This weekend I visited my friend Kelly in Kalamazoo, to celebrate her birthday (which as of now is tomorrow actually). The night after arriving, we're all dressed up and walking through the downtown area, looking for a nice restaurant to eat at that is not a chain place. Due to a suggestion by Hannah, one of Kelly's friends, we ended up settling on Central City Taphouse, which is actually the second half of a restaurant. The first half was a fancier (also: more expensive) bistro, whereas the other half was more of an upscale bar type with locally brewed beers and somewhat fancier versions of popular comfort foods.
My friend Kristina (whom I drove to K'zoo with) and I originally wanted to do restaurant-hopping, and go from place to place, trying out different foods and sharing what we got. We ended up deciding to just split what we ordered here instead. I'd been wanting to try a po' boy sandwich, so I thought I would splurge (and because it sounded freaking awesome) and get the blackened catfish po' boy with truffle frites (fries). Kristina picked out the margherita pizza. While waiting for our food, Hannah ordered these pretzel-coated chicken tenders, which basically was just chicken tenders with crushed pretzels as a breading. It was served with a house-made honey mustard dressing, which I found to be merely decent. Shortly after, our food came out, which looked very appetizing and delicious.
My po' boy and truffle frites, before being devoured.
On the right is a sweet corn salsa which was delicious.
If a picture is worth a thousand words, the above photo would keep me talking for quite some time. The sandwich was merely good, not great. The bread and toppings were average, the catfish had a strong fishy taste, which is not something I'm used to when it comes to catfish. It tasted better with the corn salsa on, but not by much. I still enjoyed my half, the other half which I gave to Kristina, which she basically had the same reaction, good, but not great. The truffle frites (fries), as awesome as they looked, seemed to have a pretty bland fry flavor to them. The truffle oil made the fries seem greasy, and the garlic aioli didn't have that strong of a taste. It was far from being a bad dish, but with the $12 price tag, I guess I expected more from it.
The margherita pizza looked just as appetizing when it came out. However, it suffered from the same issue as my po' boy and fries, meaning Kristina and I both enjoyed it, but it was merely good, not great. The crust was soft and chewy, mozzarella cheese was applied fairly, tomatoes tasted fine, but I was not a big fan of the large pieces of basil; I prefer basil to be finely chopped and applied sparingly. I'm sure there's some that would really enjoy that much basil, but that person is not me.
Altogether, the food and drinks were better than your average chain restaurant, and the service was great. The prices were decent, except for the three additional dollars I had to spend to get the truffle fries, which didn't turn out to be as great as I expected them to be. I'm not sure, maybe I just had all these high expectations due to all the good things I've been reading about po' boys and truffle fries lately, which resulted in being mildly disappointed. I'd probably return here but try one of the special brews and one of their burgers, since I've heard some good things about them. It might be a long time before I visit Kalamazoo though, so I'll definitely have to keep this place in mind just in case the occasion arises.
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