The Breakfast Club

Our weekend review #2

The Breakfast Club
676 W Grand River Ave.Brighton, MI 48116

This was not a planned stop, but I felt it also deserved a review since I had never been there before. Again, this restaurant is in Brighton (seems to be a lot of places we haven't been 10 minutes from our house) and is only open for breakfast and lunch. They have been voted the best breakfast in Livingston County for 4 years running and are well known for their oven baked french toast.

This is a cute, little restaurant that is actually larger on the inside that it looks from the outside. While Ira's breakfast was fairly standard with pancakes and coffee, he did state the coffee was really good. I tried his pancakes and agreed with him that his are better.

Me, on the other hand, I had to try what they were known for...the world renowned (states that in the menu) oven baked french toast. This is made with cinnamon rolls, texas toast, croissant, berries, and streusel. Now building from bottom up - a large cinnamon roll, a piece of texas toast, berries of all kinds, we were guessing the croissant is probably tore up and put on top the berries, and then a couple inches of struesel. What they brought to me looked like a huge chunk of 8 inch high coffee cake...WITH SYRUP! Holy cow was this thing huge!!

While I knew I would not be eating all of it, I did give it a fair try and think I ate most of it, at least more than half. It was sweet, but not too sweet and very tasty. I also had fresh and delicious orange juice that I was trying not to share with Ira.

After the meal they bring your check with chocolate covered strawberries for each person at the table - very classy!

The only downfall is that their prices are a little high for breakfast. The bill was $25 for everything I mentioned above. So, that will keep me from visiting on a regular basis, but I will definitely go back.

4 stars

Champ's Pub

Champ's Pub
140 E Grand River Ave.Brighton, MI 48116

On Saturday night Ira and I went to Champ's Pub. I cannot tell you how many times each one of us have passed this little bar, but I can bet it is hundreds. So, as Ira's turn to choose, he decided we should finally check it out and just see if this really was the best burger in Brighton.

Their menu is bar food, no doubt about it. The only thing missing from this place to make it feel like the many bars I spent so much time in as a kid (long story, not for this blog) was a pinball machine in the corner.

We each started with a beer and an appetizer of jalepeno poppers, one of my faves. Now, to me jalepeno poppers are fairly standard. They are either good all-around, the breading is too hard and tears up your mouth, or superb. I have only found one place that makes superb, so I have to say that Champ's were standard and good.

Ira had to order to burger and claimed it was like a Blimpy's burger, but larger. For anyone who has not been to Blimpy's in Ann Arbor, this was quite a compliment to Champ's. I ordered the Champ's Original - a roast beef sandwich with swiss and peppers. This was supposed to be their take of a philly cheesesteak. I will start by saying that the sandwich was good, but felt like it was missing something. However, when I first received my meal it looked like chopped roast beef on a bun. To be honest it looked like chunky dog food. So, after I was able to get past the appearance, the flavor was good. But, it could be better. So, after I mixed a side of horseradish with Ira's leftover ranch from his sweet potato fries and put that on top of the sandwich the flavor of the whole sandwich just popped.

I should also mention the fries. While the burgers and sandwiches normally come with chips, they do have 7 different kinds of fries to choose from (at an additional cost), including beer battered (yum!!) and sweet potato.

Champ's has a very neighborhood, local bar feel and since it so close to everything we do we will be going back there again.

We left very full and satisfied. Since it is bar food, even good bar food only gets 3 stars from me.