Driving to Dives and Diners

The band scored an out-of-town gig this weekend, so Friday night we loaded up the car and made the trek up to Detroit for a show with our friends the Sons of Adray. The show was at a cozy little dive called the New Way Bar. The New Way was the perfect spot for our bands’ reunion: dark, hot, and smokey with Elvis and British heavy metal serving as the between band soundtrack and on of the coolest sound guys ever. The beer selection at the New Way is almost exclusively domestic bottles and cans and the liquor shelf was comprised mostly of whiskey. You could pay a few dollars more for a Heineken or a Corona, but then again you could also pay some one to punch you until you felt tipsy. Basically what I’m trying to say here is that the New Way is the quintessential dive bar with an uncharacteristically clean rest room. After playing and sweating and partying into the night and sleeping it off on chairs and couches and floors and the Adray’s drummer’s house we headed back to Ohio sometime around 12:30 or 1:00pm. Our mission for the drive home, besides a safe return, was sweet, sweet sustenance.
http://www.myspace.com/newwaybar
http://www.myspace.com/sonsofadray

We began our cruise down 75 South on the lookout for signs of food. Freeway-side signage only pointed the way towards Bob Evanses, Burger Kings, and Big Boys, but when you’re out of town why eat what you can eat at home. We needed something local and new. And that’s when I saw it: “Beef Jerky Unlimited, Exit 6.” That sign was all I needed to remind me of the last time we hit the D for a show. On our way back we stopped for breakfast at an amazing little diner somewhere between the Motor City and the Glass City, but all I could remember about it was that it was next door to the beef jerky store. So we pulled off 75 at Luna Pier and made our way to Gander’s Family Restaurant.

I have no idea how long Gander’s has been in Luna Pier, but the building and hand-painted sign suggest a long time. The inside, however was updated at some point; the late 80s would be my guess, but it’s a bright, friendly space with booths lining the walls of the small dining room, a few tables in the middle, and a counter that serves as the (gasp!) smoking area. We seated ourselves and ordered water and coffee. The coffee at Gander’s is exactly what a diner should serve: dark, rich coffee that tastes like coffee. No fancy roasts or blends just flavorful, rejuvenating coffee. And thankfully, too, as it seems like it’s harder and harder to find a good, simple cup anymore. Sure, there are a number of excellent local boutique shops in the area and chains like Starbucks offer a great brew, but sometimes a simpler cup is what the doctor orders. Anyways, I’m digressing. Gander’s menu is exactly what one would expect from such and establishment, burgers, hot sandwiches, chicken/steak/meatloaf in the entrees, and breakfast served all day.

I couldn’t remember for the life of me what I had last time, but I knew it was breakfast and it was good. I looked over the breakfast page a few times and ultimately arrived on the Southern Sausage Omelet. Filled with cheese and hash browns the Southern Sausage is an excellent foundation for the generous helping of sausage gravy ladled on top. Now, sausage gravy is something I’ve only recently warmed to, but if every restaurant made theirs as well as Gander’s I’d probably be ordering it on everything. Thick, rich, and creamy, the gravy was jammed full of bits of spicy breakfast sausage and the whole thing created a symphony of simplicity when tasted all together. The slight tang of the American cheese and spiciness of the sausage counter-pointed the creaminess of the gravy with the potatoes and perfectly cooked eggs serving as the melody to the more flavorful components’ harmonies. A breakfast at Gander’s comes with a side of hash browns so I go to sample them by themselves, also delicious; brown and crispy on the outside, firm but yielding on the inside. But does such deliciousness and opulence come with a hefty price tag? Not at Gander’s it doesn’t. My check for my food, Joe’s Western Omelet (their most popular item) and two coffees was just a few cents north of $16, not a bad price especially considering I didn’t feel the need to eat again until about 9:30 that night.
http://www.yelp.com/biz/ganders-family-restaurant-luna-pier http://www.cityoflunapier.com/LocalBusinesses/tabid/5463/Default.aspx

Gander’s is certainly light on flash and flare, but they more than make up for a lack of fanciness with excellent food, friendly service and a damn fine cup of coffee. This restaurant is absolutely worth the hour’s layover in Luna Pier, plus it gives you an excuse to visit the pier and Beef Jerky Unlimited which offers way more flavors of jerked animal flesh than I could ever imagine (gator or buffalo jerky, anyone?).
http://beefjerkyunlimited.com/site/index.php

Breakfast Befit the Betrothed

So check this out: I'm going to get married. Yeah, your fatty foodie friend popped the question right after preparing a rack of smoky babyback ribs, baked beans, and sauteed zucchini and yellow squash. That was the last day of our vacation, so on the way back to civilization the next morning we were naturally looking for a local breakfast spot. What we found was the Windmill Restaurant in Holland, Michigan.



Some cursory internet research tipped us off to this place, a cozy greasy-spoon-type place, tucked into the quaint downtown area. This is the kind of joint where you'd expect the service to be as buttery as the food, and I'll be damned if it didn't deliver on both counts. It's pretty clear that they're known for their breakfasts, even though they do have a lunch menu as well.

Words to live by: "Breakfast Served Anytime." This is how you know you're about to eat well and hearty.

Standard diner breakfast fare abounds on the top half of the menu page, but things start to get interesting around the house specialties. I'm intrigued by something called a Bird's Nest: a pile of hash browns and bacon bits, topped with cheddar cheese and two eggs:



I got my eggs over medium because I didn't want a yolk-y mess. Props to the short-order cook for nailing that. As great as that looks, here's the best part:



A BIG FUCKING CINNAMON ROLL!!! Actually, they give you the choice of this, a muffin, or their homemade toast (as in, they bake their own bread, then toast it). I had to put the quarter there to give you a sense of scale, but even that's misleading. This thing was huge. Like, eat it with both hands huge.

As amazing as my breakfast was shaping up to be, I could not have been prepared for what landed in front of Erin. She ordered a little something called the "Hashbrown Omelette," which I assumed would be a traditional omelette stuffed with hashbrowns, which seemed like a nice convenience for those of us who tend to combine our breakfast foods. Wow, was I wrong...



THE OMELETTE IS INSIDE THE HASHBROWNS!!! I'm honestly not sure if there's even eggs in there. I do know that it's a greasy melange of cheese, sausage, and onions inside what appears to be about a pound of hash browns. This sucker is huge too - luckily they offer a half size for patrons who don't want to die of an immediate coronary. Take a look inside. How could you not want to put this in your taste hole?



If you ever find yourself in southwestern Michigan, get thee to the Windmill. Don't be upset by the lack of an actual windmill: the food will more than make up for it.

Postscript: After breakfast Erin told me that I'm never allowed to eat a hashbrown omelette, for fear that the imminent and inevitable cardiac arrest would spell the end of our marriage. 'Til death do us part indeed...