365 Photo: Day 9: Wolfgang’s Keane

Originally published at digital biblyotheke.. You can comment here or there.

When I moved back to Grand Rapids in December of 2002, I made a promise to myself that the only place I would want to live is in Eastown, a wonderfully hip and fun area that reminds me of Ann Arbor (in which A2 is always considered to be Michigan’s answer to Berkeley), just on a incredibly smaller scale. It took several years before I would end up living in Eastown, and for 3.5 years, I had a ramshakle apartment on Norwood Ave that gave me 5 minute walk to some of the better eateries, pubs/bars and shops in the whole of Grand Rapids area. In the last few years, other walkable neighborhoods have started popping up such as Cherry Hill, Diamond District, Downtown and the burgeoning midtown areas. But Eastown has always been my first love and it is here I always come to visit when I come back to visit the ‘rents. And if there is any chance of moving back to Grand Rapids, Eastown would be the first place we would look to live.

The one thing that Eastown has that I have not found duplicated anywhere I have traveled is Wolfgang’s, one of the (bar none) best breakfast places ever. And ever, I mean ever. There is nothing like Wolfgang’s anywhere — it is not their extensive breakfast menu, their awesome hazelnut coffee or the familiarity of their waitstaff who recognize me when I come in — it’s the whole attitude of breakfast that presented. It’s not some highfalutin, overly priced restaurant where one gets some “fusion” dish that fails horribly (Muse in Royal Oak, I’m looking at you) or has a limited sampling of breakfast entrees (most breakfast places), but over and over again, they have pages upon pages of delicous, artery hardening, weight gaining breakfast. It is no wonder they are consistently voted the number one breakfast place everywhere in the local “best of” polls.

My favorite, something I have tried to duplicate by ordering separate dishes at other places, is the Keane: Southern style biscuits and gravy, topped with corned beef hash and scrambled eggs. I think one of the reasons I could never go vegetarian is the promise of no more Keane, something that I would gladly travel hundreds of miles to have.

Wolfgang’s has become the staple to visit when I come into town, not a visit goes by where I’m here at least once. When Justin and I end up moving to our nesting spot and if that place ends up outside of Michigan, I’ll lament not missing friends and family, but I’ll lament missing out on Wolfgang’s.