5222 Portage RoadJust me and the boy.
J and L were still at a figure skating camp in Wisconsin. I had picked B up from my in-laws Friday after work. We went to see a movie Friday night but I told him we could do whatever he whatever he wanted to do on Saturday.
I really wasn’t at all surprised when he said he wanted to go to Airway Fun Center…in fact, it was what I assumed he was going to say.
I told him we could go to Airway and play some video games if he went to breakfast with me first. He protested a little bit but he really wanted to go to Airway so he gave in pretty quickly.
I didn’t want to go too far out of the way so I picked a spot along the way for breakfast.
We stopped at Long Island Cafe on Portage Road in Portage. This particular spot on Portage and Fairfield Roads has been a lot of different restaurants over the years. The first time we were there it was Fat Tony’s. Since then, we’ve been to this restaurant as Lindbergh’s Landing and most recently as Zoo City Beastro.
We pulled in just before 10:30 on a Saturday morning. The restaurant was bustling but it wasn’t totally packed. We waited by the door until a hostess took us to a seat in the dining room furthest from the door.
If you’ve been in the restaurant as one of it’s previous iterations, you will instantly recognize the place. Not much has been done over the years. The set up is still the same with three dining room areas. They’ve added some ocean scenes and some of the typical “island decor” to make the space their own but the layout is still the same.
The thing that really surprised me is the bar is still there. The restaurant is only open for breakfast and lunch but they have a full bar. One of their signatures is the Mimosa Tower which comes in a tall tube filled with mimosa. It’s more of a table thing than an individual thing…but I’m sure someone is going to try to drink it all by themselves.
I was not there for alcohol though. B and I needed to eat breakfast then get him to Airway.
I was hungry but didn’t want to overdo it. I picked the Long Island Benedict. This plate is a pretty standard Eggs Benedict with a toasted English Muffin, grilled ham, poached eggs and a hollandaise sauce. It’s a standard Benedict, but also a really tasty one. The poached eggs were soft, not runny, which actually made the dish a little more enjoyable to eat. The firmness of the egg made it a little bit easier to eat. The Benedict didn’t come with any sort of side…not potatoes or anything. I guess I just assumed all breakfast plates come with some kind of potato. It was a little bit of a bummer at first when I realized it but the Benedict was pretty big and pretty satisfying by itself.
B didn’t even take the time to look at the kid’s menu when we sat down. He grabbed the crayons and started trying to force me in to a tic tac toe game. When I asked him to look at the menu, he just said, “you know I want pancakes and bacon.”
The Lil’ Mates pancake option is 3 Silver Dollar Pancakes with choice of meat. B had already eaten a yogurt at home before I got up so he wasn’t super hungry. He ate one of the pancakes after I ripped it in to pieces for him so he could dunk it in syrup.
For his meat choice, he got bacon. There were three super crispy strips on bacon on the side. He ate two of those strips then offered the third one to me. He was really trying to push me along. He had video games to pay and prizes to win.
Our bill for breakfast was right around $20 before tip.
Long Island Cafe is a pretty solid breakfast joint. Their original location is in Battle Creek near the airport. I’ve heard people rave about the food but we’re rarely in Battle Creek at breakfast time so it stopping at this new(er) Portage location is something I’ve been looking forward to.