Category: Dining and Coffee Reviews

What and Where:

Earl of Sandwich | 307 South State Street | Ann Arbor, MI 48104 | (734) 213-6762

Ratings (1=terrible, 5=mind-blowingly great)

Tastiness: 3.5

Service: 3.5

Price (1=super cheap, 5=super expensive):3

Value: 3

General vibe: 3.5

Comments

• It’s hard for me to believe, but I wrote only one restaurant review last year, for a kind of lame place in Ann Arbor (that is surprisingly still open) called Vinology. Why the drop-off in reviews? I have no clue. But maybe this year, even with the unspoken and yet assumed desire to lose weight, I’ll manage to do a few more write-ups about place. Since I’m starting the new year at Earl of Sandwich, it’ll be here.
• Ann Arbor needs another place for a sandwich like it needs another coffee shop. Just on this block off of the U of M diag, there are six or so sandwich/quasi-fast food places. And yet they still come, I guess because college kids and their ilk eat a lot of sandwiches.
• The Earl of Sandwich is a chain, albeit a small and (I presume) relatively new one. Apparently, there is some kind of connection to the original Earl of Sandwich, though it’s based out of Orlando, FL. Go figure.
• I think special orders upset them because there isn’t any choice of breads or style– it’s all white and toasted. On the other hand, the bread and its toasting are very good, and the variety of sandwich choices is about as big as any of the other half-dozen sandwich places around. I am partial myself to the beef oriented ones.
• Kind of weird decor, in a way. It’s faux quasi-British library with a big screen TV and some clocks to indicate the different time zones in different places. Interestingly, the only clock even remotely accurate was the one for Ann Arbor.
• One thing that gives this place a bit of a bump over the competitors is they do have free wifi, which I am using right now.
• Overall, pretty good, though if I was in the mood for something a little more spicy and Italian-like, I’d probably recommend Potbelly’s across the street.

What and Where:

Vinology | 110 South Main Street | Ann Arbor, MI 48104 734-222-9841

Ratings (1=terrible, 5=mind-blowingly great)

Tastiness: 2.5

Service: 2

Price (1=super cheap, 5=super expensive): 5

Value: 1.5

General vibe: 3

Comments

• My millions of regular readers will know that it’s been a long time since I’ve done a restaurant review in quite a while. Why? Well, mainly because I haven’t been any place new worth writing about one way or the other in a long time. Until Vinology.
• I went here on a work-related event with three other people. Which was good because a) I got to hear about a few different dishes in one stop and b) I didn’t have to pay for it (in theory, because I need to be reimbursed for the bill, but that’s another story).
• Overall, the food isn’t that good and it is horrifically over-priced.
• They promote themselves as a wine bar, and indeed, they’ve got lots of wine. They have this kind of cool wine menu scheme where they have a very user/amateur-friendly wine drinking menu, but the problem is that a glass of wine on the low-end in this place is $8, and on the higher-end, it’s $15.
• We ordered a cheese appetizer that I think was at least $12. It was a choice of three different cheeses, which was nice. But if it added up to 8 ounces of cheese, I’ll chew on the glass the wine came in. I mean, I don’t want to be a cheapskate here, but this just seemed out of line to me.
• They have a “small plate” menu, but we all had main courses. One diner had the Kobe steak, and she loved it. Another had a roasted chicken, and her impression was that it was “okay.” A third diner had the cobb salad. He said he ordered this based the menu description that promised lobster, but he said it was mostly lettuce. I had a duck dish that I thought was kind of on the icky side– far too sweet, odd chunks of meat, and, inexplicably, it included white bread toast. So one for four.
• We all split a desert, some kind of hazelnut torte thing, and that was pretty tasty.
• The service was, well, earnest I suppose, but it was pretty slow, and this on a night where the place was pretty empty.
• So the verdict from me is this is a good place to go and get a glass of wine (and maybe a desert) after you eat someplace else.

What and Where:

Cafe Zola | 112 W Washington Street | Ann Arbor, MI 48104 (734) 769-2020

Ratings (1=terrible, 5=mind-blowingly great)

Tastiness: 4

Service: 1-4 (see below)

Price (1=super cheap, 5=super expensive): 3.5

Value: 2.5

General vibe: 3.5

Comments (as of 5/14/06)

• Cafe Zola represents for me all that is wrong and all that is right about Ann Arbor. On the down-side, it is the epitomy of pretentious, yuppified, faux-boho, exposed brick, self-important Ann Arbor establishments which is frequented by upper-middle-class (and sometimes flat-out rich) locals who profess identity with the disadvantaged and who ally themselves to some sort of safe version of liberalism. And it is precisely the kind of place routinely mocked by web sites like Ann Arbor is Overrated. On the up-side, I identify with most of these values (for better or worse), I certainly prefer Ann Arbor to many of the alternatives in the area, and I tend to like the food and company. So that’s Cafe Zola in the nutshell.
• We’ve never been for lunch or dinner, mainly because for years and years, Cafe Zola only served breakfast. So I have no way of telling you much about that. Yet.
• As far as I can tell, Cafe Zola only takes reservations for parties of five or more. If you go during the week, getting a table is no problem. I will ocassionally go myself on a Sunday or Saturday morning, and when I do that, I will sit at the bar/counter. This is not a problem either, though you might be jostled about by people waiting for a table. But be prepared to wait quite a while on the weekends, and if you go on Mother’s day (which we did today), be prepared to get pretty pissed off at the shitty service from the hostess stand. We were told it would be 15 to 20 minutes when we arrived; 45 minutes later, this same person was telling new arrivals 15 to 20 minutes. Then someone has the nerve to call our names from the list and ask us uf we wanted to sit at the counter which we could have done 45 minutes earlier, and then some old lady came up to the stand after calling in for the waiting list, something I was explicitly told you couldn’t do. It’s funny though; after I started yelling about this with my booming voice and got some stares from the well-heeled upper-middle-class faux boho yuppified pseudo liberal locals, we got a table toot sweet.
• Our wait person today was quite good, but I have to say that the bad service does not always end at the front of the house at Cafe Zola. A few years ago, there was a time where we waited for 2 hours at the table to get our food, and there has been plenty of times in past visits where the service was pretty crappy.
• So why go? The food is really good, I must say. They have these pretty good crepe dishes, but I think they’re a little over-priced for what you get. Generally, I get an omlette (and generally the farm house omlette), though I sometimes get the “Turkish Brunch” (“An array of kalamata olives, feta cheese, havarti cheese, cucumber, tomato, grape leaf dolmas, hard-boiled egg and farm butter, accompanied by pastries, fresh bread and coffee or tea”). Today I got the excellent and low-carb diet destroying french toast. They make it with rasin bread and they get it just the right level of crispness on the outside and gooeyness on the inside. Good stuff.
• Oh, and I think I go again and again because, as much as I complain, these are my kind of people in my kind of town.
• The best coffee in town, though it isn’t really a good place to go and do coffeeshop-like activities (read, work on the laptop, etc.).

And ultimately, a fine Mother’s Day was had by one and all.

What and Where:

Grizzly Peak Brewing Company | 120 W Washington Street | Ann Arbor, MI 48104 (734) 741-7325

Ratings (1=terrible, 5=mind-blowingly great)

Tastiness: 3.5

Service: 3.5

Price (1=super cheap, 5=super expensive): 3.5

Value: 3.5

General vibe: 4

Comments (as of 4/20/06)

• It’s been a while since I’ve posted a restaurant review here, largely because of my latest adventures in dieting. Well, we decided to take some dieting liberties on Wednesday night and accompany Steve B. and his wife Michelle out for an impromtu dinner. It was quasi-diet friendly… not counting the beer… or, for me, the mashed potatoes…. And to make matters worse, I’m taking a “diet break” this afternoon and evening too. Oh well; back on the wagon on Saturday.
• There are actually a couple of other brew-pubs in Ann Arbor, but Grizzly Peak is the one we always go to. Perhaps we should give the others a chance (though I have eaten at the Ann Arbor Brewing Company before– I wasn’t impressed). Well, ideas for future reviews….
• As my numbers might suggest, Grizzly Peak is consistent and consistently good. I can’t recall a bad meal I’ve had there, to tell the truth. Some of my favorites include the ribs, the fish n’ chips, the steaks, the burgers, and the pizzas. Trying for something a bit more “diet friendly,” I went for a chicken dish that included some mashed potatoes, which means I probably would ahve been better off with a steak or something.
• Prices vary quite a bit here– $6 or $7 for a sandwich (they have a great lunch deal for around that price that includes half a sandwich and a cup of their very good beer and cheddar cheese soup), $20 for the whole steak thing.
• We hadn’t been in a while because they took Annette’s favorite dish, a vegetarian burger, off the menu. They still have a salad she likes plenty. Which reminds me that I probably should have taken that approach the other night because they have a number of dinner salad kinds of meals.
• And of course there is the beer, which I find to be pretty good though not great. I personally tend toward the steelhead red. Steve B. enjoyed the porter. I’ve come in before and gotten the “sampler,” which is a pretty good deal if you are feeling in decisive and/or in the mood to drink a fair amount of beer.
• It’s a very “family friendly” kind of place, though I don’t think was too crazy about the hamburger he ordered this past time. Too much bun.

What and Where:

Gratzi | 326 S. Main Street | Ann Arbor, MI 48104 (734) 663-6387

Ratings (1=terrible, 5=mind-blowingly great)

Tastiness: 3.5

Service: 4

Price (1=super cheap, 5=super expensive): 4

Value: 3 to 5 (see below)

General vibe: 4

Comments (as of 3/25/06)

• Our visit last night to Gratzi closed out my annual “birthday week,” this one made all the more special by the fact that this is the big 4-o for me.
• Gratzi is actually part of a quasi-chain of restaurants owned by Main Street Ventures which owns four other restaurants in Ann Arbor. We’re also a big fan of one of their operations in Toldeo, Ciao.
• One of the reasons we went to Gratzi last night (and I think this is true with the other Main Street Ventures places) is if you go to the place on your birthday– and I mean the actual day, not the day you’re celebrating– they give you a significant amount off of your meal. For us, it amounted to over $20. In short, the “value” factor goes up quite a bit on your birthday.
• At one point in time, people used to say it was the best restaurant in town. I don’t know about that. But while I’ve had less than great meals at Gratzi, I think it is consistantly one of the better restaurants in Ann Arbor.
• That was certainly the case last night. I had the porterhouse steak and it was an enormous and darn tasty hunk of meat. We shared the antipasti misti, and that too was a nice start to the meal. I haven’t asked about it, but I think Annette liked her chicken marsala just fine. For desert, we had a freebie cannoli that was very yummy.
• Will contends that the fettuccini alfredo is the best anywhere.
• Other winners at Gratzi are the salmon ravioli, the veal, the various specials that crop up on the weekly menu.
• The only food complaint/critique I had about last night is the vegetables seemed oddly under-cooked, both on the antipasti misti platter and with my steak.
• I think the wine list is a bit over-priced, though we were recommended a very nice bottle of wine last night.
• It’s a really pretty restaurant. We were lucky enough to sit on the second level right by the large window that overlooks main street, so there was people watching outside and over the balcony’s edge inside.
• All in all, a big thumbs up. Gratzi is not exactly a “risky” restaurant, but it almost always is a winner for “occassion” meals like last night.

What and Where:

Chuck E. Cheese | 2655 Oak Valley Dr. | Ann Arbor, MI 48103 (734) 222-1003

Ratings (1=terrible, 5=mind-blowingly great)

Tastiness: 2

Service: 2

Price (1=super cheap, 5=super expensive): 3.5

Value: 1 (though see below)

General vibe: between 1 and 5 (see below)

Comments (as of 2/19/06)

• Every once in a while, especially when the weather is bad and/or when Will is having a wee bit of “cabin fever,” Annette or I (and it is more often than not me) take Will and/or his friends to Chuck E. Cheese. It’s sort of a restaurant and we went this on Saturday, so I thought I’d offer this review.
• Obviously, no adult would go here without children. Though one of my neighbors told me a funny story about how she took her sister there on her 21st birthday. The newly legal to get drunk anywhere sibling was not amused.
• I actually don’t mind the pizza, much in the same way that I don’t mind a hamburger from MacDonald’s once in a while. It’s not real pizza, but, for someone like me who grew up in suburban/strip mall America, it is oddly comforting, like Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. They have a salad bar and other food at CEC, but I have no idea as to why you would even think about eating these items.
• Chuck E. Cheese is amusingly staffed with surly teenagers/early 20-somethings. I can’t imagine what the “manager” in one of these places looks like. And God help the poor sap who draws the short straw and then has to get into that damned rat costume– some dumb-ass might make you hold up a can of beans.
• The vibe of CEC depends. Chuck E. Cheese is essentially a kiddie version of Las Vegas, and my impression is that one’s feelings toward “sin city” are exactly the same as one’s feelings toward CEC. We’re itchin’ to get back to Vegas, so the Cheese is okay with us. Actually (and strangely), I find Chuck E. Cheese a pretty easy place to read, grade papers, check my email, etc.
• For the “under 10” age group though, Chuck E. Cheese seems to universally be the equivalent of crack.
• At face-value, is an extremely poor value. The food is over-priced as are the tokens to play various games and win various completely worthless tickets. On the other hand, it often is a small price to pay to entertain the boy for a couple of hours.

What and Where:

Paesano’s | 3411 Washtenaw Ave., Ann Arbor, MI 48104 | (734) 971-0484

Ratings (1=terrible, 5=mind-blowingly great)

Tastiness: 3.5

Service: 4

Price (1=super cheap, 5=super expensive): 3.5

Value: 3

General vibe: 3.5

Comments (as of 2/9/06)

• Paesono’s is the quintessential “okay” to “pretty good” restaurant to me: there’s nothing really spectacular about this place, but there’s nothing at all horrible about it, either. More often than not, I’ve had pretty good food– not great, but pretty good.
• They have all the usual red sauce Italian food at work, but you’re better off getting the specials here, even though they might seem a little odd. Annette and I (and then, after we went there, some people I went to dinner with from work) had an appetizer of shredded brussel sprouts with proscuitto and a bit of risotto in the middle. Sounds weird, right? Very very good, and I don’t care if you don’t like brussel sprouts.
• On the other hand, I’ve also had food that can only be described as mediocre and/or not at all worth it.
• Great deals on wine– they pride themselves on this, and they ought to.
• We’ve always had very nice (and basically good) service. One time, Annette and I went there before a movie or something, and we split an entree that we had to send back, something that is very unusual for us. That sort of thing happens, and they just bent over backwards to make us happy, which they did.