Road Tips

Villa Macri Ristorante - Granger, IN

My company has decided to consolidate parts of my territory and Indiana was going to be taken out of my mix of states that I cover.   I was a little upset about it, but it didn't result in a reduction of pay or benefits - just a more focused area that I will begin to travel to later in the year.  I wanted to make one last trip over to see some of my accounts in Indiana that I had gotten to know for nearly 20 years.  I ended up in the South Bend area one night and was in the mood for some Italian food.  I took a quick look for restaurants near my hotel and it turned out that there was one that was literally walking distance from my hotel - Villa Macri Ristorante.  I made the short walk over to Villa Macri for dinner that night.     

Just after World War II ended, George Macri met and young lady, Iole Toscano in Reggio-Calabria, Italy.  Three years later, the couple married and they immigrated to the United States in 1954 ending up in the South Bend area.  From this union two sons - Jerry and George, Jr. - and a daughter - Yvonne - became part of the Macri's young family.  George Macri, Sr. started a jewelry store in South Bend in 1956, but his wife, Iole, was known as a great baker, making breads, cakes and pastries for friends and family.  She wanted to have her own bakery, but was told many times that it would be impractical for her to have a bakery.  However, she persisted over the years and with the help of her husband and three children, Iole Macri opened Macri's Italian Bakery in 1978 directly next door to the family's jewelry store.  

In 1980, Jerry and George, Jr. purchased a building that had been a bar on Niles Ave. in downtown South Bend and gutted the place.  They refurbished the space and turned it into a small 36-seat delicatessen - Macri's Deli.  The delicatessen sold both sandwiches, meats, cheese and other special Italian items.  

Jerry ended up taking over the delicatessen and moved it to a strip mall he had developed on Grape Road in nearby Mishawaka.  George, Jr. transformed the former deli space into Carmela's Bakery named after his wife who learned to cook and bake from both her own mother and Iole Macri.  Eventually, the bakery became Macri's Bakery after Iole passed away in 2007 and Carmela's became a full-fledged Italian restaurant.  

Pictured right - Jerry Macri.  Photo courtesy South Bend Tribune.  

In 2007, Jerry decided to sell the strip mall he developed and he bought a plot of land in Granger and developed a small "Italian Village" complete with a gift shop, wine shop, a sports bar, and two restaurants in one - Macri's Deli and Villa Macri.  In 2008, Jerry Macri opened his spacious complex located just north of Indiana State Highway 23 and N. Main Street in Granger.  (see map)

I walked into the Villa Macri around 7:15 p.m. and found that they actually closed at 8 p.m.  (I'm guessing it had to do with staffing issues more than anything.)   I was greeted by two young women at the hostess station just inside the door.  The wine store appeared to be just down the way from the hostess stand, as well as a couple other shops.  

At first I asked if there was seating in the bar.  One of the girls said that there was and I asked if I could see the dining room and the bar before I figured out where I wanted to sit.  She pointed down a hallway and said, "They're down there."  I started to walk down the hallway and then I turned back figuring that I would get a menu and park myself somewhere if neither one of them was going to show me where it was.  

I asked for a menu and said, "I'll find a place myself.  No use walking all the way there and then having to come back."   The other young lady told me that she'd take me to the dining area.  

I was ushered down the long hallway toward the dining area.  There were Macri family pictures lining the hallway along with decorative Tuscan-style wall lighting.  At the end of the hall was a gelato/dessert bar.  Opposite the gelato/dessert bar was an enclosed banquet room for meetings and private functions.  Just outside the banquet room was an outdoor patio where Villa Macri hosts live music from time to time.   

About halfway down the hallway on the opposite side of the large meeting room was Villa Macri's sports bar.  It was empty and all the televisions were turned off.  It seemed so out of place in an Italian restaurant like Villa Macri.  Considering that they closed early through the week, closing at 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday - plus the fact that they weren't open on Sunday at all - it just seemed strange to have a sports bar in an Italian restaurant. 

The hallway emptied out into the bar area.  It featured a long curved marble-topped bar with a walnut back bar.  Old world Italian architecture with arches and a high ceiling were the highlights in the bar.  It was a slow night at Villa Macri and there were only two other guys sitting at the bar.   

The dining room on the other side of the bar featured faux Italian statues, faux vines and brick accents throughout the room.  Sturdy wooden tables covered with linen tablecloths were spaced around the room.  There was no one in the dining room.  I was starting to think that maybe I needed to go to someplace else given that hardly anyone was in the place and that could be a tell-tale sign.  But by this time it was 7:20 p.m. - 8:20 body-time - and I was hungry.  I told the young hostess that I was going to sit at the bar.  She handed me a menu and I took a seat at the bar.  

Ashley was the bartender that evening and she was doing chores behind the bar.  I could kind of tell that she didn't want to be waiting on anyone as she was sort of short and curt with her greeting as she was flying around behind the bar doing whatever.  She asked me what I wanted to drink and I got a pint of the Bell's Two-Hearted IPA that they had on tap.  

The menu featured typical Italian items - pasta dishes such as manicotti, tortellini, and lasagna, as well as steaks, chicken dishes, a pork osso bucco, and lamb chops were prominent on the menu.  Seafood entrees such as grilled salmon and scallops with risotto were also on the bill.  A number of appetizers including calamari, bruschetta, spinach artichoke dip and antipasto for two were available.  Curiously, appetizers such as chicken wings, nachos, and ahi tuna sashimi were available, as were a full slate of deli sandwiches from Macri's Deli.  I'm guessing that those were more for the crowd who would be coming in to the sports bar part of Villa Macri.  

They also had a number salads on the menu and I ended up starting out with a small Italian salad consisting of chopped romaine lettuce, sliced cherry tomatoes and shaved parmesan cheese.  Their house dressing is a pomegranate/balsamic vinegar that was served on the side.  Along with the salad came a basket of warm Italian rye bread and a plate of olive oil with red pepper flakes.  It was a good salad and the bread was fabulous.  I think I've had red pepper flakes in dipping oil once or twice before and I forgot how it jazzed up the flavor of the olive oil.    

I love ravioli and I find myself getting it quite a bit when I'm out at Italian restaurants these days.  Villa Macri had a whole section of specialty ravioli on their menu - you could get ravioli stuffed with veal, butternut squash, Italian cheese medley, beef, lobster and porcini mushroom in a garlic sauce were available.  I ended up getting the beef ravioli topped with Villa Macri's housemade marinara sauce.  The bowl had about a dozen large ravioli pillows stuffed with Italian-seasoned ground beef with a layer of marinara ladled on top.  

Everything about the dish was wonderful - the taste and consistency of the ravioli was excellent and the marinara had a sweet and tangy taste.  All the flavors mixed together made for a great Italian meal.  I had no problem finishing my plate and even used some of the Italian rye bread to sop up the remaining marinara sauce.  It was that good.  

I was sort of leery about Villa Macri when it was about 7:30 at night and there were only two other people in the place.  I almost left figuring that few people in such a big place didn't bode well for the food in the place.  But I'm glad I stayed.  Even the bartender warmed up and became more attentive as time went on.  My beef ravioli with marinara sauce was outstanding, and the Italian salad with the warm Italian rye bread was a great start to the meal.  I don't think I'll be back out in the South Bend area anytime soon, but if you're looking for a good Italian meal in Granger, Villa Macri is a great place to go.  

Harmony Brewing Company - Grand Rapids, MI

On our trip to Grand Rapids, MI, I was keen to try some of the nearly 5 dozen breweries/brewpubs in the area.  I had looked up some in advance and found that a good portion of the breweries served food.  Well, on our first night in Grand Rapids, my wife wasn't too whippy about going to a brewpub for dinner.  She saw a Cuban restaurant south and east of downtown Grand Rapids that she really wanted to try.  I decided to go along with her wishes and we found the restaurant.  We parked in the back, went around to the front door and pulled on it.  Locked.  Closed.  According to the sign on their front window, they were supposed to open at 5 p.m. and close at 9.  It was well past 5 p.m. when we were there.  My wife was crestfallen and wondered if I had a Plan B.  I did and it wasn't all that far away.  We ended up going over to the Harmony Brewing Company.  

Like most brewpubs, the genesis of the business usually starts in someone's home or basement.  And that's exactly what happened with brothers Jackson and Barry Van Dyke who started to brew their own beers at home around the start of the millennium.  The brothers eventually got into property management and helped develop some old buildings in Grand Rapids in the city's Uptown neighborhood.  However, their dream to open their own brewpub was always in the back of their minds.  

The brothers found an old building in the Eastown neighborhood of Grand Rapids that had been a liquor store for years before the place went out of the business and the building fell into neglect.  The building originally was built in 1928 and when Prohibition ended in 1933, it became a distribution center for Miller beer.  When the brothers bought the building in late 2009, they found product on the shelves, as well as bottles of soda pop still in long shut down coolers.  The Van Dyke brothers spent the first month of ownership of the building taking garbage and old inventory out of the main floor and the basement.  

Over the next two years, the Van Dyke brothers spent $300,000 on the transformation of the old building.  They used salvaged doors and floors throughout the place and their first beer vessels were re-purposed dairy tanks they bought on line from a dairy farm in Wisconsin.  Renovations took a little longer than they anticipated, mainly because the brothers were doing most of the build-outs themselves.  But in February of 2012, the Van Dyke brothers - along with their sister Heather - opened the doors to Harmony Brewing Company.  

Business turned out to be brisk and at times demand was so high for both beer and food at the original location that the Van Dyke's knew they needed to expand.  Since they were sort of locked in at Harmony Brewing, they found a 100-year-old-plus building on the west side of Grand Rapids that had originally been a sausage factory, but more recently had been a Mexican restaurant.  After renovations, the Van Dyke's opened Harmony Hall in 2015.  

We found Harmony Brewing Company at the corner of Wealthy St. SE and Lake Drive SE - a sort of convoluted intersection that puts Harmony Brewing inside a triangle.  (see map)  There's a small parking lot that we were able to get the last parking space when we drove in.  Other than that, parking is available on the street near the brewery.  

(A quick aside - we were sort of amused and somewhat curious about Wealthy Street and the origin of the name. It's a prominent street on the east side of Grand Rapids and we found ourselves on Wealthy Street a handful of times during our visit as there were a number of restaurants, shops and breweries along the way.  It almost sounded like a street on the board game Monopoly, or was named for one of the more well-to-do areas of the city.   It turns out that the street was named for the wife of one of Grand Rapids' first merchants and community leaders, Jefferson Morrison, who was also instrumental in platting out the city in the mid-19th century.  After losing his first wife to illness, Morrison married Wealthy Davis in 1850 and named one of the streets after his new wife.  That's it - the street was named as a loving gesture to Morrison's new wife.)

After getting inside, we entered the bar area and there was a hostess at the stand just inside the door.  The small bar featured a few stools and there were a small handful of booths in the bar area.  The hostess took us to a booth in the bar and dropped off a couple menus for us.  

There was a back dining area in Harmony Brewing that featured booths and tables with garage doors that would open for patio dining.  It had been raining and had cooled off after the front came through, so there was no outdoor dining that evening.  A small stage was in the corner that has been used for live music in the past, but there was a four-seater table on the stage during our visit.  

Our server that day was a young guy by the name of Keely who was a personable and helpful staffer throughout our visit.  We sampled a couple of their beers - the Fiddlestix American pale ale and the Pleasant Peninsula India pale ale - to start out.  We both liked the flavors of the Fiddlestix over the IPA and ended up getting that.  I was sort of surprised that my wife didn't get her usual vodka and cranberry juice as they had a full bar at Harmony Brewing.  

The menu is pretty basic at Harmony Brewing.  The main emphasis is on their wood-fired pizzas called by some as the best pizza in Grand Rapids.  But they also had appetizers such as house-made breadsticks that could be topped with either a pesto or with a balsamic vinegar, sea salt and oregano.  They also had pretzel rods with a beer-cheese sauce for appetizers, as well as a roasted red pepper dip served with kettle chips.  

My wife felt she needed some greens to start out with, so she ended up ordering a Caesar salad from their salads part of the menu for both of us to share.  For a dollar up-charge, she also got anchovies on the salad.  The romaine lettuce was cool and crisp with a nice house-made Caesar dressing along with fresh grated parmesan cheese and croutons.  Fresh-cracked black pepper was mixed in with the greens and dressing.  The salad was big enough for one person to have as a meal.

We ordered our usual sausage, pepperoni and mushroom pizza.  It was a Neapolitan-style pizza with a thin hand-tossed crust.  It was a good pizza - not the best we'd ever had - but it was still good.  I think my wife was not too enamored with the pizza because I think she had her heart set on having Cuban food.  But we ended up eating all of the 12" pizza.  

I knew we were going to go to Harmony Brewing and get one of their pizzas at some point during our visit to Grand Rapids.  Because the Cuban restaurant that my wife wanted to go to was closed for the evening, we ended up going there on our first night in town.  We enjoyed their Fiddlestix American pale ale, and my wife really liked the Caesar salad that she had ordered to start off with.  And the Neapolitan pizza we both shared was a good pizza.  Harmony Brewing's original location was a cozy and funky little joint, and the service we had was fun and friendly.  For our first visit to a brewery in Grand Rapids - a city that is known for their numerous breweries - Harmony Brewing was a good choice. 

Verde - Bettendorf, IA

A new contemporary Mexican restaurant had opened in a new development in downtown Bettendorf back in May and my wife and I had been wanting to give the place a try.  As we usually do, we wait about 90 days for a restaurant to work out its kinks and it was well past 90 days from when it opened when we finally made the trek to Verde to check the place out.  

Verde is the brainchild of Sid Rognoni who first came on to the culinary scene in Davenport about 10 years ago as a co-owner of the now-closed Bowls Urban Eats.  He also is involved with RAW, an upscale cocktail lounge with esoteric appetizers located in downtown Davenport.  In 2017, Rognoni - along with partner Ruben Garcia - opened Ruby's, a bike shop, craft beer, and brat house in downtown Davenport.  (To read the Road Tips entry on Ruby's, click here.)  

As part of a large revitalization of downtown Bettendorf near where the new I-74 bridges were being built, a multi-function property by the name of The Bridges was proposed for upscale lofts, retail and restaurant space.  Rognoni teamed with local chef Connor Larson - whose previous gig was at Bass Street Chop House - to come up with the eclectic cuisine for Verde.  Innovative seasonal selections with "out-of-box" thinking beyond traditional Mexican food was something Larson was wanting to focus on along with craft cocktails and craft beers.  In early May of this year, Verde opened to the public.  

You can see Verde when you cross over the Mississippi River on the I-74 bridges, but getting there can be a bit confusing.  Well, at least it was for us on our first time.  Verde has a State Street address, but as State Street - the one-way that heads east - curves up under the new approach west of the I-74 Bridge, it becomes Grant Street - which is the one-way that heads west in downtown Bettendorf.  After the approach, the road curves back at 16th Street and becomes State Street again.  (Got that?  We're going to have a test on this tomorrow morning.)  From either direction - west on Grant or east on State - take 16th Street south across State (or is it Grant? - I'm so confused!) and turn right on State street - which is a two-way street in The Bridges complex.  Verde is on the northwest side of one of the buildings at The Bridges with parking in lots west of the building.  (see map)

We were greeted by a young lady upon entering Verde who asked if we had been in before.  When we told her this was our first visit, she said in a sort of surprised tone, "Oh!  OK, well, welcome!"  The restaurant featured artisan hardwood flooring, color-tinted pinewood paneling, along with contemporary industrial lighting and ornamental balls hanging from the ceiling.  A unique portrait of a Mexican sugar skull woman was prominent on the back wall of the space.

The bar was part of the dining room area and featured a small variety of tequilas, draft beers and other liquors.  High-backed chairs lined the wood-topped bar and some flat screen televisions hung high on the wall on the back wall of the bar.   

The hostess ended up seating us in a booth near the back wall.  A young lady by the name of Veronica came over to greet us and we looked through the menus that were dropped off for us.  Veronica wanted to know if we wanted to start off with a drink.  Absolutely!

My wife was in the mood for a good margarita and they had some interesting drinks on their menu.  The watermelon paloma caught her eye, but she ended up she ended up getting the classic margarita.  I ended up getting the same thing.  

She thought Verde's classic margarita could have been a little more sweet, but I was fine with mine.  She likes the margaritas I make at home - 1 oz. fresh squeezed lime juice, 1 oz. Herradura silver, 1 oz. Cointreau (or Grand Marnier), a squeeze of organic blue agave syrup, then shaken with ice vigorously for about 15 to 20 seconds.  All that is then pour through the shaker strainer into a glass on ice.  It's good stuff.   

The menu at Verde that evening was a little sparse.  We were told by Veronica that they would be expanding the menu as time went on with more seasonal offerings.  Small plates such as rice and beans, elote-style grilled cauliflower, and a strawberry and beet salad were on the menu that day.  Large plates included a grilled  pork shoulder 'al pastor', achiote-glazed chicken with a molé sauce, and a traditional carne de res grilled beef dish topped with a black molé.  

They also had some of their signature house-made masa (corn) tacos on the menu and that's the direction we went.  We decided to go with the fish tacos and the barbacoa tacos that they had on the menu that evening.

The fish tacos were basically single thick strips of seared ahi topped with pickled veggies and shaved radish slices.  The tacos were finished with a slightly spicy macha salsa.  The ahi tacos were very good - the house-made corn tortilla shells had a very good flavor and texture.  These were very good tacos.   

The lamb barbacoa tacos were equally as good.  They featured thin strips of barbecue lamb, topped with a thick borracha salsa, a thin slice of onion and an avocado slice.  I had two of the lamb tacos and an ahi taco, while my wife had two fish and one lamb taco.  For a nice light meal, we were very happy with what we had.  

We haven't been back to Verde since our initial visit, but now that the weather is cooling down we're planning on getting back there to try their fall menu.  But the tacos we had on our first visit - the lamb barbacoa and the ahi tacos - were very good.  While my wife thought the margaritas could have been a bit more sweet in taste, I thought they were fine.  It's not necessarily inexpensive at Verde, but then again they bill themselves as a unique Mexican restaurant with a contemporary twist.  If you're looking for a basket of chips and salsa and fishbowl-sized margaritas as the start of your Mexican meal, then Verde isn't your place.  But if you're looking for something different in terms of the preparation and quality of the menu items, then I'd get to Verde as soon as you can.    

Prodigy Burger & Bar - Carmel, IN

Over in Indianapolis for some account meetings, I had finished a long day of traveling and decided to find some place that was close to my hotel in Carmel to get something to eat for dinner.  I was in the mood for a burger and some craft beers to throw down and I found a place on the Internet that seemed to fit the bill.  I ended up heading up the road to Prodigy Burger & Bar in the Clay Terrace shopping mall just south of 146th Street.  (see map)  

The Prodigy Burger & Bar is one of 5 locations around the greater Indianapolis area with another location in Kokomo.  The concept for a family-friendly burger and bar came from local restaurateur Jeremiah Hamman who brought the high-end steak franchise, Mo's - a Place for Steaks, to Indianapolis and Carmel just after the turn of the century.  After breaking from the investment group behind Mo's, Hamman eventually rebranded his two restaurants as Prime 47.  (Hamman was also a partner in the short-lived CharBlue Steakhouse in downtown Indianapolis and is a partner in a company that currently manages the concession stands at the Grand Park Sports Complex in nearby Westfield, IN.)  

When a Ted's Montana Grill closed at Clay Terrace in late 2016, the space sat vacant for a few weeks.  Hamman contacted the management of the outdoor mall and inquired about the former Ted's space.  While there were already a number of restaurants in the immediate area, Hamman envisioned a sort of neighborhood pub where families and friends could gather for craft burgers, sandwiches and libations.  The first Prodigy Burger & Bar opened on November 2nd, 2017.  

During the restoration/re-development of the Markland Mall in Kokomo, IN - 35 miles to the north of Carmel - Hamman saw an opportunity for a Prodigy Burger & Bar in the new mall lay-out.  He opened the second Prodigy in the fall of 2018.   

Both Prodigy Burger & Bar locations were going strong when Hamman decided to sell his interest in his two restaurants to O'Reilly's Holdings led by Keith Reilly and a handful of other investors.  The deal was struck in February of 2020 and O'Reilly's took over ownership of the two restaurants soon thereafter.  (O’Reilly’s Holdings also owned three other restaurant brands - O'Reilly's Irish Bar with locations in Indy, Fort Wayne and Speedway, as well as TwoDeep Brewing Co. in Indianapolis, and Detour American Grill - which later became a Prodigy Burger & Bar - in the affluent Geist area on the far northeast side of Indy.)   

Expansion was on the mind of O'Reilly's Holdings as they were looking at putting Prodigy locations in some of the former Stacked Pickle sports bars which had closed in March of 2020.  O'Reilly's opened a Prodigy location on the far south side of Indianpolis in Greenwood in August of 2020, then opened a second Carmel location on 106th St., and the fifth Indy-area Prodigy Burger & Bar opened near the IUPUI campus north and west of downtown Indianapolis.  

It was about 6:30 when I pulled into the Clay Terrace outdoor mall and found a parking spot in a lot behind Prodigy Burger & Bar.  They had a nice outdoor patio with wrought iron tables and chairs, but no one was seated outside.  It was a somewhat nice night - cloudy, but pleasant.  I was sort of surprised that no one was outside.

Color me even more surprised that there were just a handful of people in the restaurant when I walked in.  It was a nice place - wood floors, brick accents on the walls, a collection of booths and tables in the dining area.  But there were just three tables filled when I walked in just after 7 p.m.  I was starting to think this may be a bad idea.  

I took a seat at the bar and was greeted by Melissa who looked like she was pulling double duty as a server and a bartender.  She plopped down a menu on the bar top and asked what I would like to drink.  I saw that they had a Space Dust IPA from the Elysian Brewing Co. out of Seattle.  I signed up for one of those while I looked through the menu.  My first drink told me that the beer had gone flat.  But there was no one at the bar to let them know.  I just drank it.  

Burgers were, of course, the main selection at Prodigy Burger & Bar.  They had a list of about 12 burgers that featured flat-grilled beef.  For a $2.00 upcharge, you could get wagyu beef; for $5.00 more, you could get a bison burger.  They even had the vegetarian Beyond burgers available for a $2.00 upcharge.  Prodigy had four more burgers made with a proprietary blend of locally-sourced beef that were about $4.50 to $5.00 more than a regular beef patty.  

Some of the burgers on the menu included the Duke which featured two patties, pulled pork, bacon, smoked gouda, and BBQ sauce.  There was the Heavy Metal that had two patties, pepper jack cheese, chili and a Sriracha sauce.  And the Mac & Cheese burger featured two patties topped with American cheese, then topped again with house-made mac & cheese and bacon with a garlic aioli.  One of their top-end burgers was the "G.O.A.T." inspired by former Indianapolis Colts quarterback Peyton Manning who loved bacon cheeseburgers.  This burger featured a single half-pound special blend patty topped with cheddar cheese and four strips of thick cut bacon.  It was finished with lettuce, tomato, pickles and onions and a house-made sauce before going onto a sesame seeded bun.  

For people not looking for burgers, Prodigy had pork tenderloin sandwiches, various chicken breast sandwiches, a smoked beef brisket sandwich, fish and seafood entrees, and three different styles of mac & cheese bowls.  Prodigy also had gourmet hot dogs on the menu, along with a number of kids selections.  Appetizers including wings, loaded chili and cheese tots, beer-battered shrimp and beef brisket nachos were also available.  

A guy who I thought was the manager came out to work at one of the cash registers at the bar and he asked me - in a heavy British accent - if I was ready to order anything.  I couldn't tell him that my beer was flat - I had drank half of it already waiting to order.  So I placed my order with him.  

I ended up getting the Mushroom-Swiss burger and asked if I could some bacon on it, as well.  I had a choice of sides and I ended up getting panko-breaded onion rings.  The burger came on the "house" bun and had a healthy slab of Swiss cheese, a load of sautéed mushrooms and bacon that I wouldn't classify as thick cut.  

The burger certainly looked good when I looked it over.  But the first bite told me otherwise.  The burger was woefully overcooked and the bun was dry.  There wasn't any juice in the meat to drop onto the wax paper covering the cooking sheet that they used for a plate.  I started to pull the bun off the burger just to be able to get to some of the things that weren't dry - like the sautéed mushrooms.  They were the only saving grace for this burger.

The onion rings were also bland and over-cooked.  The panko-crust sort of flaked off with each bite - of which there weren't many of those, either.  I threw in the towel early and let Melissa know that I was through.  

Prodigy Burger & Bar had so much promise when I pulled up in front of the place.  It looked nice from the outside and I had high hopes for the experience.  However, not seeing anyone on the patio, then seeing the place nearly empty at 7 p.m. told me that I should have just done an about face and walked out.  But I stayed and had a burger that sucked, beer that was flat, and onion rings that were disappointing.  The service I received from Melissa and the manager, however, was friendly and efficient.  Sometimes when places get taken over by holding companies, things have a tendency to go south.  It appears that may be the case with Prodigy Burger & Bar, I'm sorry to say.  So much potential, so much disappointment.

Grand Rapids and Western Michigan

My wife and I had a week's worth of vacation time left on the calendar this year and we definitely wanted to make it count, considering our vacation to the Gulf Coast of Alabama earlier this year turned out to be quite possibly the worst vacation we had ever been on.  We kicked around a number of options and decided that we wanted to head to Grand Rapids, MI.  There were a couple three reasons why - 1) It has an extensive number of microbreweries and brewpubs in, around and near the city; 2) We've never been to Grand Rapids before; and 3) My wife wanted a place where we could go and walk along the beaches of Lake Michigan, about a half-hour drive from Grand Rapids.  

We went just after Labor Day - I had to change my vacation dates because I was supposed to attend a trade show that my company decided to attend just three weeks before the show.  I was going to be on vacation that last week of August, but our company made a decision to just go and set up in a meeting room at a hotel near the trade show site.  I was able to push my vacation back a week, but my wife had some minor problems getting her company to allow her to change her vacation.  But she was able to pull it off.  

However, with the rise of COVID-19 Delta variant cases across the nation, a number of manufacturers decided to pull out of the trade show and a week before we were to attend the show, my company decided to pull the plug, as well.  So, I guess I didn't have to change my vacation, after all.  But, it turned out for the best as the crowds along the Michigan beaches were down dramatically from the week before.  

The weather was unseasonably cool for the first couple of days we were in Michigan.  The day we were traveling to Grand Rapids, a strong cold front brought severe storms through southwest Michigan.  There was some tree damage to parts of the Grand Rapids area, but we were able to get through the rain rather easily.  After the storm front had passed, brisk winds out of the northwest brought cooler than normal temperatures.  It was refreshing, actually, from the warm humid air we had experienced for days before.  

We stayed just east of what is known as the "Medical Mile" in Grand Rapids.  The Medical Mile originated in 1996 with the Jay and Betty Van Andel Institute, a medical research facility started by one of the co-founders of the Amway Corporation.  From there, a number of other hospitals and research facilities including four different college medical schools sprung up along Michigan Street in Grand Rapids Hillside neighborhood.  The DeVos family - the other founders of Amway; and the Meijer family - from the Meijer grocery store chain - have also given millions of dollars toward hospitals and research facilities over the past 25 years.  Quite actually, the medical campuses were rather impressive.  

Being a Hilton Honors Lifetime Diamond member, we naturally stayed at one of Hilton's properties while in Grand Rapids - the Hampton Inn and Suites.  (see map)  (There was a very nice Embassy Suites along the Grand River in downtown Grand Rapids that was also very nice, but they wanted too many points for the stay there.)  The Hampton Inn featured a parking garage under the hotel, we got a nice upgrade to a junior suite for being a Lifetime Diamond member, and it was clean, quiet and comfortable.  We slept great every night we were there.  I would absolutely recommend this hotel if you make it to Grand Rapids. 

Getting around Grand Rapids proved to be a bit of a challenge.  Coming into the city, the eastbound lanes of the Gerald R. Ford Freeway (I-196) were closed at the bridge over the Grand River.  Our hotel was on the east side of the river and we had to get off the freeway and then sort of navigate backstreets to get to our destination.  All around Grand Rapids we found street closures and construction work going on.  Some roads were torn up completely and we wondered how in the world they were going to be able to finish those projects before the snow started to fly.  And the one-way streets in Grand Rapids were also sort of confusing.  After a couple three days of driving around, however, we were able to figure out what was where and how to get there.  

For years, the two cities of Grand Rapids and Asheville, NC have vied for the unofficial title of "Beer City USA".  We went to Asheville a little over 4 years ago to experience some of their numerous breweries.  (Click here to see some of the places we visited.)  We had enjoyed Asheville immensely and had always wondered about Grand Rapids.  Well, it turns out that Grand Rapids has over 50 breweries of all sizes in and around the city.  And in places like Kalamazoo - an hour to the south - there's another 12 to 15 in that area.  In fact, in the 6 counties that encompass southwest Michigan, there are over 100 breweries that you can visit.  We tried to focus on the ones in Grand Rapids, but we found ourselves going to brewpubs in Grand Haven, South Haven and Saugatuck.  

Unlike Asheville, however, many of the Grand Rapids brewpubs were spread out and you couldn't walk between many of them like you can in Asheville.  Ride shares are plentiful in Grand Rapids, so you can park and ride between many of the brewpubs.  

We found some pretty interesting places in our quest to discover the brewpubs in the area.  One of the more unique ones was Brewery Vivant whose taproom was in an old funeral chapel.  (Below left)  We just sort of stumbled upon it one night as we were driving by and I couldn't believe the luck of finding the place.  Brewery Vivant was styled after European pubs and their Rapid IPA was a fine beer.  Someone asked us later on if we had eaten there, but we had already eaten at another brew pub earlier in the evening.  "Oh, you should have eaten at Brewery Vivant," we were told by a young woman at another brewpub we visited.  "They have excellent food."  

We went over to Grand Haven one day, about a 30 minute drive from Grand Rapids and found Odd Side Ales.  (Above right)  It was part brewery, part coffee house situated in what was a former piano manufacturing facility.  Not only were their beers good - the Citra Pale Ale was exceptionally good - but it was a pretty neat and laid-back setting.  My wife loved the place tremendously and since we've been back she's told everyone who asked about our trip about our visit to Odd Side Ales.  

Also over in Grand Haven was the Grand Armory Brewing Co.  (Below left) This small brewery was situated in a 115-year-old historical building that once was the small town's local armory and gathering hall.  Grand Armory shared the first floor of the building with a coffee shop and a barbecue joint.  The second floor housed an art gallery.  The brewpub's tap room was a cozy little place and my wife and I both enjoyed their Crop Duster hazy IPA as well as their Weezin'-the-Juice citra IPA.    

Another interesting brewpub we went to in Grand Rapids was the Mitten Brewing Company. (above right)  Housed in an old fire station, this brewpub featured a baseball-themed taproom with memorabilia on display, primarily from the Detroit Tigers.  My next door neighbor is a huge Tigers fan and I remarked to my wife that he would have been in heaven in the place.  We enjoyed a couple of their Fogout New England hazy IPA's on their patio out back before we had to go inside as it got cold once the sun went down.  Actually, my wife was dressed for it, but I just had a polo shirt and jeans on and it was getting a little nippy for me.  

Some of the other places we stopped by were Greyline Brewing, ELK Brewing, the Grand Rapids location of the Atwater Brewery out of Detroit, City Built Brewing and the resurrected Grand Rapids Brewing Company which first brewed beer in 1883.  We also ate at a handful of brewpubs during our trip to Grand Rapids and Western Michigan, so I'll have individual entries on those places in the coming weeks.

One of the things my wife and I like to do do when we go on vacation is to check out parks or arboretums.  It turned out that Grand Rapids had a world class arboretum and sculpture garden - the Frederick Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park.  The grounds have a year-round arboretum and over 300 sculptures and works of art on the grounds.  Originally opened in 1995, over 700,000 people visit the park annually and we thought it was well worth the $14.50 per person admission fee.  

The Lena Meijer Tropical Conservatory featured over 500 plants from 5 continents, the largest display of its kind in the state of Michigan.  Waterfalls and streams wandered through the gum trees, palms, and walls of orchids with pathways around the perimeter and into the heart of the exhibit.  Tropical birds in cages were also place throughout the floor area of the 5-story building, and in the spring the conservatory has a tropical butterfly display where hundreds of butterflies - imported in their own chrysalis from Asia, Africa and South America - fly freely throughout the conservatory.  

Also in the immediate area to the conservatory was a garden featuring cacti, succulents, agave plants and floral displays that survive in the most arid parts of the world.  My wife really digs succulents and we took our time going through that room to check things out.  

In the sculpture park, we found a number of interesting and sort of confusing works of art that had been gathered by the Meijer family over the years.  This sculpture (below left) was near the amphitheater that features concerts from mid-July thru mid-September.  (This year, performers such as the Beach Boys, Emmy Lou Harris, Squeeze, Ani DeFranco and Harry Connick, Jr. graced the stage at the Meijer Gardens Amphitheater.)  The sculpture - Lying Man by Sean Henry - was realistic looking from afar.  However, upon closer inspection, the man would have been 9 feet tall if he was real.  

Off the path of the sculpture park was this interesting looking sculpture - Neuron by contemporary artist Roxy Paine.  (Above right)  Clicking on the picture, you can see the intricate detail of Paine's work.  It was strange, yet sort of spellbinding.  

Back in an area of the sculpture park called The Grove, there was this cool piece of art by Kenneth Snelson called B-Tree II.  (Below left)  The sculpture was built on site and is another example of "Tensegrity", a concept that Snelson helped devise with Buckminster Fuller and who both have patented some of the concepts of tensegrity.  Tensegrity is explained as a "design principle which applies when a discontinuous set of compression elements is opposed and balanced by a continuous tensile force, thereby creating an internal prestress that stabilizes the entire structure."  B-Tree II is based on patterning triangles where carefully calculated tension of the stainless steel cords locks the tubes in place.  

As we continued to wander along the pathway that wove through the park, we came across this interesting statue called "Broken Nose Carrying Bottle Number One."  The lifelike bronze sculpture by Spanish contemporary artist Juan Muñoz is similar to many works that Muñoz placed in unexpected spots that would somehow cause conflict between the sculpture and the viewer.  The Meijer family acquired this work in 1999, two years before Muñoz died of a heart attack due to an aneurysm in his esophagus. 

Throughout the sculpture garden were a handful of waterfalls with babbling brooks draining into small ponds.  While there weren't any rose gardens or large flower displays that we like to see in gardens when we travel, there was a tranquility in the running water that allowed my wife and I to linger in those spots before we moved on.  

Probably the highlight for us was the Richard and Helen DeVos Japanese Garden.  This 8-acre garden was designed by Hoichi Kurisu, a world-renowned designer of Japanese gardens, both in Japan and in the U.S.  In addition to the Japanese garden at the Meier Sculpture Garden, Kurisu has designed Japanese gardens in Portland, OR, Dubuque, IA (which I never knew until writing this), and in Florida.  Kurisu put in traditional elements of a Japanese garden - quiet areas (including a Zen garden), waterfalls, and numerous vistas.  The picture above right is from the Viewing Hill which overlooks the Lena Meijer Pond on the grounds.

But the most prominent feature of the Meijer gardens was the two-story tall "The American Horse" created by noted animal sculptor Nina Akamu.  Commissioned by Fred Meijer nearly 25 years ago, the sculpture pays homage to the famed Italian artist/architect/engineer/sculptor Leonardo da Vinci.  

Information boards at the site of The American Horse told the story of da Vinci's project that he was working on for the Duke of Milan starting in 1482.  He made a number of drawings of the anatomy of a horse and started work on a life-sized clay model of the horse in 1491.  Over 70 tons of bronze was accumulated for the 26-foot high horse by the time the life-sized clay model was finished in 1494.  However, the bronze that was to be used for the project was given to the uncle of the Duke of Milan to forge cannons that would be used to fend off invaders.  

In 1499, the French invaded Milan and the clay statue was used primarily for archery practice.  The elements further eroded the sculpture and it was destroyed just a few short years later.

In the 1970's, full-time airline pilot and part-time art collector/historian Charles Dent came across an article in the National Geographic magazine featuring da Vinci's horse.  Determined to finish what da Vinci started, Dent set up a large studio in his hometown of Allentown, PA and set up a non-profit corporation - Leonardo da Vinci Horse, Inc. (LDVHI) - to help raise money for the project.  By 1988, $2.5M had been raised allowing Dent to commission Garth Herrick to begin work on the project.  However, Dent later contracted ALS and died in 1994.

In 1997, the LDVHI had contacted a company to cast the horse, but the company wasn't keen on the design.  They suggested bringing in Akamu, a well-known animal sculptor who after looking at the original model, determined that it was unsuitable for casting.  Fred Meijer then became involved and raised the money for two identical 26-foot high horse statues be cast.  Akamu finished the project in 1999 with one horse going to Milan, while the other was placed in the center of the DeVos/Van Andel Piazza.  da Vinci, Dent and Akamu are all recognized with small displays and plaques in the piazza.  

We were at the Frederik Meijer Gardens for a little over two hours and we didn't even visit the interactive children's garden, nor the farm garden on the far end of the sculpture garden.  We figured we walked over two miles during our time there.  It was a great day - a bit cool, but we sort of forgot about that while we were walking.  

One morning, we took a walk along the river on the Butterworth Trail what is part of the Grand River Edges Trail.  We walked along the east side of the river from a parking lot in Canal Park up to Leonard Street and then back down south to below the dam.  For a mid-week day, there were a number of bikers, walkers and joggers on the path enjoying the morning.  There were a handful of turnout areas where you could look over the Grand River to the west side.

We made it down to the dam and noticed there were a number of anglers in waders just below the dam.  My wife asked one of the guys coming up the ramp what they were fishing for.  "Coho salmon," he said as he trudged past us, probably calling it a day.  We stood there for a few moments watching the dozen or so men fishing in the shallow water below the dam and there were no bites noted while we were hanging out.  

The I-196/Gerald R. Ford Freeway bridge over the Grand River was closed to east bound traffic, so there was a large construction presence past the dam.  Past the expressway bridge, the trail loops over across the river to the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum.  However, the library/museum had been closed for sometime due to COVID restrictions.  But that was OK with me.  Even though I'm a big history buff, I just didn't think the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum would be all that interesting.  It's sort of like the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum in West Branch, IA - 45 minutes from where I live.  I've even driven past the library/museum a number of times when I would visit a good friend who lived in West Branch, but I've never really wanted to go in to see the museum given Hoover's track record as president.  

My wife was adamant that we went to Lake Michigan and walked on the beaches.  We drove 30 miles over to Grand Haven one day and walked the beach there at the Grand Haven City Beach. (Below left)  It was a brisk day with the winds coming off the lake at about 25 miles an hour.  It reminded us of our vacation along the Gulf Shores of Alabama where the wind coming off the ocean was relentless the whole time we were there.  We walked for about 25 minutes along the beach before my wife decided that she was getting sort of cold.  The water temperature on Lake Michigan had to be in the 60's making it pretty cold on our feet and legs when the waves would wash up on the beach.   

One other day, we went down to St. Joseph, MI to Tiscornia Park, a place my wife and a friend of hers had visited earlier in the summer.  (Above right)  She was adamant that we go there as she found the place to be so peaceful and pleasant.  And we picked a great day for it, too.  Winds were light, temps were in the upper 70's and we walked along the beach then out to the St. Joseph North Pier lighthouse.  I can see why she wanted to go there.  It was actually sort of tough to leave.  

We made it over to Saugatuck, a small town that we've been to two or three times before.  This time, we walked along the boardwalk that meandered through the large marinas lining the harbor at Saugatuck.  There was very little activity going on in the marina - we figured that some of the boats probably wouldn't be going back out on the lake since it was after the Labor Day holiday.  But we marveled at the size of some of the boats in the slips at Saugatuck - some we're undoubtedly worth more than our house.  

Just outside of Saugatuck, we were driving along the back roads and encountered a hops farm.  My wife was stymied for a moment as to what the long vines growing up along wires were, then when I said they were hops, she immediately knew.  "I guess I've never seen hops vines so long," she said.  Come to think of it, I really hadn't either.  But it showed that there was a conscious effort by local farmers to help the local breweries out by having locally-grown hops for their beers.

All in all, our trip to Grand Rapids and Western Michigan was clearly one that we needed.  It was 180 degrees out of phase from our trip earlier in the year to the Gulf Shores of Alabama.  It was peaceful, the weather was nice (except for the day at the beach in Grand Haven), and we were able to catch up on sleep.  We visited a number of breweries and had some pretty good food - with the exception of one place that I'll talk about in an upcoming entry.  The parks and villages we visited and walked around were both fascinating and laid-back.  We avoided the tourist traps and found some places that we wished we could have spent more time.  My wife even came home with a big bag of Michigan peaches that we ended up freezing so she can enjoy them in smoothies for the next couple three months.  Oh, yeah - we're going back to Western Michigan again at some point.  And maybe sooner than later.  

Mema's Italian Grinders - Newton/Des Moines, IA

I went back to my hometown of Newton, IA on a Saturday afternoon a few weeks ago to attend a fund raiser for a friend of mine.  I got into town around 3:30 and I was going to head over to the Newton Maid-Rite (also known as Mr. Dan's Sandwich Shop) to have a couple Maid-Rite's before heading out to the fund-raiser.   However, a food truck sitting in a parking lot at the corner of W. 2nd St. S. and S. 2nd Ave. W. (see map) caught my attention because friends of mine in Newton had been raving about the Italian grinder sandwiches the truck has been serving for the past couple of years.  I did a quick turn into the parking lot so I could get one of Mema's Italian Grinders.  

Growing up in Newton, IA, our pizza choices were pretty limited.  There were three or four places - including a Pizza Hut - that had pizza.  One of those places was a small pizzeria called the Pizza House.  It was located on W. 2nd St. N. in a stretch that was once home to pool halls and seedy bars called "Skid Row".  I used to work in a store that was the pool hall at one time and it was four doors away from the Pizza House.  Sometimes when I was working late, I would just call down to the Pizza House and order a pizza.  

Helen Cline started what may have been the first pizzeria in Newton in 1959.  I remember her as a kindly lady who had a quick laugh.  She made her own sauce and that was said to be the key to the overall taste of her pizza.  I never really got into pizza until I was in high school - yeah, believe it or not, I was a picky eater for the first 15 years of my life.  And I never had a Pizza House pizza until I was 18 or 19 years old.  

The one cardinal sin that the Pizza House could be accused of is that they used pre-packaged pizza dough - already rolled out and sitting in a plastic bag on a shelf above the prep station - rather than making their own dough.  It wasn't the greatest pizza, it wasn't the worst pizza.  For someone like me who didn't know better years ago, it was fine for what it was.  

Years after divorcing her first husband, Helen had remarried Don Christensen in 1989 and ran the Pizza House for another 10 years before retiring due to health problems.  The half-block that Pizza House was part of was demolished and a bank was put up in place of the buildings that were there for years.  A year after Helen closed down Pizza House, she passed away at the age of 66.

Helen and her first husband, Al, had four children and the youngest, Randy, had a son by the name of Chad.  Chad Cline was interested in some of the recipes that his grandma Helen - known as "Mema" to her grandchildren - had kept over the years.  He dabbled with the pizza sauce recipe and added crumbled Graziano Brothers Italian sausage and ground beef along with the sauce to make one of his grandmother's delicious "grinder" sandwiches served on a hoagie bun.   

Realizing there wasn't a food truck in the greater Des Moines area that served what he called "gourmet grinders" featuring a mixture of beef and Italian sausage, he then had a food trailer built for him in early 2019.  Cline then teamed with a Des Moines-area family-owned bakery to make buns for his grinders that would be slightly crispy on the outside, but have a warm and soft inside when the meat was added.  It was in April of 2019 that Chad Cline and his wife, Heather, brought out the 30-foot trailer and began to sell the first Mema's Italian grinder.  

Cline went around to events and parking lots primarily in the Des Moines area for the first few months, but it was when he first went to Newton in 2020 that I started to hear about Mema's Italian Grinders from friends who gave it a try.  He would set his food wagon up in Legacy Plaza where the former headquarters of Maytag once were and serve his grinders - with a bit of local history behind them - to people who were at Gezellig Brewery and at the Cellar Peanut Pub having craft beers.  On some days, Cline would sell out of the grinders because he'd go through the 500 buns he brought to make the sandwiches.  

From just doing grinders at first, Chad Cline branched out with more sandwiches including a three-cheese meatball sandwich, a ham & cheese sandwich with Italian dressing, a spicy Italian sandwich with capicollo, Genoa salami, pepperoni, and smoked ham; a ground Italian sausage sandwich, and a pizza burger with seasoned ground beef and ground pork topped with a red sauce, cheddar cheese, smoked provolone cheese, and pepperoni slices.    

Last year during the height of the pandemic when restaurants were either closed or had restrictions on inside dining, the Mema's Italian Grinders food trailer would set up at a garden center in Grimes three days a week.  With a semi-permanent location, Mema's found an even greater following and on good days they would sell up to 700 sandwiches.  At one point, Cline was buying more Graziano Italian sausage than local Hy-Vee stores.  And the small bakery couldn't keep up with his orders for more hoagie buns.  

Through all of this, Chad Cline continued his position as an information technology technician.  He would get up around 4 a.m. and get the food trailer ready for that day for his crew, take it to the parking lot of the garden center, then he would head off to work.  At the end of the day, he'd come back to clean up and pull the food trailer back home.  He found that to be extremely taxing at times and started to think about opening a brick and mortar location.  

The Clines found a spot in the Des Moines suburb of Grimes, IA in June of this year and after Chad quit his full-time IT position, they began the build-out this summer.  In early September, they had a soft opening of their carry-out only restaurant located at 2250 E. 1st St. in Grimes.  (see map)  In addition to the small restaurant - which is open Wednesday thru Sunday from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. - Cline will continue to run the Mema's Italian Grinders food wagon at different places in and around the Des Moines area.   

Growing up in Newton, there was an annual "Ridiculous Day" where merchants around downtown Newton would set up tables outside their businesses and sell stuff for "ridiculously" low prices.  It's fun for bargain hunters - many of whom would start shopping when stores would open at 6 a.m. - and it was fun for kids as there was a parade and many activities.  But it was a pain in the ass for retailers.  I had to work Ridiculous Day a few times and it was a lot of hard work.  It turned out the day I was in Newton, it was Ridiculous Days - now a two-day event.  That's why the Mema's food trailer was set up in the parking lot just south and west of the square in Newton.  (Quite honestly, I didn't know they still had Ridiculous Days in Newton - nor did many of my friends who still lived there!)  

I was sort of taken aback that there was no line at the trailer that was mostly red and green with white and yellow accents.  I had heard that Mema's was known to sell out during the middle of the afternoon when they would come to Newton, so I was sort of apprehensive when I went up to the window to place an order.  "Do you still have any grinders left," I asked the young lady in the trailer.

"We sure do," she replied in a cheery voice.  I addition to the grinders, Mema's was also selling their three-cheese meatball sandwich, their ham & cheese sandwich, and their ground hot sausage sandwich that day.  They also had toasted cheese ravioli, mozzarella cheese sticks, garlic cheese breads and Mema's Meatballs - 3 hand-rolled meatballs made with a Cline family recipe seasoning and served with some of Mema's red sauce.  

I ordered up a grinder and another younger girl took my money - $10 bucks.  OK, that's fine, I thought.  Every raves about these grinders, so I'm guessing they'd be worth 10 dollars.  

As the first young lady I talked to made up the grinder, then put it in a convection oven to melt the Italian cheese over the top of the meat, I asked if any of the people in the trailer was related to Helen Cline.  "No," the young lady making my sandwich said.  "Chad isn't here today.  He's off working somewhere else."  (He was probably working on the build-out of his restaurant location.)  It wasn't long before she handed me a long styrofoam container with my grinder inside.

After I got my grinder, I thought about just eating it on my car's trunk lid.  But it was hot and I didn't want to be standing there in the sun in the parking lot.  So, I went out to Maytag Park, the large tree-lined park on the south side of Newton.  I found a parking spot along one of the roadways in the park and pulled over to check out the sandwich.

First of all, it wasn't all that big of a sandwich - about 7" in length.  The hoagie bun with the ground sausage/ground beef mixture was sort of small.  It barely covered 3/4's of the container.  And I made a rookie mistake - I didn't catch that I could have ordered the grinder with either jalapeños or banana pepper rings (or both) for a 50 cent upcharge.  Jalapeños would have been a nice addition to the sandwich.

But the grinder on its own was, well, good.  The hoagie roll was crusty on the outside, but soft and chewy inside.  The combination of the Graziano Brothers ground sausage with ground beef in the tangy red sauce had a nice flavor.  The provolone cheese on top of the meats had a nice caramelized texture and kept its stringy consistency.  Of course, I dropped a big glob of meat with the sauce on my tan shorts that I was wearing that evening.  But I knew that if anyone would point out the stain on my shorts, I could easily point to it and say, "Mema's grinder", and they'd probably know.  (I was able to get most of the stain out when I stopped off at a buddy's house to have a couple three beers with him before the benefit started.)  

OK - I've tried the Mema's Italian Grinder that everyone around Central Iowa has been clamoring about over the past couple of years.  And it was, well, it was good, but not worth waiting more than 8 people deep in line for.  And I thought it was a bit pricey.   Chad Cline has done a good job emulating his grandma's sauce recipe and he's teamed up with Graziano Brothers for his ground Italian sausage and beef mixture, as well as a Des Moines-area bakery for some good hoagie buns.  Next time, I will get either jalapeños or banana peppers (or both!) on my Mema's grinder to help zip up the taste of the sandwich.  I think it's also great that they've made the investment in opening a brick and mortar location as I like to see that natural progression from food truck - or trailer, in this case - to a restaurant.  The spirit of Helen Cline lives on in her grandson!

Farren's Pub & Eatery - Champaign, IL

Years ago, I was in a subterranean restaurant/pub in Champaign and I remember having a pretty good burger there.  Of course, this was 15 years ago when I first started Road Tips and that was the first and last time I was in there.  I was interested in getting a good burger while I was in Champaign recently and I went past the subterranean place set back along an alley from N. Randolph St. - whose name I couldn't remember - but there was no sign on the front of the place.  Still hankering for a burger, I then ended up looking up "Best Burgers in Champaign" on my smart phone and topping the list was a place called Farren's Pub & Eatery.  Once I sat down to write this entry showcasing my recent visit to Farren's Pub & Eatery, I realized that it was one and the same place I had originally written about in June of 2006.  (Click here to see that post.)  It turned out they had moved to a new street-level location in the summer of 2019 and I didn't realize at the time I was there a few weeks ago that it was one and the same place. 

When I first started out writing this blog in 2005, I didn't have a voice or a formula for my entries for the first handful of years.  I also didn't have a worthy camera on my phone to take pictures to include in my blog until about 2008 or 2009.  I found that including the history of an establishment is usually a key component that can tell stories upon stories of a restaurant and how it came to be.  I didn't do that with my original post on Farren's Pub and I wanted to include that in this post.  

Carolyn Morton grew up in the Chicago area and ended up going to the University of Illinois to study biochemistry.  During her time in college, Carolyn worked various positions in bars and restaurants in the Champaign/Urbana area.  After school, she worked as a wine consultant, then became general manager of Silvercreek, an upscale restaurant in downtown Urbana.  The restaurant business was about as far away from biochemistry that one can get.

While at Illinois, she met Brian Farren and the couple eventually got married.  Looking to do something different with their lives just before the turn of the 21st century, they found out that a small subterranean bar in downtown Champaign - a place called Creamy's - was up for sale.  The couple took over the place in 1999 and renovated the place while adding a kitchen and turned it into a restaurant/pub.  Farren's Pub opened their doors for business in February of 2000.  

From the start, Carolyn Farren had a menu that was a little upscale including seafood and pasta dishes.  But she also had a burger on the menu that made from ground beef that was locally-sourced from a butcher/meat shop in Champaign.  Farren's Pub quickly gained a reputation for their burgers and in 2007 they garnered their first recognition by being named as one of the 3 best burgers in Champaign/Urbana by a local publication.  

When people started to come in to Farren's Pub to try the burgers, Carolyn Farren decided to go to a more burger-centric menu and do away with some of the nightly specials and more upscale items they had served.  Within a couple years, the burgers at Farren's Pub topped a number of local "people's-choice" lists, then started to gain national attention from publications such as Trip Advisor.  For not wanting to have a burger-centric restaurant when they first opened up, Carolyn Farren was more than happy for the recognition she was getting.  

Toward the end of 2018, a popular Spanish-style bistro by the name of Radio Maria closed their doors on the corner of N. Walnut and Taylor St. in downtown Champaign.  In February of 2019, Carolyn Farren announced that Farren's Pub would be moving to the former Radio Maria spot giving them a larger bar and more seating than the original location.  The Farren's re-opened in July of 2019.  

After finding the location for Farren's Pub, I found a parking space just down the street on N. Walnut from the restaurant.  (see map)  It had been raining hard off and on for about and hour, but by the time I parked my car and walked a block or so to the restaurant, the rain had eased into a drizzle.  

As I got into Farren's, I was greeted at the hostess stand by a lady with a British accent by the name of Michelle.  She was bubbly, overly friendly and outgoing, and she made me feel quite welcome as a single diner.  The dining room was full and Michelle told me that it would be a 5 to 10 minute wait.  I asked if I could sit in the bar and she said, "That would be a great thing most any other night, but unfortunately we're holding a private event in there this evening."  

She asked if I'd like to sit on a chair at the entry way between the dining area and the bar to wait for a table to open up.  She gave me a menu to check out while I waited and said, "I can even get you something to drink while you wait."  I saw on their beer menu that they had the Triptych Brewing Dank Meme available on tap.  I had been out to the Triptych Brewing facility earlier in the evening and had a couple of the very good hazy IPA beer at its source.  I signed up for one of those.  

From what I understand, the dining room didn't change much from the days of Radio Maria.  It still had the hardwood floors, the support poles in the center of the room and and exposed brick wall along one side.  Large windows that looked out on the north and east side of the dining room gave it a bit of natural light.  Plants and vines were placed along top of the wall on one end, while potted plants dotted the floor which had plexiglass partitions between tables.  I sort of liked the partitions as it gave each table in the dining area a bit of intimacy.  

The bar area is also somewhat of a holdover from the old Radio Maria.  The bar features a semi-circle at one end with blue-light accents under the bar top.  They added some paint to the exposed brick walls opposite the bar and kept the unique lighting accessories hanging from the ceiling.  It was too bad the bar was closed off for a private event that evening.  I would have loved to have had a chance to eat in the bar area.  It was pretty cool in there.

About 15 minutes after Michelle told me it would be a 5 to 10 minute wait, she came to me and said, "I have a table right here for you."  She showed me to a table right by the entrance to the bar area.  I had mowed through my pint of the Triptych Brewing Dank Meme and she got me another one going after I sat down.  

I was definitely in the mood for a burger that evening, but some of the other things on the menu caught my attention while I was checking it out waiting for a table to open.  They had tacos on the menu, including a blackened tuna taco.  Chicken, ground beef and steak tacos were also available, as well as a black bean taco for the vegans in the crowd.  

Farren's Pub also featured a number of sandwiches and they've also won local awards for some of their sandwiches, as well.  The grilled chicken breast with sautéed mushrooms topped with Swiss cheese was intriguing to me, as was the "Mother Clucker" which was basically the same sandwich only with a bleu cheese sauce added to it.  But in the end, the burger won out.  

Michelle had turned me over to Michael, a nice guy who was soft-spoken, after I was seated.  Michael was giving me some pointers on their burgers and he said that the Russell burger was their award-winning burger. "It's named after a guy named Russell who used to order it every day over at our old place," he explained to me.  They also had a sautéed mushroom burger with your choice of cheese, and the green chile burger topped with pepper jack cheese sounded like a winner.  But Michael basically talked me into getting the Russell burger.  I asked could get some of the green chiles on the side, as well.  He said it would be no problem.  

Someone from the kitchen brought my burger to me and I was sort of confused with the chiles on the side.  I was expecting green chiles, but they were more like a roasted red chile.  That was fine with me as it helped enhance the overall flavor of the burger.  

The Russell burger features a half-pound flat-grilled whole beef patty topped with sautéed mushrooms, bacon and pepper jack cheese.  The bleu cheese sauce is also supposed to go on the burger, but I asked Michael to put that on the side, as well.  Onions and pickles came on the side as did a side of skinny fries.  

While I didn't realize it until much later, I had ordered a Russell burger on my initial visit to Farren's Pub & Eatery over 15 years ago at their old location.  Except that I think they gave me the Motherlode instead that featured Swiss cheese instead of pepper jack cheese, and the bleu cheese sauce with sautéed mushrooms.  Nonetheless, I was getting a true Russell burger on this visit.  

The burger was, well, a spot-hitter.  It was just excellent with all the flavors going on.  But the quality beef in the burger shined through all the toppings and condiments that I put on the burger.  It as juicy, flavorful and savory.  The lightly toasted bun held together very well with all the juices, peppers and cheese on the burger patty.  The fries were actually pretty good, too.  They had a crisp outer shell with a flaky core.  The burger was a lot of food and I was able to finish all that and had just a few of the fries by the time I threw in the towel.

As I was waiting on my check from Michael, Michelle walked by the table and I flagged her down, asking her where the restrooms where.  "Down that hallway and first door on the left," she said as she pointed to the far corner of the dining room from where I was seated.  So, I got up, made the trek to the restroom.  I walked down the hall and took the first door on the left - just as Michelle said.  But what she did was direct me to the WOMEN'S restroom!  Sure, for Michelle, the first door on the left down the hall would be the restroom she would use.  She meant the second door on the left for the men's restroom.  

And, of course, there were two ladies in the restroom when I walked in.  They were just standing there and understandably startled when I walked in.  I stopped, said, "Oh, shit!"  Then I quickly exited heading to the next door down the hall.  It was sort of embarrassing.  

After I went to Farren's Pub & Eatery, I didn't realize that I had gone to their original subterranean location over 15 years ago.  I did remember how good their burger was and I went back to the old location - not remembering the name of the place - but it was closed down.  However, I did find the "new" Farren's Pub location not realizing until starting my research for this blog entry that it was the same place as the one I was looking for earlier on.  And the burger I had on this visit was just as good as I remember from the visit years ago.  The staff at Farren's Pub were friendly and accommodating, I was made to feel comfortable as a single diner, and the atmosphere was laid-back and relaxed.  I'm hoping it won't be another 15 years before I make it back to Farren's for one of their burgers.  

tacobar? - Davenport, IA

It's rare for a chef that has a pretty successful restaurant to basically stop and rework the concept in mid-stream.  That's what happened with a place we liked to go to in downtown Davenport from time to time, an upscale casual restaurant by the name of Woodfire Grill.  In October of 2019, owner Toby Christianson decided that he was getting stale as a chef and he wanted to do something fun with a new restaurant concept. He ended up shutting down Woodfire Grill and rebranding it into an eclectic taqueria.  In February of 2020, Christianson reopened the restaurant with the unique name of tacobar?. 

Toby Christiansen grew up outside of Fargo, ND and got into working at restaurants as a teenager.  After graduating from Minnesota State-Moorhead, he started on an odyssey where he worked for a number of upscale restaurants around the Midwest.  He helped open restaurants in Grinnell, IA and in Muscatine, IA before making his way to the Quad Cities over 15 years ago.

In 2004, a restaurant by the name of Centro opened on the ground floor of the historic Redstone Building in downtown Davenport.  Once the flagship store of what eventually became the Von Maur department stores, the building also houses the River Music Experience on the other half of the ground floor and up on the second story of the building.  Centro had signed a three-year lease when they opened in the summer of 2004 and that lease expired in 2007.  The lease was renewed month-by-month as the owners of Centro were helping the River Music Experience find a suitable replacement for their restaurant.  They found it in Christianson who was the managing partner of a small investment group who ended up taking over the location.  

Pictured right - Toby Christianson.  Photo courtesy Quad City Times.   

Christianson's upscale/casual restaurant Woodfire Grill took over the new location in March of 2008 and my wife and I ventured down there less than our usual "three month rule" after a new restaurant opened.  Of course, there were problems and that was the first night we met Toby Christianson who came by our table to profusely apologize for my wife being served the wrong meal.  We told him that we usually wait 90 days after a restaurant opens to allow them to work out the kinks.  Toby said to us, "Well, if everyone did that, new restaurants would be out of business in less than 90 days.  That's why we need people like you guys to help us work out the growing pains."  It was a good point and one that we've thought about since.  But, honestly, we still try to let a restaurant go for 90 days before we give it a shot.  

The Woodfire Grill was a place we had been to a number of times over they years and we really enjoyed the food that Toby and his staff served there.  They always had a good bar and sometimes we'd just hang out with friends for a drink.  

But Christianson was getting burnt out after running Woodfire Grill for nearly 12 years.  As I said, he ended up reimagining his restaurant into a chef-driven eclectic taqueria with a diverse selection of crafted drinks and a couple dozen craft beers to choose from on tap.  I was told that the name "tacobar?" came about as that was the immediate retort people would say to Christianson as he told them that he was turning his popular restaurant into a taco bar.   After closing Woodfire Grill in October of 2019, he had a soft opening of his new restaurant later in December and tacobar? was pretty much open for full business in February of 2020.  

Of course, not long after tacobar? opened last year, they were forced to shut down due to COVID-19 restrictions.  Christianson worked through that by offering carry-out meals and also providing tacos to many of the front line medical workers who were fighting the coronavirus.  

And the continued outbreak of the coronavirus was one of the reasons why it took us so long to finally get down to tacobar? for a meal.  We were out with friends of ours having a couple drinks on a Friday night and the women were wondering where we should go for dinner.  My wife brought up tacobar? and our friends basically said, "Yeah, we haven't gone there yet, either!  Let's go!"  

We found a parking space just down 2nd Street from tacobar? which is located at 2nd and Main.  (see map)  We had actually tried to get into tacobar? on a Friday night during the time when restaurants were still under 50% capacity restrictions sometime late last year, but we were told it would be a 45 minute wait.  Well, there was going to be no problem getting in this particular night - even if there were restrictions in place - as there were just a handful of people in the place.  And with their outdoor patio open during warm weather months, there was plenty of places to sit.  

The inside had changed a bit from the days of Woodfire Grill.  Some of the banquette-style seating and booths had been taken out on one side of the restaurant and small alcove seating was available.  I detest banquette seating, so this was a good change.  

However, on the other side of the restaurant, they kept the banquette seating in the middle of the dining area.  
There was a little lounge area off to the side that replaced a number of tables along the east wall of the restaurant.  It was kind of a neat concept to have comfy sofas for people to relax on while having a drink.  

It was such a nice evening that we decided to sit out on the patio.  The patio overlooks the courtyard for the River Music Experience, and on Friday nights from June until September the organization sponsors "Live @Five" where they showcase local bands from 5 to 7 p.m.  It was around 8 p.m. when we got to tacobar? on that Friday night, so the crowds had pretty gone and the band and production company had already packed up and moved on when we got there. 

There is no waitstaff service at tacobar?.  There are menus available to take to your table and then figure out what you'd like to get.  Then you go inside back by the kitchen and order up your food.  They bring the food out to you once it's ready.  

We ordered the obligatory chips and salsa for our table to enjoy while we looked at the menu.  The chips and salsa are not free at tacobar? and run $2.95.  But we were fine with that.  The chips were fresh and warm, and the salsa had a nice little kick to it with hints of chipotle peppers and cilantro.  It was excellent salsa.      

And since there is no waitstaff, that means you have to go to the bar and order your drinks.  And that means two separate charges.  The bar area hasn't changed at all from the days of Woodfire Grill.  It still had the high-back chairs at the bar, the small tables along the front window and the six flat screen televisions hung above the back bar.

My buddy and I had gone to the bar to order drinks - my wife wanted a strawberry margarita while I saw the unmistakable spigot for Kona Big Wave.  I ordered the drinks and the bartender - a blonde young lady - asked me for my name.  When I said it, she said, "I THOUGHT that was you!"  It turned out it was the ex-wife of a guy that I know and I hadn't seen her since they had gotten divorced a few years back.  It turns out that she had been working at the Woodfire Grill with Toby and stayed on when he went to the tacobar? concept.  

Well, the first hiccup of the evening occurred when the keg for the Kona Big Wave blew as she was pouring it.  "And we don't have a replacement keg," she said looking under the bar.  I decided to get a Sierra Nevada Hazy IPA they had on tap instead.

The second hiccup came when I went to order food.  They touted "puffy tacos" on the menu - made from Navajo-style frybread - and I thought about getting a couple of the pork shoulder puffy tacos.  However, I was told that they were out of the puffy taco shells that evening.  Hmmm....  OK.  Let me look at the menu again.  I decided to go with the pork tacos.  Then someone in the kitchen called up to the girl at the cash register and said they were out of pork that evening.  I was sort of incredulous that they were 0 for 2 on what I wanted to order.  OK - back to the drawing board.  

Usually, they have six proteins to choose from for their tacos at tacobar? - chicken, pork shoulder, ground beef, carne asada (steak), butter-grilled shrimp and a fried tofu for the vegetarians.  Toppings are grouped, such as "main stream" - lettuce, pico de gallo, taco sauce and fresh cheese; "al pastor" - pineapple, cilantro, onion and achiote pepper salsa; "Tex-Mex BBQ" - garlic-cider slaw, pickled onion, a house-made bbq sauce and house-made pickles; and "Korean" - chopped cabbage, chimichurri, sesame seeds, and a spicy "yum-yum" sauce.    

My wife went with the chile lime chicken - three corn tortillas filled with marinated grilled chicken, main-stream style.  She also got jalapeño slices on the top of each tortilla.  The tacos were served in a tin-foil dish - not too fancy of a vessel for an eclectic taco place like tacobar?.   My wife really did enjoy the chile lime chicken, the tin-foil dish, notwithstanding.  

I ended up getting the carne asada tacos - there was a $2.00 upcharge for the carne asada - with the "Mexican OG" toppings which are the traditional cilantro and onions with a choice of sauce.  I got the chile verde salsa to go with my tacos.  And they were fine - not outstanding or earthshaking.  They were just typical carne asada tacos in double corn tortillas.  I really wanted to try the pork al pastor tacos, though.  I guess I'll have to go back again at some point and do that.  

For our first visit to tacobar?, I thought the food was fine.  There were a couple three setbacks (ran out of the beer I ordered, no puffy taco shells, no pork al pastor), but we were able to work around it.  My wife enjoyed her chile lime chicken tacos and I really liked their house-made salsa.  Toby Christianson has said that he doesn't want to compete with the myriad of Mexican restaurants in the area, he just wants to enhance the offerings.  I hope tacobar? is able to make it as the location is a prime spot in downtown Davenport.  But knowing how successful Christianson has been in the past, I'm sure that he'll be able to make it work.

Joey B's on the Hill - St. Louis

I think I've eaten at nearly every restaurant located on St. Louis' famed Hill neighborhood in all the years that I have been traveling there.  But one place on the western edge of The Hill that I had passed many times over the years was one of those that I had never been in before.  Trying to figure out a place to get dinner after getting into St. Louis one evening, I decided to take a chance and give Joey B's on the Hill a try.   

Joey B's on the Hill is one of the three Joey B's locations in the St. Louis area - the other two are Joey B's in Concord Plaza in St. Louis, and another Joey B's location in the western suburb of Manchester.  But the three restaurants are just branches of a tree of a number of restaurants in the St. Louis area that first started in the late 1950's.  That's when Frank "Frankie" Gianino established Valencia's on Delmar, an family-style old-world Italian restaurant that also featured pizza.  Frankie was a partner in another restaurant, Rossino's, located in the Central West End of the city.  

Along with his two brothers, Willie and Chip, Frankie Gianino started a small chain of carry-out pizza restaurants in the 60's - Gianino's Pizza Den - and it was there that Frankie's son, Bill Gianino, cut his teeth in the restaurant business.  Sometimes he was a reluctant worker in his dad's pizza places as he was 16 and didn't want to work on Friday or Saturday nights, but was forced to when his dad was shorthanded.  

After Bill Gianino was discharged from the Army in 1975, he followed his father's footsteps and opened three small carry-out pizza places on the south side of St. Louis.  His father helped him get his start, but Frankie Gianino passed away in 1977.  Bill Gianino leaned on the expertise of his uncle Willie Gianino who helped him grow his business.  The small carry-out place in the suburb of Oakville eventually became Bill Gianino's, a small ma-and-pa-type Italian restaurant.  Later on in the early 90's, a space opened next do to his eponymous restaurant and Gianino opened Frankie G's, a small bar and grill.

Pictured right - Bill Gianino.  Photo courtesy Sauce Magazine and the Gianino family.

Bill Gianino's two sons, Tony and Billy, joined their father in developing two other restaurants - Frankie Gianino's in Imperial, MO, and Billy G's in the suburb of Kirkwood.  But it took one of Bill Gianino's lifelong friends to help develop the Joey B's concept of restaurants for the Gianino family.  

Joey Barczewski and Bill Gianino were pals since grade school.  Barczewski eventually got into the restaurant business and opened a sports bar on Laclede's Landing a number of years ago.  Bill Gianino asked Barczewski to join him in the Gianino family of restaurants and together they developed the modern day Joey B's concept.  A building that used to house a Bartolino's restaurant on the west side of The Hill became available and Joey B's on the Hill opened in 2008.  As I wrote earlier, that was followed by two other Joey B's restaurants - one in the Concord area on the south side of St. Louis, and another on the far west side in Manchester.  

On a sad note - Bill Gianino was spending some time in June of 2020 on his farm near Cuba, MO when he suffered a heart attack and passed away.  Gianino was 69.  His legacy continues on thanks to Barczewski and his sons who now run the Gianino family of restaurants.  

It was just after 6 p.m. when I went down Hampton Ave. and took a left turn on Columbia Ave. to get into the parking lot behind Joey B's on the Hill located on the northeast corner of the intersection.  (see map)  I went inside and was immediately in the bar area of the place.  Things were a little tight to maneuver through the bar to get to the restrooms toward the back end with the high-top tables so close to the bar, itself.  I thought about having a seat at the bar, but it was pretty packed when I came in.  So, I ended up heading over to the hostess stand to see about getting seated in the dining area.  

I was seated in the dining room at a step-up booth along the wall.  A number of tables were in the center of the dining area and there was a patio off to the side.  Joey B's on the Hill reminded me of an upscale sports bar with a number of flat screen televisions on the wall throughout the place.  There was a mix of families having dinner, friends having drinks, and a single patron - me - who wanted both dinner and drinks.  

After getting a menu from the hostess who sat me, I was greeted by my server that evening, a friendly guy by the name of Josh.  He said, "We have an early bird special where you get either a pasta dish of your choice, our Chicken Speidini or Chicken Modiga with salad and one side for $11.99."  Then he looked at his watch and said, "Ooohh, it's after 6.  Well, I'll tell you what.  If you give me your order now, I can still probably get it in."  Well, I hadn't even opened the menu yet to see what they had to offer, let alone knowing what kind of pasta they had to offer or what the hell Chicken Modiga was.  (It's a lightly breaded chicken breast that's pan fried topped with Provel cheese, and a white wine and butter sauce.)   I said I was going to pass on the early bird special.

Josh then told me that their special that evening was the fried chicken dinner for $12.99.  "Best fried chicken in the city," he told me with all sincerity.  But I doubted that it could top the great fried chicken at Hodak's, a place I had considered going to when I got into town.  (Click here to see the Road Tips entry on Hodak's.)  I told him that I'd just start out with an ice cold Budweiser and take a look at the menu. 

I was a little astonished at the offerings in the menu.  They had pasta dishes, sandwiches, burgers, and entrees such as the aforementioned Chicken Modiga, beef tips and noodles, housemade meat loaf, and a 12 ounce New York strip steak.  They had pizza on the menu at Joey B's on the Hill and it was served in a square cooking sheet.  The thing that got me is that some of the items on the menu came with "St. Louis' favorite cheese", which is the creamy Provel cheese.  Now, I can take Provel cheese from time to time, but I prefer mozzarella on my pizza.  I thought about the pizza for a moment until Josh told me when he brought my beer out that they did not offer mozzarella cheese on their pizza.  Some places in St. Louis give you the option, but not at Joey B's.  

They also had a number of appetizers and salads on the menu.  I thought about getting some of the toasted ravioli to start out, but Josh told me that the portion served was great for two people to share and it would be more than enough for one person to have as dinner.  I decided to pass up the toasted ravioli for this trip.  

Man, they had a lot of stuff on the menu at Joey B's on the Hill.  I was apprehensive about all the items on the menu because history has told me that restaurants with deep menus usually only do all of the foods well enough, but not great.  I was certainly in a quandary that evening.  Josh may have come around three or four times to see if I was ready to order, but I was trying to mentally pare down the items that I was interested in.

Here's what I was looking hard at for dinner - the Swiss cheese and Mushroom burger (I hadn't had a burger in a long time), the meat loaf, the lasagna, the portobello-stuffed ravioli, and I also considered the fried chicken special that evening.  But I reluctantly - and with my fingers crossed - I ended up order the tortellini that evening. 

The tortellini featured beef, veal or chicken stuffed pasta served in a thick cream sauce along with fresh peas and sliced mushrooms, then finished with grated parmesan cheese.  A basket of fresh and warm sesame-seeded Italian bread came on the side with the tortellini.  (I passed on a salad that I could have gotten.)

The tortellini was surprisingly very good.  I was amazed at the taste of the stuffed pasta shells in the rich and creamy white sauce.  It was a large portion and I was certain that I couldn't finish the whole bowl of pasta, but it was so good that I couldn't stop eating it.  I was taking portions of the Italian bread and dipping it in the cream sauce because it was so sinfully good.  I ended up eating a very large portion of the tortellini and had only two pieces of bread left in the basket at the end of the dinner.  

As I was eating my dinner, a young lady by the name of Breanna came over to introduce herself to me.  "Josh had to leave suddenly," she explained.  "I'm taking over for him."  I thought it was rather strange because there were a couple times that I saw Josh at the order station in the dining room after she came over to tell me she was taking over.  If he had to leave suddenly, there was a guy who looked like Josh inputing orders into the system.  

Nevertheless, I was more than happy - and very surprised - at how good the meat-stuffed tortellini was at Joey B's on the Hill.  I'm leery of restaurants that have a lot of food to choose from on their menu - and it was a large combination of American and Italian foods.  But Joey B's more than acquitted themselves on their very good tortellini.  The fresh and warm Italian bread they served with the pasta dish was a plus.  I felt bad for Josh as I made him check with me three or four times before I decided on dinner.  Maybe that's why he "left suddenly" and Breanna took over my table.  He'd just had enough of the guy who couldn't make up his mind.  I won't say the tortellini at Joey B's on the Hill was the best I've had, but it was very good and it was a perfect meal for someone who really didn't know what he wanted when he came in the door.

Triptych Brewing - Savoy, IL

My wife and I have friends who, when we get together, we usually laugh too much and drink too much.  They like to drink craft beers and we'll meet up with them from time to time for an afternoon or evening of laughing and drinking.  On one Sunday afternoon a couple of years ago, we met up at Radicle Effects Brewerks (formerly Against the Grain Brewery) in Rock Island, a place that brews their own beers, has great bloody Mary's, and also offers a handful of beers from other craft breweries.  (They even have Old Style and Pabst Blue Ribbon available!)  My friend and I were at the bar and he was looking at the beer menu.  He said to me, "Hey, have you ever tried the Triptych Dank Meme?"  I said that I had never heard of the brewery.  He explained to me that it's located in the small town of Savoy, IL, just south of Champaign.  "Oh, yeah," he said excitedly.  "I was down there a couple years ago and had one of these at their brewpub.  It's great."  

He talked me into getting one and I had to say that it was very good for a hazy IPA.  I later found out that a Hy-Vee store over in Rock Island sells 4-packs of Dank Meme in 16-ounce cans and I've headed over there a few times over the last couple years to pick some up for my beer fridge at home.   

Well, I recently spent the evening in Champaign and it turned out that Savoy was just a couple three miles down the road from the hotel I was staying at.  I decided to head down to Triptych Brewing and get a Dank Meme from its source.  

Anthony Benjamin was looking for a hobby to start right when his wife entered law school at the University of Illinois in 2005.  It just so happened that he saw a program on television that showed the basics of home-brewing and he was immediately hooked.  Starting out in his garage - like any number of owners of micro and craft breweries over the years - Benjamin got to be pretty good at it.  In fact, he won a handful of awards and medals in brewery competitions while he was also working in the engineering department at the University of Illinois.  In 2009, Benjamin was named the Midwest Home-brewer of the Year based on the number of awards he won in contests across a 12 state region.

Pictured right - Triptych Brewing majority owner Anthony Benjamin

Through home-brewing, Benjamin struck up a relationship with computer engineer Joshi Fullop.  Along with a third friend, local Champaign lawyer Jason Bartell, the trio decided to look into doing their own brewery at some point.  Funding was a bit of a concern, so the three started a Kickstarter fund to raise the $20,000 needed to get their brewery in motion.  It wasn't long that the money was raised - actually over $5,000 more than they had hoped for - and things were kicking into gear.  

The trio found a space in a building in Savoy in 2012 and with the construction help and know-how of another fellow home-brewing enthusiast, Lyle Amacher, they were able to turn the space into an 500-square foot brewery with a small adjoining taproom.  By the end of 2012, Benjamin was starting to brew beers in the 1.5 barrel system and in February of 2013 Triptych Brewing opened for in-house serving of their beers.  The brewing system eventually grew to a cobbled-together 3-barrel system and then they acquired more vessels to make it a 5-barrel system.  Initially, they only sold beer-to-go in 32-ounce growlers, but they eventually put in a canning line so they could sell their beers in 16-ounce sizes. 

The name Triptych is a sort of interesting story.  Wanting to stay away from a name with a regional connotation, Benjamin looked at the three basic ingredients to make beer -  water, barley and hops.  There were also three initial owners of the new brewery.  He had learned years before that a triptych is a set of three associated artistic works blended into one work of art.  And, voila!  He had come up with a name!  The Triptych Brewing logo features a blending of water, hops and barley in three entwining circles.  

The Triptych Brewery was a hit right off the bat and as their business grew the trio of owners knew that A) they would need more space, and B) more time would have to be devoted to the business.  Fullop couldn't do that with the demands of his job, nor could Bartell with the demands of his law firm.  But this was Anthony Benjamin's full-time job since he quit his position at the University of Illinois just before the brewery opened.  Fullop and Bartell ended up selling their interests to Benjamin, who, in turn, sold shares of Triptych to Lyle Amacher - who had just retired early from his job with AT&T - and another home-brewer friend by the name of Greg Altstetter.  It wasn't long after that that a fourth partner - local realtor and property manager, James Voigtlander - became a minority investor in the brewery.

With Triptych Brewing signing distribution contracts around the state of Illinois, Benjamin and his minority partners had to find a larger space in which to brew their beers.  It turned out the owner of a flooring company just across the street from Triptych Brewing in Savoy was looking to move to a larger location.  Triptych moved into the building in the spring of 2018 and put in a much larger brewing operation going from nano-brewery status to micro-brewery status with three 15-barrel brewing systems in an 8,000 square-foot space.  

I had finished up with one of my accounts in Champaign in the late afternoon and had checked into my hotel on the south side of Champaign.  A storm front was brewing in the western skies when I made the short trek down Neil Street into Savoy.  A quick turn to the right and another quick turn to the right, I found myself pulling into Triptych Brewing on Woodfield Drive.  (see map)  I got what was the last parking space in the lot next to the taproom.  (Additional parking is available across the street at the brewing facility after 5 p.m. and along Woodfield Drive.)  

I would have to say the decor at Triptych would be classified as modern industrial.  The open space had a lacquered concrete floor with a number of metal/wood-topped tables with mismatched chairs at both the high-tops and regular tables.  A flow chart of how they make the beer is depicted in a mural on the wall in the space, and an authentic shuffleboard table was being used by two guests next to the mural.

I ended up taking a seat at the bar and took a look at the beer menu on the wall behind the bar.  Triptych Brewing had nearly 20 beers, ales and ciders on tap that day including a guest cider from the Brick River Cider Company out of St. Louis.  They had a handful of fruit-based beers including the tart ale called "Hawaiian Shirts" that featured mango and passion fruit.  I'm usually a sucker for anything with passion fruit (a.k.a. lillikoi in Hawai'i), but that sounded too fruity for my taste.  They also had a low-alcohol Belgian-style beer, as well as a mild-English ale with a 3.5 ABV.  And they had a smoked lager on tap that they made in collaboration with Narrow Gauge Brewing Company, a craft brewery located in the the St. Louis suburb of Florissant, MO 

I was intrigued by a couple beers they had that day - the Wake Up, Nero; and the Indistinguishable from Magic.  Both were hazy double India Pale Ales and had similar alcohol content (7.9 and 8.0, respectively).  I liked the smoothness of the Wake Up, Nero a little better than the Indistinguishable from Magic, but both were very good.

But I was there to get a Dank Meme on tap.  One of the bartenders by the name of Joe introduced himself to me when I first sat down and he poured me a pint glass with a nice head of foam.  It had the wonderful hazy gold color that I've come accustomed to.  And it was just as smooth and had a nice citrus back-end that I really enjoy with the Dank Meme.  It's an easy drinking beer and I was able to easily polish off a pint before ordering a second one.  

I walked around the tap room as I enjoyed my second beer and noticed that there was a food truck setting up in front of the building along Woodfield Drive.  Triptych Brewing has La Paloma, a Mexican food truck specializing in street tacos, on Thursday evenings from 5 to 8 p.m.  But guessing by the gathering storm that looked like it could just start dumping rain at any minute, I figured they wouldn't be open much longer that evening.  I hurried up and finished my beer, then took off back to my hotel getting there just moments before it started blowing and raining heavily.  

I sent my friend a picture of the front Triptych Brewing after getting back to the hotel and he texted me back, "Jealous!" moments later.  Triptych Brewing is a great little brewery and I really enjoy their Dank Meme hazy IPA.  They have a number of interesting beers and their distribution reaches nearly all corners of Illinois.  If you find yourself in the Champaign area and are on the look-out for some very good craft beers, you need to take the short trek down to Savoy and give Triptych Brewing a try.