Sooo...what in all the blathering has been missing from “The St. Louis Diner Review”? Well aside from interesting writing or topics when thing suspiciously missing would be the reviews of Diners. Specifically St. Louis Diners. While I cannot make up immediately for the lack of St. Louis Diners I can do a long distance dedication for the M-22 Diner in Onekema Michigan.
We go up to Arcadia Michigan which is on M-22. Onekema is about 9 miles south of Arcadia and 9 miles north of the fabulous Manistee. Onekama sits on Portage Lake which has an outlet to Lake Michigan. It is...scenic. The Diner has had a couple of different incarnations but this new one seems to be sticking.
It is hard to find a decent place to eat up here. Hubble’s Bait Shop over in Bear Lake is an excellent choice and you have The Lighthouse in Elberta to the North and slightly north in Frankfort, The Bayview. But they all have their faults and you want to find a “go to” place.
A couple of things. M-22 is a road that runs from Manistee, generally following the coast up and around and down to Traverse City. It is “a thing” up here and we all have stickers on our cars, hats, t-shirts and what not. To learn more:
Although the outside of the place might not seem like much (Landscaping Wise) the place is very well maintained and clean and the service is excellent. They have kept some of the old fisherman’s place motif but it is a big, open restaurant with a view of Portage Lake. If the weather is nice you can even sit out on their deck but I have found for solo dining and newspaper reading, being inside is the best.
On a recent visit there were 2 or three tables with several people in them. Based on the conversation they were all locals or at least long time property owners and I do think there is much to be said for going where the locals go. The discussion was of real estate, construction work, fishing and a recent car accident. Between that reading the Traverse City Eagle I felt like the faux Michigander I am.
I have become an eggs over easy person. This is after years of not eating eggs at all and then with the Celiac, no longer being able to experience the joy of toast, cream gravy or chicken fried steak, I needed to step out. After a year long affair with the scrambled egg I have now moved on to “over medium”. This is a big deal. Anyway, as you can see above they do a nice job with:
1. Over medium eggs
2. Ham
3. Bacon (crisp)
4. The ever important “hash brown”, shredded and properly browned yet still useful for sopping up your runny egg.
This is a good breakfast place. They pride themselves not on their regular breakfasts but on their pancakes. This day it was peach pancakes and the reviews from the other tables were that they were “excellent”. They also sport about a dozen high quality omelettes.
You can check out the entire menu here:
The iced tea was average. Nothing special but it was served in pint glasses and topped off twice. The service is attentive without being annoying. At no time was I wanting for anything and twice I was asked by the manager and another waitresses if everything was OK and/or could they get anything for me. I was impressed.
Whether you eat at the counter, or a booth or out back at one of the tables I strongly recommend the M-22 as a fine establishment. Next summer the goal would be to get a team together and visit all the diners around us and provide a nice guide for those coming our beautiful little neck of the mitten.
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