Sammie's Family Restaurant

Sammie’s Family Restaurant
9804 Red Arrow Hwy, Bridgman, MI

In early June I took a camping trip to Warren Dunes State Park in Michigan with “the boyfriend” Wm., and some friends of his. After the first tedious morning of cooking breakfast over a fire, Wm.’s friend Nick made the decision to head into town for our next breakfast. We visted Sammie’s Family Restaurant, a diner-type place in Bridgman.

The first thing I noticed was that restaurants in Michigan still apparently have smoking sections. I know I point out smoking sections a lot in my reviews. This is mainly because they were illegal in my home state by the time I was old enough to buy a pack, so their legality in Ohio always seemed like sort of a novelty to me. They’ve been outlawed in Ohio since December ‘06 now, and recently became illegal in Fort Wayne (where I often go to visit Wm.) Yes, I do smoke, but usually when I dine I’m with non-smokers and tend to stay away from the smoking section, which was the case on this occassion.

The non-smoking section was slightly elevated above the smoking section, with a chest-height wall between them. I took advantage of my lofty position by staring at some tattooed biker guy who was seated in smoking.

The menu featured typical diner breakfast food, plus “skillets.” I think it said something about these skillets being world-famous or something. I really don’t remember. I chose a farmer’s omelet, which was some type of omelet with vegetables and cheese in it. The waitress asked if I’d like a half-order, and being both low on funds and not a “big eater,” I said yes. The obvious question is: so, was it a 1.5 egg omelet? I’d say it seemed more like at least two eggs. With homefries and toast, it was quite enough of a meal for me. The most interesting part of the omelet was the constrasting slices of white (provolone?) and orange (doubtlessly american) cheese on top of the omelet. Inside the omelet, the side with white cheese on top had orange cheese inside, and vice versa. Classy!

Wm. ordered some kind of French toast combo, then ate nothing but the French toast. At a later date he revealed to me that this was because he “unleashed on the bathroom.” This says far less about the quality of Sammie’s food than the overactivity of my boyfriend’s bowels. The other three in our party had various dishes, but I can’t remember them in detail.

Also, I tried some super-hot habanero hot sauce. It was flavorless and not really that hot. Yawn.

Drinks, my $4 half-order, Wm.’s half eaten French toast combo, and tip came to just under $14. The omelet was a steal. I am not letting my boyfriend order anything “combo” on my tab again.

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