Traveling Adventures: Milwaukee's Comet Cafe

It was a Tuesday night.  I was tired but all of my Father's Day Etsy orders were finished & done.  I was about to have one of those whiny 'I don't know what I want to do or what I'm up for or who I want to do it with' kind of evenings and 'Oh, I don't have the money anyway."  (Btw, I always want to do it with Ryan Reynolds).

As a server, when you get the opportunity for a night out, you want to be served.  After waiting on people 24-7 it's nice to be waited on.  So after weighing all of my options, I thought I'd take myself on a date- dinner & a movie.  I've learned how much I really enjoy my alone time...

BUT THEN!!!  THEN, YOU GUYS!!!!... I had the best idea EVER!!!  Why not take myself to MILWAUKEE!!!???  I've never been!!!  It was something my ex and I had planned that fell through and why the h-e-double-hockey-hell should I not go on my own!!???  After just having seen 'Bridesmaids' which is set in Milwaukee, it just felt right.  It felt perfect.  It was only 5pm... In two hours time I could be eating dinner in a new city I'd never been to and have an adventure!!!  TRAVEL!!!!

So I threw away all of my stupid excuses and made a list of reasonable 'to do's.  And then I packed a bag.  And duh!  I have Big Toe.  He's my road trip protector!  You don't mess with BT!!!  He's always looking out for me.  :)

This is going to sound so corny but every moment that passed felt like my life was changing dramatically.  How many times had I passed up an eight hour drive to San Francisco while living in L.A.!!???  I had to move to Chicago to interview at Ghirardelli to have them send me to San Francisco??? LAME.

"Remember this, d*umbass."

"NOTHING is impossible."

"Live the life you dream NOW."

"D*MBASS!!!"

I put myself in my cute little polka dot dress, heeled shoes, got some Caribou coffee and sang & danced my way to Milwaukee.

I really love food.  REALLY.  And I am NOT a food snob.  I'll pretty much eat anything... which is why I LOOOOVE 'Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.'  That show can give me a heart attack just watching it!  When googling places to eat in Milwaukee, I saw that Comet Cafe had been featured on it.  That sealed the deal!  I was gonna eat somewhere Guy Fieri had eaten and live to tell the story!!!

Comet Cafe, y'all!

My server's name was Nathan.  He was very sweet and helpful to the weirdo in the polka dot dress that kept asking annoying questions like, "What are you known for!???"  He even said polka dots were his favorite color, plaid is his close second.  :)

I played it very cool but I was UBER excited to be in Milwaukee.  A) It's SUCH a cute city.  Who knew!??  It's really awesome!!!  And B) I didn't want to come across as a Food Network lemming cause this was more about the spirit of adventure than tv telling me what's good and what's not.

After telling Nathan my love of Goose Island's 'Sophie' and Allegash White, he suggested this Scrimshaw craft beer.  It was nice!  I prefer less hoppy beer that has a lot of layers.  This was a little bland for me but it was something different and different is exciting!

I got the meatloaf dinner and it came with Cream of Mushroom Soup.

It was FANTASTIC.  :)

Another great thing about going on dates alone?  You get everything you want!!! I LOVE dating me! I'm a spinach and artichoke whore.  There were other appetizers that looked delicious but I'll eat baby flesh covered in artichokes and cheese.  I accidentally burned the roof of my mouth off.  I'm an idiot. I also prefer chips with any kind of cheesy dip rather than crostini or pita-- but you're not listening so who cares.

Then my camera died so I had to take this DELICIOUS meatloaf dinner picture with my crappy cell phone camera.  YOU GUYS...

YOU GUYS...

It's a Meatloaf Dinner with BEER gravy.

The gravy tasted like a Boeuf Bourginon sauce.  There HAD to be red wine in it.  It was so FREAKING good.  I'm going to drown my food babies in this sauce.  And yet this picture looks like an alien intestine plate.  I'm so sorry, Comet Cafe, it was DELICIOUS!!!

Here's another. 

You're just gonna have to take my word for it.

THEN... because hellooo... this was a date with me and I'm awesome & pretty sexy & really enjoying the conversation I'm having with this awesome me that I want the date to last longer, so it was dessert time.  Nathan suggested the Banana Split Cupcake.

I couldn't eat it though.  I'd had too much.  And I reeeally burned my mouth on that dip, lol...  So I took it home.  I'll be honest... I wasn't really excited to try it.  It was pretty heavy, looked like 'muffin' cake rather than fluffy, moist cake.  And then when I got home...

Holy Aunt Jemima balls... It was a SUPER moist banana cake filled with cherries.  Super dense but SUUUUPER moist.  It was DELICIOUS.  I wasn't crazy about the frosting but I'm a baker and that's a personal preference.  People are so picky about frosting-- you never know. 

Anyway, I'm TOTALLY gonna go back on a day where I can roam around Milwaukee.  Nathan kept saying things like, "Did you run out of things to do in big, ol' Chicago?  What are you doing here?"  And I thought that was soooo funny because Milwaukee is absolutely pretty and quaint.  Just driving around they have tons of museums and the huge Summer Fest, etc.  It's a REALLY cool city.  I'm psyched to go back!

And look what I found!!!  Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.  I KNEW that sauce had red wine in it!!! 

I would marry that meatloaf dinner. 

Beer Gravy and More Beer Gravy and oh my God, MORE BEER GRAVY,

MandiCrocker