Olde Peninsula Brewpub, Kalamazoo, Michigan

This was Todd's first "official" weekend away, having taken a new job just outside of Kalamazoo. He'll spend workweeks at his sister's in K'zoo, then we'll alternate visiting each other on weekends. Since he'd only been there a week, I made the first of our cross-county trips to see each other.

Having been to K'zoo only once before, I was looking forward to a night on the town with Todd, along with his sis and her family. Since we had her 19-month-old in tow, we needed to find a place that would be loud enough to counterbalance any potential outbursts from the tyke.

We decided on the Olde Peninsula Brewpub in Downtown Kalamazoo's Haymarket district. It was located in a charming, historic building, with a typical woody, brewpub decor. Like any bar on a Saturday night, the "OP" was jammed: crunchy granola families, Western Michigan University students, and teenage kids on Homecoming dates.

Our evening was off to a great start: less than 5 minutes after waiting at the bar with one of those loathesome chain-restaurant pagers, it lit up, signalling that our table was ready. Given it was 7:30pm and almost bedtime for the 19-month-old, dinner was beginning to look like a quick in-and-out, until....

Ten minutes at the table and, still, no server. Fortunately, that gave us enough time to decide on drink and dinner orders, so we would be prepared. Our server finally arrived and ONLY offered to take drink orders. The restaurant was slammed, so we cut some slack. I ordered one of their Fall brew specials, the "Jack-o-Lantern," a combination of house-made porter and pumpkin ale. Todd had a Black & Tan, his sis a virgin strawberry daiquiri, and her husband, an iced tea.

Twenty minutes later, our drinks arrived. Todd's Black & Tan was more "Black & Black," but the rest of the drinks were fine. My Jack-o-Lantern was actually pretty tasty, with a rich, dark coffee flavor and a hint of pumpkin spice in the background. The daiquiri was hot pink, thick and smoothie-like, and the iced tea was iced tea. After another brief disappearance, our server returned to take our dinner orders.

I opted for a veggie burger, topped with sauteed mushrooms and melted swiss. Todd ordered a fried perch sandwich, with salad instead of fries. His sis went for the stuffed flounder, and her husband the Old Peninsula Chicken, a marinated chicken breast atop sauteed spinach. An hour later, my head pounding and knee bouncing up and down, our orders arrived--but only two were correct. Todd's perch sandwich arrived as simply perch with fries, while his brother-in-law's chicken with spinach translated into a chicken breast sandwich.

I immediately launched into a tirade with our server. The house manager arrived within minutes, and we let loose: an hour and a half later, our orders still came out wrong. The chicken breast, on top of being completely the wrong order, could barely pass as a chicken tender. And Todd's fish sandwich arrived instead as fish and chips. After profusely apologizing and offering a gift certificate for a future visit, he instead accepted our counter-request to simply not charge us for this disastrous dinner.

Famished, I ravenously downed my veggie burger, while the rest of the table nibbled at their less-than satisfactory meals. The 19-month-old, fortunately, crashed out as we awaited our orders--oblivious to the debacle that had occurred. Vindicated, we called it a night on the Olde Peninsula, and vowed not to return.

Photo credit beerme.com