Hometown Home cooking All of the Comforts of

BY JOYCE B. WILCOX

As I walked down the garden path of the outdoor seating area and into this quaint 1920-built renovated-home-nowrestaurant at 407 North State Street in Big Rapids, I knew I was in for something special. And Ala Mode Café didn’t disappoint me. The moment you enter you can feel your grandmother’s embrace. From the charming ambiance, the warmth of the staff, and the incredibly delicious tastes and aromas coming from each morsel lovingly prepared in the kitchen, you feel right at home. That is, of course, if your home had a grandmother who was a cross between chef and cookbook author, Paula Deen, and HGTV chef and home designer, Joanna Gaines. Oh yes, with an added pinch of cooks like my mom and babka, too.

The plaque on the wall in the entry with a quotation from Virginia Wolfe says it all: “In order to love well, live well, and sleep well— you must dine well.”

Once you sample any of the menu’s entries, you have the sense that the proprietor and head chef, Mary Challender Smith, knows what she’s doing and does it well. Open Wednesday through Sunday from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., Ala Mode Café offers a variety of breakfast, brunch, and lunch dishes. The menu is comprised of comfort food, house signature features, and gourmet cuisine all prepared from scratch.

Well known for its numerous and bountiful breakfast egg dishes, it should be noted that these dishes come with homemade specialty breads or biscuits as well as homemade jams and gravies. This is comfort food at its best and it’s prepared your way. I can personally vouch for the perfectly prepared crisp bacon, over-medium eggs, and wheat toast with luscious raspberry jam. Smith sealed the deal on this article some time ago with this breakfast prior to either of us realizing that I’d be writing about the restaurant. I know she wasn’t aiming to please a reviewer; she was aiming to please a customer.

“My mom was a wonderful cook and she taught me a lot. I owe her a great deal,” Smith said.

If you’re looking for something for the kiddies or perhaps the kid in you, there are always special pancakes to be made just for you. Are you ready? Pancakes can be prepared with vanilla or chocolate chips, pumpkin, raspberries, walnuts, cherries, raisins, M&Ms, pineapple, blueberries, bananas, or apples. See, I told you that meals could be prepared your way.

Omelets and quesadillas are given the same personalized courtesy as the pancakes with a diverse list of ingredients including ham, bacon, sausage, corned beef, sausage gravy, tomatoes, garlic, green peppers, onions, broccoli, pineapple, portabella mushrooms, sauerkraut, or jalapeno peppers. If you pick your favorites from that list, I’d be

willing to bet that you can smell them cooking with mouth-watering delight.

Having grown up in Big Rapids on 4th Avenue on the east side, Smith not only knows her way around the kitchen, but she is also well acquainted with the city and many of her clientele. The youngest of five children, she was raised with her four siblings by her disabled single mother and inherited her mother’s tenacity for life and passion for cooking.

“When you go through poverty as a child, you always want food on the table,” said Smith.

Taking the skills she learned from her mother, Smith worked as a cook at Ferris State University and the local hospital for over twenty years. She opened her first restaurant in 2000. It was at the log cabin on Maple Street where she perfected her dishes.

The years passed, the menu evolved, and the clientele increased. Many of Smith’s signature dishes, such as the Homemade Beef Pasty, remain on the menu at the State Street location as customers’ favorites. This recipe came from Pamela Panek, her closest friend. Pamela had it handed down from her mother, Beatrice Panek, from Ironwood in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, so we all know it’s the real deal.

Seating at the log cabin Ala Mode was restricted to 36 customers and the parking was very limited. Smith knew that the inevitable move had to happen, so she closed the log cabin in 2020. After extensive remodeling at 407 North State Street, she reopened the Ala Mode Café and has been there for almost three years.

“We can now seat sixty-seven customers. Plus, we have an outdoor patio seating of 16 people in warmer weather,” Smith said. “That’s more than double the seating.”

The State Street restaurant now features four to five dining rooms, depending upon how the enclosed porch is utilized. The booths and smaller tables can be rearranged for groups as needed, so customers can dine individually or in small gatherings. In order to promote a warm, cozy, and calm environment for dining, wall screen televisions display scenic settings while quietly broadcasting mellow music. Pictures and other art of a warm, eclectic variety are on display throughout the restaurant.

Smith’s success story seems to be due to her delicious recipes as well as incredible staff. Her ten employees function as a team and are able to work in a friendly environment every day. The same staff prepares the same dishes, so customers are always able to enjoy the same quality with their meals. Smith lives by the motto, “Once you’re an employee, you’re family.”

While dining at Ala Mode Café recently with my husband, we thought we’d indulge ourselves with two of their more elaborate breakfasts: Red, White, & Blue and their Classic Eggs Benedict. Once again, we were not disappointed.

Red, White, & Blue consisted of two sweet snowshoe waffles topped with blueberries, strawberries, whipped cream, and served with two eggs and sausage patties. Apparently, that meal was delicious and the only thing missing were sparklers.

Classic Eggs Benedict lived up to its name and reputation as well with golden toasted English muffins with seared ham rounds, medium poached eggs on top, blanketed with a savory Hollandaise sauce and served with potatoes. The only thing missing from my meal was a cot to take a nap after feasting.

I have a confession to make. While I have dined at Ala Mode Café for breakfast and brunch, I have never ordered from the lunch menu. This has more to do with loving a good breakfast and not liking the breakfast mess in my own kitchen than anything else. I have heard from friends that their wide assortment of burgers and sandwiches are also delicious and that their homemade soups are phenomenal.

For many reasons, I may have to return soon to Ala Mode Café for some comforts of hometown home-cooking. If you need an added incentive, I hear that they’ve added brunch drinks which include the following: Mimosas, Baileys, hot scotch cocoa, caramel apple cider, and Bloody Marys.