Local Food-y Post

Although I half-jokingly say I live in SW Outer Nowhere, Michigan, I realize that with modern transportation, it's a lot less nowhere-y than it could be.

One example of this is that we live only minutes away from some pretty fantastic, local-source, artisanal restaurants or other eateries.

For example, there is Crane's Pie Pantry, a fruit-farm restaurant just outside Fennville, Michigan. The sandwiches are pretty basic, but the dessert pies are great. In the fall, the parking lot is often packed, with cars parked along the side of the road. (I should probably note that in the US, "pie" usually means a sweet dessert pie.)

Friday evening we tried Journeyman Cafe in "downtown" Fennville, which my husband had walked by while taking the kids to the children's museum for their field trip.

Our son and I split a wood-fired pizza, and my husband ordered clams. They print the menu each day, based on what they have available that day. There is also a bakery and coffee bar. We liked the pizza, but my son learned that he does not want to order anchovies!

I often say I'm not a cook, but I come from a long line of eaters. Although my husband claims he can step on my foot and I'll open my mouth* (think step-can trash can), I tend to be a little fussy about my food. I have this naive idea that it ought to taste like something other than just salt or just sugar.

My husband, who is a cook, is much more fussy than I am. He often makes something and then rejects it on some teensy taste or texture defect I can barely detect when he dejectedly points it out. (The fact that I'll eat this "ruined" food is why he say this*.)

So we like to eat at places where they make their own sauces, rather than buying them by the food service drum.

Places like the Amicarelli Vineyard in South Haven, where we have ended up with three distinctly different tomato sauces in various dishes at one table. The spinach pie is to die for -- one of the tasty exceptions to "pie in the US is sweet"!

Or like Su Casa, a great Mexican restaurant also in Fennville, which built a large new restaurant next door to the tiny old one. We went there Sunday evening to celebrate the opening of the new restaurant. (Having finished construction of our own not long ago, we were very sympathetic about construction delays.) Luckily for us, Sunday evening was not as busy, and we didn't have to wait for a table or our food.

And talk about luxury, in the front of the new restaurant they offer Palazzolo's Artisan Gelato, which I didn't realize has their manufactory right in Fennville!

Su Casa offers Mexican-inspired flavors like horchata and tamarind, which I think is about the best thing about America's melting pot: to be with a Polish-Irish-American guy buying Mexican flavors of Italian gelato from a woman from Germany.

I could go on for pages:

Sherman's Dairy Bar is in South Haven. (Sorry, they just closed Sunday for the season.)

The Chocolate Cafe is in South Haven. (They were open all last winter -- the Mexican hot chocolate with chilis is almost as good as my husband makes.)

The Corner Chocolate Shop is in South Haven.

We are absolutely awash in farm markets around here. There's the Dutch Farm Market, Stephenson's Farm Market, and Crane's U-Pick. (The Pie Pantry Cranes, the Cranes of Crane's U-Pick, and the Cranes who have the corn maze are all related, but have separate businesses.)