Thursday, April 2, 2009
St. Izzy's mac & cheese rules!
St. Isador's
625 Spring, N.E.
Grand Rapids, MI 49503
click here for a map
(The church is on Diamond, N.E., but the fish fry is held in the former St. Isador School gym on Spring, N.E.)
Date and time of visit: April 3, around 5:45 p.m.
Parking: parking lot adjacent to gym and on street; not too bad
Accessibility: one little step
Cost:
$8.00, adults
$7.00, seniors
$5.00, kids 5-11; under 5, free
Desserts available (donation suggested)
Wait: about 10 minutes
Tables: banquet tables with folding chairs
Gambling opportunities: 50/50 raffle
Chocolate opportunities: "World's Best Chocolate" bars
Highlights:
- macaroni and cheese
- lemon slices
- the only fish fry we've been to that had a climbing wall
The decision to abort West Catholic High School's fish fry was wise. St. Izzy's macaroni is not to be missed. It's seasoned with something (a pinch of nutmeg?) that sets it apart from others, and if you're lucky, a little crust from spending time in the oven complements the creaminess nicely. Next year we might skip the fish altogether and just get the mac and cheese, although the fried pollack is pretty tasty too. French fries, rolls, and cole slaw (of course) rounded out the menu, along with the usual fluids and milk. Our fluid of choice was the recently released Bell's Oberon.
We ate off styrofoam plates and used plastic cutlery. A couple centrally located tables held tartar sauce, malt vinegar, ketchup, and lemon slices (a nice feature).
There was no problem getting a table for our group of seven, the queue moved quickly, and there was virtually no wait for seconds. The crowd wasn't as big as it was last year, perhaps due to the St. Isador school closure. It, along with St. Al's school, became part of All Saint's Academy, housed at what was Blessed Sacrament school. Last year there was a steady stream of enthusiastic school-aged helpers seeking to refill our beverages and whisk away empty plates. Too bad; their presence and art work made it more festive. Plus we had to bus our own table.
Still, this is one of the best parish fish fries around, and a good one for one of our party's maiden voyage into the world of GR fish fries.
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Be sure to see the article from the Grand Rapids Press (March 28--and the article also has a link to this blog!) about fish fries. We're not alone!
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1 comment:
Our group attended the WC FF early in March. The lake perch, although good, had a 7 piece limit on it (not real big pieces) and no baked fish. The cole slaw was not all that great (too many onions) but you did get dessert included w/ your meal and a nice variety of drinks (coke, diet, orange, water). Rolls were good and we liked the short wait. The "crew" there is somewhat "green" and you can tell this is their first FF experience but all in all it was a nice meal to visit with friends. The consensus by the group was that we would probably not go there again but you never know...
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