It’s no secret that Sean and I love breakfast. It’s obviously the best meal of the day, and it’s even better when someone else makes it for you.
In every city we’ve lived (Mount Pleasant, Saginaw, and Grand Rapids), we’ve been on a hunt to find the best breakfast place.
We’ve got a few on our favorites list for Grand Rapids (including Anna’s House), but one takes the pancake: Real Food Café.
They’ve both got great environments, but it gets quite crowded on weekends. And a word of warning: they won’t seat you until everyone in your group is there. It’s a little frustrating, especially if you’re just waiting for someone to park the car, but I actually really like the rule. It gives priority to the people who have actually been waiting.
Another word of warning: they only accept cash and local checks. There are ATMs at both locations, so be prepared to pay some fees if you forget your cash.
Now that we have the warnings out of the way, let’s get to the good stuff: the food.
Sean and I play that game at the beginning of the meal where we pretend we don’t know what we want, so we spend a few minutes browsing the menu while sipping our coffee. And then we get the same thing we always get.
Sean gets two eggs (over medium), meat (bacon), and home fries with a side of (white) toast.
And I get the Tuesday Morning: two eggs (over medium), bacon, and a slice of French toast. This time I decided to add a side of home fries, because they’re that good.
I wouldn’t change anything about the food at Real Food Café. The french toast isn’t soggy, the over-medium eggs are always done perfectly, and the bacon is the right amount of crispy. And the home fries. Holy cow. They’re absolutely delicious, with just the right amount of burnt potato.
I definitely recommend getting to Real Food early, or you’re going to be waiting a while. Luckily, they’re great at customer service and have a pot of coffee available to anyone waiting.
It’s honestly our favorite breakfast place in all of Grand Rapids. It’s set the bar pretty high for everywhere else. Everything available is top-notch, including the cinnamon rolls and pies available at the register. It’s so hard to resist buying one every time.
What’s your favorite place to eat breakfast?
There’s this place in my college town called “Eggs, Etc” and it’s the BEST at potatoes and egg things. Loaded potatoes are a big weakness of mine. There’s another place out here called “The Pan” and the (upwards of 2 hour) wait is SOOOO worth it. Their pancakes are to die for and they make a lot of their own fancy butters and syrups. They have pineapple syrup that makes me swoon. They apparently have deep dish pizza too, but I’ve never gotten that far in the menu.
Soooo we’re going to both of these places when I visit, right?
You act like that wasn’t already the plan? Any excuse to go to either of these places is a good one.
This is why we’re friends.
Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day too!!! I can’t wait to go on my vacation in two weeks because I know I’ll be eating lots of yummy food like this!!!
http://inspirationindulgence.com
Oooh so fun! Plus, when you’re on vacation, calories don’t count, right? 😉
We love breakfast! In fact we had “brinner” as we call it tonight (breakfast for dinner): pancakes, eggs, hashbrowns, bacon. We had a favorite breakfast place before we moved but haven’t found one that stands up to the old one yet. 🙂
I love that! Breakfast is seriously the best.
love a good breakfast, this looks awesome!
avecdanielle.blogspot.com
Those hash browns look AMAZING!!! Little “hole-in-the-wall” restaurants as we call them are some of mine and Josh’s favorites! Yesterday, we had lunch in a pharmacy! No joke!! Great post!
It’s rare for me to eat breakfast, growing up my family were the kind of people to oversleep and just wake up and eat lunch. But every once in awhile my sister would get up and make me french toast. It’s one of the only breakfast foods I like.
I have never been an actual breakfast eater, but I love breakfast for lunch or dinner…especially diner breakfast. For some reason it tastes so much better when someone else cooks!