch.
I knew there was an old IGA Store across the street from the high school that has a deli inside. I stopped in there a couple of months ago to check it out but there was a wait on the chicken because it was after the meal rushes. I just grabbed a Pepsi that night and figured I come back on my next stop through Vicksburg.
The Dawg House is on the corner of Highway Street and Davis Avenue on the southeast side of town across the street from Vicksburg High School. The little building is an old IGA store that used to be known as Fink’s Butcher and Deli Shop.
Burgers and Brews
1101 S. Centreville RoadLabor Day weekend has always meant a trip to the beach. Things changed this year though. Nana and Grandpa moved to Michigan and have a house on a lake. We traded in the big lake for Nana and Grandpa’s lake. The kids noticed at first but in the end, they probably had a lot more fun with the sunset cruises than they would sitting in the sand being forced to wait for sunset over the lighthouse.
My weekend was pretty messed up. I worked 12 hours on Thursday, 14 hours on Friday then had to get up at 2:30 AM to fill in for a 3:30 AM shift in Grand Rapids on Saturday. J and the kids went to Sturgis without me on Friday. That was the plan anyway because I also had to work on Labor Day so I was just going to meet them out there on Saturday morning.
Needless to say, I was exhausted on Saturday getting only about two hours of sleep the night before. I took a short nap when I got there then we spent the day hanging out by the lake. J’s mom had just seen an advertisement for a new(er) restaurant in Sturgis and asked if we wanted to go there for dinner.
Burgers & Brews is inside Sturgis Bowl on South Centreville Road (M-66) south of South Street on the southside of Sturgis. The bowling area has been in Sturgis for quite a long time but this restaurant looks like it’s just been around a couple of years.
Portillo’s Hot Dogs (Champaign)
2306 N. Prospect AvenueIn your 20’s, it seems like all you do is go to weddings. Weekend after weekend after weekend is filled with weddings.
In your late 30’s, weddings are a little more rare and usually just family, but a new thing is popping up. 40th birthday parties.
I’m at that age. I turn 40 in October. A lot of my friends are also turning 40 and most of them are getting birthday parties like we’re still 5-years-old. Only now instead of cake and ice cream, they are full of cheap beer and fireworks.
There are very few people I still maintain contact with from my childhood but there is one guy who has always remained close not only to me but to my entire family. His 40th birthday party was a couple of weeks ago in Pana, IL.
I’m about 99.9% sure you’ve never heard of Pana. It’s a small town in Christian County, IL. It’s much closer to St. Louis than it is Chicago.
We would have needed a babysitter for the whole weekend so J decided to stay home. My parents were going to the party as well so I pretty much just hung at their house until we made the drive south.
I knew I wasn’t going to stay in Pana all night. It was just going to be a thing where I made an appearance because he is a friend and it was really important for my mom that I go. I didn’t know anyone other than my family and his family so there wasn’t a lot for me to do. I stayed through the fireworks show (yes, there was a professional fireworks show) then started the 5-hour (6 with the time change) trek home.
I had eaten a sandwich at the party but I was still pretty hungry when I left. I knew that Champaign was a little over an hour away and I knew they had gotten a Portillos since the last time I was in the area. Portillo’s isn’t always my first choice when it comes to Italian beef but it is a good choice and one I won’t pass up if there’s one nearby.
Portillo’s Hot Dogs is on Prospect Avenue near Town Centre Boulevard on the north side of Champaign. There really isn’t a nearby Interstate exit to get off on. My GPS took me north on I-57 past I-74 and backtrack at the Olympian Drive exit.
The restaurant sits in a highly commercialized area in front of a Menards. The large restaurant sort of looks like a 50’s diner from the outside with a lot of neon and steel panels. The super efficient drive through wasn’t set up because it was almost 10:00 at night by the time I got there. There were only a few cars in the parking lot so getting in and getting out was easier than it’s ever been. Read more…
SW Michigan Dining 