BrookLEn in Michigan: The One Who Smelt It

My family has been going to Ludington, Michigan for generations to soak up the beach on the sandy shores of northern Lake Michigan. But only in the past few years have I discovered that Ludington also has one of the best fish shacks in America, Bortell's Fisheries. It has now become a pilgrimage for my family (we WASPs go for pilgrimages!), and this year we managed to get there on a perfect evening. Okay, some tips for Bortells:
1) You will always miss it the first time you try to get there. It's on a local road, shrouded by trees and orchards. And it's really a shack, easy to pass.

2) You can't eat there. Well, there are picnic benches outside the shack, but the real secret is...

3) Go before sunset, get your food, and then head to the park. Right across the two-lane highway is a hidden drive to a small park that is on a bluff looking out to the lake. The view is incredible, and there are picnic tables for your convenience!

Everything is fried fresh for you-- you get to pick from today's catch, and receive it hot and greasy in a paper dish. This year, we whetted our palettes with (from left to right), smelt, walleye, and lake perch (the classic). Perfectly breaded, hot to the touch, this fish wouldn't have been better even if it was dipped in liquid sunset.

Eating Eastern European in Ohio

We roadtripped to Ohio this weekend to see Tom Waits in Akron, so we decided the ethnic of choice for our culinary adventures would be Eastern European. Saturday night before a Cleveland Indians game, we caught an early dinner at Sokolowski's University Inn. It was old-school cafeteria style and $24 got the two of us all of the food pictured -- mine was stuffed cabbage with homemade dumplings and mixed veg, N's was pierogies with cabbage and noodles and mashed potatoes, dessert was blueberry pie -- plus all-you-can-eat soup and salad bar, plus beer!

Sunday morning post-Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, we drove past an industrial wasteland punctuated by labor unions and Chinese restaurants to find Frank Sterle's Slovenian Country House. It was like they transplanted a dining hall from the old country -- the perfect setting for polka-dancing weddings. There were quite a few large tables of families of 15 or so people spanning 3 generations, probably there after church every Sunday. Again it was an unbelievable amount of food for not much money -- who can blame mid-Westerners for their size?

Where else can $16.95 get you chicken noodle soup, salad, bread, wiener schnitzel, kielbasa, roast pork loin, mixed veg, sauerkraut, and yummy oniony sauteed potatoes served with an ice cream scoop, plus coffee and delicious apple strudel!

I could only finish half of mine but had to take it to go it was so tasty -- perfectly breaded and fried schnitzel, smoky sausage, tender pork. Let me just say meat, potatoes, and any type of crust or dough as the strong points of this cuisine; vegetables not so much...

Down in Akron, we were still full from lunch, so we just had an ice cream dinner -- Mary Coyle's has been making "butter-rich" ice cream since 1937 - yum!!