10441 Stadium DriveWeekends are nuts. Is that just us or is that everyone?
We haven’t had many free weekends this summer. There’s been a lot of skating with some weddings and other family obligations sprinkled in. When we looked at our schedule at the beginning of summer, we knew there were only going to be one or two weekends where we had nothing planned before school started.
The weekend before Labor Day was pretty free. We didn’t have much to do. We caught up on the usual stuff. Laundry, groceries, yard work, but we had the afternoon free.
It was a decent day out. The sun was out. It was hot, but not too hot. We started talking about going somewhere for dinner. We haven’t dragged the kids out of the house in a while so we decided it was time.
We talked about the usual suspects when looking for someplace with outdoor dining…then J brought up someplace new. We had kind of written this place off early because of the cost but there were some deals that weekend and we thought we’d like to give it a shot.
The Backyard of Kalamazoo is unlike any other restaurant in the area. The large property sits on the corner of Stadium Drive and 1st Street in the very west end of Kalamazoo County’s Texas Township. The restaurant aims to be a gathering place. While there is a traditional full service restaurant, the main attraction is the yard.
You have a couple of options when you pull into the parking. We’ll start with the building first.
There’s a large metal building that serves as the properties main restaurant. There is a fenced in patio off the backside and doors that lead in to an air conditioned inside space. Both of these areas are full service restaurants with table service.
Both areas are seat yourself. Both are really nice spaces. Inside is going to be more comfortable with air conditioning but can be a little loud with high ceilings in a metal building. There were plenty of families who had spent some time outside playing in the yard then came in to eat to cool down.
If you prefer draft beer, this is the place to get it. There is a bar where you can get drafts in a plastic cup. The outside bar only has cans.
The other dining option is out in the yard and that’s all kind of self service.
We’ll start with getting in to the yard. There’s an admission fee. It’s not included in your meals. To be completely honest, this was the only reason it took us so long to get out here to eat. Regular costs are $12 for adults and $6 for kids. Yes, you have to pay for yourself even if you plan on just following your kids around. If we paid full price, it would have cost us $36 just to get in to the yard. They’ve been running a promotion the last couple of weeks where adults get in for $12 and kids get in for free. They also have season passes that are much, much cheaper if you plan on going more than a couple times. It’s $30 for adults and $15 for kids. So it’s more than paid for on the third visit.
The yard is fenced off from the restaurant. There’s is a shed right at the entrance where you pay to get in. They give you a wristband that you need to keep visible so they know you’ve paid to be in the yard.
The yard is huge. There’s a lot of space. In that space, there are a lot of different seating options. There are some Adirondack chairs if you’re just chilling with a spouse or a friend. There’s picnic tables if you’re planning on eating. There are even gazebos you can rent for larger parties which provide the most shade.
The idea of the yard is to be social. There are a lot of things for kids to do and yard games for adults.
For the real little kids, there are a bunch of backyard play houses and Power Wheel type cars for them to drive.
For the older kids, they’ve had bounce houses and water slides the last few weeks. B headed straight for the non-water obstacle course. We didn’t bring his suit because we didn’t realize there’d be water. Amazingly, he listened to us and stayed out of the water. You can usually check their Facebook page to see if they have inflatables like this and/or water features.
L is a little too old for the kids stuff and she’s not really interested in a lot of the yard games. She and I walked around a little bit and messed with some things. There were a couple of slam ball nets we played for a little bit and, of course, there’s a lot of cornhole games. The kids don’t really know how to play but the four of us did throw some bags for a while before left until the bags became weapons the kids couldn’t stop throwing at each other. L has become more of a board game person when we go to breweries so a lot of the yard games really didn’t interest her. She would have preferred to grab a board game and just sit with us. B could have ran around making new friends all day if we had let him.
Food outside is ordered off your phone. There is a QR code on each table.
The table itself isn’t linked. The food is brought out to a table next to the outdoor bar then you receive a text message when it’s done. All of the boxes have a name on it so you know which ones are yours. You can also get silverware, napkins, and there’s a water jug with some plastic glasses you can grab.
The outdoor bar has a number of different can options for drinks. There is beer, cider, and wine to choose from. B originally asked for a Sprite but I didn’t see and I didn’t ask. This area is pretty much just a garage they open up with a refrigerator. I do wish they had a full bar with taps out here but you can always go inside for drinks and I assume I could have gotten B a Sprite inside.
I got myself an M-43 and J a Sangria. I had already closed the tab on my phone from ordering lunch so she had to start a new one. I like the idea of how having the tab on your phone works but I’m always paranoid about closing it before we leave. We end up with several different credit card charges because of that.
The food menu isn’t huge but there’s something for everyone. The menu says it’s locally sourced and I would call this kind of upscale pub food.
We started with Mac & Cheese Bites to share. There were six of the fried appetizer alongside ranch to dip them in. The kids are weird an don’t like fried mac & cheese for some reason. All good. More for J and I.
I chose The Backyard Classic which is their burger offering. This sandwich is an Angus beef patty with lettuce, tomato, onion, American cheese, and Southwest dressing. I left off the dressing and added bacon. The sandwich is a simple but solid burger served on a toasted bun.
The sandwich came with sidewinder fries. They’re a frozen food service fry but you don’t see these very often. There were a lot with the burger. They’re really crispy on the outside and soft in the middle. I don’t always love frozen fries but these are good and they’re unique enough I was left wanting more.
J ordered the Two Berries Met in the Yard Salad. This salad is a romaine and spinach mix topped with strawberries, blueberries, cucumbers, red onions and sunflower seeds tossed in a citrus vinaigrette. J loves any salad with fresh berries and this one called to her right away. It was missing any sort of cheese though. Not sure if I missed that as an add on when I was ordering. J didn’t say anything about it but she usually likes a feta with this kind of salad.
L asked for the Say Mac & Cheese off the B & B Backyard Kid’s Menu (the owner’s kids’ names both start with a B, hence the menu name). This is a really creamy Mac & Cheese that L loved. I thought I was going to have to order her a second one. She’s at that point where she’s about to grow out of the kid’s menu. It’s always a risk for us to order her something off the adult menu because if she doesn’t like it, we’ve wasted quite a bit of money. She loved this mac & cheese though. She couldn’t stop telling us how much she liked it in between bites. She definitely would have eaten more if it was available to her.
L chose a side salad as her side instead of fries. The simple salad is lettuce, bacon, croutons, carrots, cucumbers and onions. They didn’t give me a dressing choice so I asked for Italian or ranch in the comments. It came with ranch, She doesn’t like all those veggies and in the past, this would have been a disaster not being able to know what was on the salad or being able to leave those off, but she’s growing up and just picked off what she didn’t like. She finished this off as well.
B was not interested in eating but of course we made him. He picked the Ooey Gooey Cheesy Chicken Quesadilla. We missed the chicken part which is right in the name. For a kid’s meal, he got a ton of food. There was a huge quesadilla and just about as many of the sidewinder fries that I had in my meal. He took a few bites of the quesadilla and kept complaining about it “tasting funny.” We decided not to argue with him at the time and go play. I took this home because there was a lot of food left. When I heated it up the next night, I realized there was chicken in it so it probably did taste funny to him. I thought it was tasty though. It was a great late night meal after work a couple of nights later.
Our bill just for food, not including drinks, was about $66 before tip.
Our total bill, with admission, drinks, and food was about $95 before tip. Had we paid full admission price, it would have been $120 before tip.
So, the cost is really a factor with this place. I think there are ways to justify both from a owner and consumer point of view. I love what they’re trying to create and that takes money. Profit margins are slim in restaurants and if you’re offering as much of the extra as they are, that money has to come from somewhere other than the food. I get that.
From a consumer standpoint, I also get that a $120+ meal is not something you can do all the time. It’s a balancing act for everyone. We only had 1 drink each or it would have been a lot more.
I think The Backyard is what you make of it. We’re not super social people. We’re not going to make new friends over a game of cornhole. I know there are a lot of people that are that way though.
The Backyard is definitely better in groups. I think our kids would have had more fun if they had friends there. I’m an anti-social person anyway so I’m good just finding a table, having a couple of beers and making sure B doesn’t do anything stupid to hurt himself or anyone else.
The food was good. We all really enjoyed our meals. $66 for four meals seems to be pretty average anymore so I don’t think anything there was out of line.
I like the idea of this place and I have a feeling it will get better over time. They’re doing a lot of playing with the admission prices of the yard right now to see what works best for everyone. It is cost prohibitive for us right now at full price and I think that’s a case with a lot of families. They’re adding new games and toys regularly. A giant municipal park like playground is probably out of the budget but would such a cool addition. Who knows what they will think of. They need to turn a profit, I 100% get that but they also need people to show up. I’m glad we took advantage of the deal that was going on and went to see what this place was all about. We had really nice afternoon (until the kids threw bean bags at each other). There’s so much potential for this place and they’re laying a solid foundation right now.