Due to a Saturday night social engagement, we ended up spending Valentine’s weekend in South Bend, Indiana.  Unfortunately, it didn’t occur to us until several days before that restaurant occasions would be absolutely essential.  Fortunately, Parisi’s Restorante Italiano had fairly last minute availability for a 7:00 p.m. dinner.

This was our first time at Parisi’s.  Despite the restaurant’s close proximity to Notre Dame I’d really never heard much feedback about it while I was a student there.  Overall, this little-hyped Italian eatery is actually a relatively pleasant surprise.  It has a cozy houselike feel with sports-related photos lining the walls and diners separated into several different dining spaces.  The food is quite affordable.  Our four-course meal for two, with drinks, cost right around $60.00 and there was even a $30.00 dinner-for-two menu for those willing to choose from specified entrees.  My only major complaint regards service – our server seemed a bit flustered and disorganized, but this could be chalked up to the extremely busy weekend. 

We started off our Italian Extravaganza with an antipasto platter, which we almost always order when available.  It included salami, soppressata, provolone, pepperoncini, olives, cucumber, and peppers atop a scattering of lettuce.  The meats were particularly good.  Our second course consisted of fresh baked bread and butter (delicious) and iceberg salads (boring).  I barely touched my salad in the interest of saving room for the main course.

For our main courses, the hubby had chicken parmesan and I ordered gnocchi with tomato sauce.  As you can see, the presentation wasn’t anything special.  Food quality, however, was solid on both dishes.  The breading on the chicken was perfectly cooked and the gnocchi seemed homemade.  I was a proud member of the clean plate club and found the portion to be ideal for my hearty appetite.  While gnocchi was the obvious choice for me, I did notice an extensive “design your own pasta” section of the menu as well as plenty of pasta, chicken, fish, and veal dishes.

Finally, we couldn’t end our meal without dessert – a heart shaped tart that was described as “strawberry” but tasted more “cherry Poptart.”  This dessert was definitely the weak link of the meal, thanks to the liberal use of a sweet, artificial tasting filling in lieu of fresh fruit.  If you need dessert at Parisi’s, do yourself a favor and stick with the spumoni instead! 

Fortunately, we were stuffed enough that the lackluster dessert didn’t spoil what was overall a pretty tasty and pleasant meal.  Parisi’s is definitely a safe bet for a quick, affordable Italian meal post-game or while passing through South Bend.

Although our family loves to try different restaurants when visiting Chicago, it’s nice to have a reliable “go-to” pizza place to pop into after a long day of shopping or touring.  We went through a Giordano’s phase before being put off somewhat by the constant hordes of tourists.  We also dined regularly for a while at InField’s at the old Marshall Field’s but I think quality has declined since the Macy’s takeover.  Fortunately, I think we may have found a new favorite pizza joint in the form of Pizano’s in the Loop.

Atmosphere-wise, Pizano’s is a cleaner-than-average bar.  Typical Chicago/sports bar memorabilia lines the walls, and the lights are dim.  There are three different places to sit: upstairs restaurant, downstairs restaurant, and upstairs bar.  Upstairs is where the action is at, with downstairs having more of a banquet room feel.  I see little difference between sitting in the restaurant versus the bar as both have table service and a similar atmosphere. 

Every meal at Pizano’s starts off with typical crusty Italian bread and butter.  I imagine they would bring olive oil if asked.  It sometimes comes out warm and is very tasty.

Pizano’s has pastas, sandwiches, and pizza with some miscellaneous items thrown in. I have ordered the homemade gnocchi on both visits, the first time with pesto and pine nuts and the second with marinara sauce.  I prefer the latter type of sauce on gnocchi because the dumplings tend to be so heavy.  These are indeed heavy, but tasty.  My only gripe is that the $14.00 portion is large enough to serve a family of six.  Next time I’m going to try and ask for a half order as I hate to waste food.

There are several different types of pizzas to choose from at Pizano’s, but my family swears by the thin-crust variety.  Even this takes thirty minutes to prepare so order right away if you’re starving.  The sauce is delicious, but I believe the cheese blend really sets these pies apart from their competitors.  Pizza prices range from $11.00 to more than $25.00 depending on size and toppings.  Toppings are pretty standard and include pepperoni, sausage, onion, green pepper, and tomatoes. 

Finally, this is sort of random, but Pizano’s has some of the best fountain soda I’ve ever tried.  It could be because they serve it in huge glasses but I always find myself gulping down gallons when I’m there!  Don’t worry – the beer’s good too.

Although the Loop location is most convenient for us, there are actually three Pizano’s locations.  Head here to find one that’s convenient for you.

I love Indiana’s Amish country, and fall is just about the best time to visit.  We make a visit to Nappanee’s Amish Acres just about every year, sometimes to stay the night and sometimes just to eat and shop.  Most recently we stopped in to see Pirates of Penzance at the Round Barn Theater (HILARIOUS!) and to enjoy a gut-busting family-style Thresher’s Dinner.  As always, it was a wonderful day.

Here’s an exterior shot of the main barn which contains shopping, two films, and the entrance to the Round Barn Theater for plays.  Show tickets cost around $26.00.  Plain and Fancy plays all year, every year, with other shows rotating by the seasons.  Admission to the films is included with the Amish Acres admission fee which also includes a historic farm tour, hayride, and several other attractions.

This is the entrance to the restaurant barn where the serious eating takes place.  As you can see, there was all sorts of fun fall stuff going on during our visit including a pumpkin patch and a scarecrow competition. 

There were lots of beautiful and funny scarecrows, but I liked how this one looked like she had some spunk.  Actually, she kind of reminded me of my grandmother.

Pumpkins abounded during our visit.  We didn’t do the pumpkin patch tour this time, but we have once before.  The tractor-drawn wagon ride is fun and visitors can select their own pumpkins out of many in a designated field.  This is a great fall activity for anyone, particularly families with small children.

The Thresher’s Dinner takes place in a barn, but it’s a nice one.  There are white tablecloths, after all!  Meals are generally served family-style, although some the menu was recently updated to include a la carte offerings as well.  We always get the famous Thresher’s Dinner with fried chicken and beef for just under $20.00 per person.

The meal starts off with ham and bean soup and fresh bred with butter.  I like the soup better than the bread, but I’m not a big bean person.  On our recent visit, we also had the option to visit a “salad bar” which basically looked like a big bowl of lettuce and some dressings.  We opted out of the salad to avoid filling our bellies with roughage before getting to the good stuff. 

Here’s the main event – fried chicken, roast beef, buttered noodles, mashed potatoes, dressing, and corn.  Sometimes the corn is replaced with green beans or another seasonal vegetable.  Everything is pretty darn good.  I like the tender, carefully seasoned beef the best, while the hubby prefers the lightly coated fried chicken.  We always end up getting seconds of the mashed potatoes.  My only complaint from our recent visit is that the noodles were just a little too soggy, probably because they are prepared in large portions and then sit for a while.

Finally, every meal at Amish Acres ends with a choice of pie.  There are usually lots of different types available, but we arrived very close to closing time on this particular visit and as you can see lemon meringue ruled the day by the time we got to dessert.  I did manage to nab a piece of dutch apple and the hubby got some type of multiple berry pie.  These pies were good, but not as flaky and delicious as the cherry pie I usually select so I recommend dining early for maximum selection.

Those wishing to take home some Amish noodles, jellies, or a pie can stop and shop in the gift store right outside the restaurant barn’s entrance.  We usually take home some raspberry jam.  For the truly ambitious, Amish cook books are also available so you can recreate your Thresher’s dinner at home.

We’re only a month out from the next great excuse for a three day weekend, so start making those plans!  If you want to squeeze in one last weekend in the great outdoors before cold weather looms, consider a few days down south.

Brown County State Park is Indiana’s largest and, in my opinion, most average state park.  This may sound like an insult but it really isn’t.  The park has everything one needs in a state park – twelve miles of hiking trails, horse paths, tons of greenery, and on-site lodging.  There is plenty to keep a family busy here for a day or a long weekend.  These amenities combined with the park’s large size make it a good pick for a crazy holiday weekend.  That said, the park just doesn’t have anything truly distinct, like Clifty Falls’ waterfalls, Pokagan’s scenic lake and toboggan run, or Turkey Run’s river straddling trails.  In other words, go to Browne County State Park enjoy nature but don’t expect to be shocked and awed by anything in particular.

Here’s the view from one of the park’s dozen or so hiking trails.  Most are of moderate difficulty and only one trail is classified as “rugged.”

The Abe Martin Lodge, of which you can read my full review here.  We didn’t love our stay at the hotel, but we did love the Little Gem restaurant which you can take advantage of even if you aren’t a hotel guest.  Don’t miss the macaroni and cheese! 

If you do decide to stay at the lodge, you can take advantage of its lobby facilities and do…puzzles!  For some reason we always end up doing this when we stay in state park lodges.  We were quite proud of this one even though the pieces were larger than normal.

If you get stir crazy from all the nature, be sure to take a trip into downtown Nashville.  It’s a little touristy, but fun.  I personally thought the famous Nashville House (fried biscuits) was overpriced and overrated, but I loved the downtown candy store and several other knick-knack shops.  Tourists can also take a trolley ride around to see the town’s highlights.

As a loyal Marriott rewards club member with a particular penchant for Renaissance properties, I have been looking for an excuse to stay at the Renaissance Indianapolis North since it opened about a year or so.  I got my chance last week when visiting the city for a meeting. 

Overall, we had just an okay stay.  The facility was nice but the service was really crappy from check-in to check-out.  Our room was large and clean but oddly arranged so we actually had very little floor space.  We also had an exceptionally terrible breakfast buffet experience that set us back over $30.00. 

Here’s the exterior view.  Fairly ho-hum, but I still had high hopes for what was inside.

The lobby is decorated in the bright, modern style typically used in Renaissance hotels, but the atrium ceiling is lower than usual so the hotel lacks that “grand” feel.

The Renaissance is full of little nooks and crannies like this where people can sit and play cards or have a drink.  Unfortunately, the lobby was occupied by a large group reception for the whole evening on the night of our stay.

The pool isn’t the most exciting in the world, but at least it was clean during our visit. 

Here’s the gym, which is small but pretty fabulous.  The wall not pictured was lined with brand spanking new treadmills.  Marriot hotels almost always have this very nice brand of exercise equipment, but I can’t remember what it’s called.

This is the entrance to the hotel restaurant, Grille 39.  I had high hopes for this restaurant because we’ve had some really fabulous meals at other Renaissance resorts.  In fact, breakfast here is when our stay really began to go downhill. 

The buffet line was pretty barren by the time we visited at 9:30 a.m., but I managed to fill my plate as shown above.  While the food looks pretty good, most of it was not.  The bacon was oddly seasoned and cold.  The pastries were dry and flavorless.  My strawberries had mold, which you can actually see if you look close enough.  The only really yummy dish in the bunch was the cheesy potato casserole pictured at 3 o’ clock on my plate.

Here’s a photo of the hubby’s plate, with more dry pastries and some bland pancakes. 

The grossest part of the meal, by far, was the “made-to-order” eggs.  I asked for scrambled eggs with cheese.  Twenty minutes later, I finally received this half-cooked mess that looked like the beginnings of an omelet.  I couldn’t eat more than a bite or two.  YUCK!  At the end of the terrible meal, we couldn’t even manage to flag down our server so a manager finally ended up bringing us the check. 

Overall, breakfast was a very disappointing end to a somewhat disappointing stay.  The Renaissance Indianapolis North simply failed to “wow” us, so I will likely be heading back downtown on my next trip to Indy.

The hubby and I have been on a slightly-healthier eating schedule since returning from a food-filled vacation.  Last Saturday, though, all our good intentions went out the window when we saw multiple billboards enticing us to enjoy fresh baked pies at Crane’s Pie Pantry Restaurant.  This unique eatery is located just a short jaunt from several major Michigan lakefront tourist towns including South Haven and Saugatuck, which makes it ideal for a pit stop enroute to or from a day of shopping or enjoying the lake.

Here’s the view from the road.  It looks rather industrial from this angle.

This iconic truck sits out front right next to where visitors drive in.  After our visit, we saw it pictured in a wide variety of promotional and informational publications.

On the inside, however, this place is jam-packed with character.  Guests sit at wooden tables of varied shapes and sizes or even at school desks.  Every spare nook and cranny holds some antique, whether a doll, an old stove, or a collection of pots and pans.

Some of the items, like this long-deceased dog, are actually a little creepy. 

Others, like this neon-green flower-filled bathtub, are practically modern art.

Our server was friendly and attentive, probably partly because we were practically the only ones there at 11:00 a.m.  The crowd did start to pick up after we left but there is so much seating space I can’t imagine this place ever has much of a wait.

The menu is heavy on good, simple comfort food, primarily of the soup/salad/sandwich variety.  I ordered the BLT sandwich and found it to be one of the best BLTs I’ve ever had.  The bacon was perfectly cooked and the bread homemade.  There was also tons of mayonnaise, which I consider to be a huge, unhealthy plus.

The hubby picked a grilled cheese sandwich with cheddar and mozzarella.  The cheese was the ooey, gooey, fabulous type that stretches after you bite into it.

Of course, the highlight of a meal at Crane’s is dessert.  Options include homemade donuts, ice cream sundaes, and lots of flavors of pie.  We hemmed and hawed over cherry versus apple before deciding on raspberry.  It was delicious, served nice and hot, and with an ideal ratio of filling to crust. 

Crane’s also sells pies and hosts U-Pick for fruit in certain seasons along with various special events.  You can head to their website to see what’s going on during your visit.

Believe it or not, we’ve got some pretty darn tasty cuisine here in the Midwest.  The five restaurants listed below aren’t necessarily the fanciest or most upscale dining experiences I’ve ever enjoyed but they do offer really great food, friendly service, and are relatively unique to the Midwest.  Best of all,, none of them will break the bank. 

1.  Giordano’s (Chicago, IL) – There are many excellent Chicago deep-dish pizza restaurants, but Giordano’s is, in my opinion, the best.  There are about twenty locations in Chicago and its suburbs.  We especially like the one at Prudential Plaza.  You MUST get a deep-dish pie if you go, preferably one with extra cheese.  The appetizer sampler platter is pretty tasty too. 

2.   Legs Inn (Cross Village, MI) – This place is very random, very Polish, and very yummy.  It is also in the middle of nowhere, but worth the drive.  Legs Inn offers traditional Polish cuisine in a Polish/American Indian-inspired setting.  They even had a polka band playing when we visited.  Be sure to try the kielbasa (sausage) and the kopytka (potato dumplings), and come hungry because everything is yummy. 

3.  Kil@wat (Milwaukee, WI) – The hubby and I consistently cite our meal here as one of our top three of all time.  Everything we tasted was amazing, but I specifically recommend the pretzel bread, tender braised short ribs, and trio of mashed potatoes plus the chocolate raspberry ganache tart for dessert.  The space in the Intercontinental is attractive and modern.  Best of all, our full evening of gourmet food set us back less than $100.00.  It looks like they have reworked the menu a little bit since we visited, but I presume the food is still terrific.

4.  Amish Acres Thresher’s Dinner (Nappanee, IN) – I’ve eaten at a wide variety of Amish country restaurants in both Indiana and Pennsylvania, and Amish Acres is the best.  Dinner is served family-style and includes ham and bean soup, fresh-backed bread and apple butter, assorted relishes, green beans with bacon, beef and noodles, mashed potatoes, dressing, chicken, ham or roast beef, and choice of pie, all for under $20.00 per person. 

5.  Great Lakes Brewing Company (Cleveland, OH) – This isn’t a fancy restaurant, but it’s a good one.  This downtown brewery serves its own brews along with tasty German and Polish-inspired cuisine.  Get yourself a pint of beer and some prime rib and relax in Great Lakes’ unpretentious setting.