I have always thought that Kalamazoo sounded like a funny name for a city. Now that we spend quite a bit of time there I still think it sounds funny but I am learning my way around more and more. We spend all day one day each week there. I usually make a slow cooker meal on these days because dinner can be cooking while we are away. This week though things were a bit different.

Thankfully it was a gorgeous 70 degrees day. Bright sunshine and warm breezes made this a super fun day. Usually we would be in heavy jackets and sneakers if not boots by now but I saw many people still wearing flip-flops.

After dropping off my son off at Western, my daughter decided that rather than eat later like we usually do she hadn’t eaten anything this day so she wanted to eat now. I let her choose where she wanted to go and she chose the Noodle Co. I hadn’t been there in years. My daughter chose the Pesto Cavatappi without meat. I thought she would order it with chicken or shrimp. It smelled amazing as it arrived at the table. She finished her serving before I did and said her pasta serving was smaller than mine but next time she would also order the meat with it. It had great flavor but was not quite filling enough.

I ordered Pad Thai with steak. Yummy! It arrived sizzling hot and was a nice big portion. My daughter helped me eat some after she finished hers.  It was still steaming hot even after she finished hers! The dish itself had great flavor and just enough spice to make it flavorful with a hint of heat but it was not overpowering. There was plenty of steak spread throughout the bowl. With 2 sodas our bill was about $20. We decided that we would definitely be back here for lunch again!

We ran a few errands and then I decided that what Kalamazoo is missing is a good cupcake place. I have found a couple bakeries but they are not really what I am looking for. I want the sweet cupcakes of a Gigi’s or a Mimi’s. So, I Googled Kalamazoo cupcakes and found a few more bakeries that we hadn’t tried yet. The one that looked like it may be most promising for what we were looking for was called Boonzaaijer.  The bakery wasn’t far from Westnedge Avenue where we were running errands so we headed over to give it a try.

As we pulled into our parking place you could smell the butter cream frosting. It was amazing! We like floated in following the smell. The closer we got the bigger our smiles got. Once inside there were a couple of tables again a wall and two cases with cakes, cookies and cake slices. No cupcakes. Boo. But, we decided to give the cake slices a try. They were $2.10 each. We chose 2 chocolate raspberry, 2 chocolate, one lemon and one raspberry slice. They also had mocha, strawberry and vanilla. We took our little box out to the car and each chose one slice to taste. The cake was super light. Almost like biting into air and the butter cream was just as creamy and flavorful as we imagined. I would have loved a bit more frosting on top but overall we were very happy. We took our remaining slices home to share with the rest of our family.

We headed back out to pick up my son at Western after his class. Most of the work my kids do for school is online. So, we went and found wi-fi so they could work on school work for an hour or so. By then it was about 5:00 pm so I took my daughter over to her dance studio to meet with her friends while my son and I went out to eat. He chose Buffalo Wild Wings. I tried to talk him out of it. He doesn’t get to eat out very often and I kept offering other choices he may like but he kept replying, “It sounds good but maybe next time.” So off we went to Buffalo Wild Wings.

We chose to do appetizers for dinner. The above platter is one of the specials – The Game Day shareable. It has (from lower center going clockwise) fried pickles, traditional Buffalo wings, fried Wisconsin cheese curd and chili cheese fries with diced onions and jalapeno. My son also ordered a snack size order of Caribbean jerk wings. The platter was MUCH better than I thought it would be. There was more than enough for the two of us for dinner. I loved the cheese curd. My son liked the fries. Our waitress was attentive and refilled our drinks several times.

Now, it is not often we eat out but it is even rarer that I let anyone get dessert. It is not something I grew up with and try to discourage in our family. But, my son looked at me and asked if we could please get dessert. He had been really good today and he still had an hour of his sister’s dance class and the drive home. I decided to let him get dessert.

He chose the cinnamon sugar tortilla with ice cream, chocolate sauce, caramel sauce, and deep-fried cheesecake bites. Oh my goodness! I ate a couple bites but it was too rich for me. The cheesecake bites were really good though. We left over half the dish uneaten. It was delicious though we needed at least two more people to share it with.

In the end we had a full day in Kalamazoo. I can’t wait until we can explore more places. We still need to find a good (cheap) movie theater and are still looking for the elusive cupcake!