Cover Story: Tasting the Bounty of Western Michigan
At Pennyroyal Cafe & Provisions, chef Missy Corey serves the best of the region.
SAUGATUCK, MI — Every time we visit Saugatuck we have a serious discussion — how many meals should we have at Pennyroyal Cafe & Provisions? This gem of a restaurant and shop, co-owned by executive chef Missy Corey and her partner, Starflower Farm farmer Ryan Beck, is open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, so you could conceivably eat every meal of your visit there (unless it’s Tuesday, or in January, when the restaurant is closed).
While we haven’t done a full day of dining at Pennyroyal (yet), we do often go twice in one day, swinging by for a lunchtime smoked whitefish melt (an all-time great sandwich with smoked whitefish, pickled peppers, and Swiss on toasted rye), before returning for dinner and ordering the pecan-rye crusted walleye and roasted chicken with fries, alongside a local cider or brown butter old fashioned. On our way back to Chicago, we like to stop at the Provisions Barn behind the restaurant to fill a cooler with local sausages, housemade pimento cheese, juicy strawberries, and fresh bunches of radishes.
“We named it Pennyroyal Cafe and Provisions right from the beginning,” Corey says. “We had started the farm the year before the restaurant opened. If people asked, ‘Why is this tomato salad so good?’ we could say ‘We grew the tomatoes, and you can buy them right here and make it yourself.’ Part of the inspiration for the space was to highlight all the amazing agriculture around here.”
The farms of this part of Western Michigan are a major source of inspiration for the chef. Corey grew up in Chicago, where she cooked for a time after college at Mon Ami Gabi. “It was a magical way to enter the restaurant scene in Chicago, since it’s an amazing old-school fine dining restaurant,” she says. Corey wanted to get closer to the source of where food came from — “The provenance of ingredients, how they’re treated, and where they’re coming from is important to me” — and returned to Maine, where she went to college, to work on a farm and at Portland restaurants like Fore Street and Duckfat. “I worked the farm for a year and grew organic vegetables, and it got me into the restaurant scene in Portland,” she says. “I ended up coming back to Chicago, and met Ryan. He had his own urban farm in Chicago, and I thought — ‘This is all coming together. I’m a chef, he’s a farmer, it’s what I've been looking for.’” In Chicago, she worked at the now-closed The Bristol, before heading to Publican Quality Meats, where she worked as chef de cuisine: “I did a deep dive into sustainable nose-to-tail butchery, which helped round out my experience.”
A job brought Corey and Beck to Saugatuck, and it was the relationships they built with farmers that made them stay. “It’s a unique agricultural zone where it’s more north than Chicago, but it’s warmer because of the lake,” Corey says. “It’s called 6B. It’s a beautiful microclimate around the lakeshore, and it’s called the fruit belt. It’s a fun, special place to grow.”
Their organic Starflower Farm is seven minutes down the road from the restaurant in Fennville. Beck farms 16 acres, two of which are for Pennyroyal, and the produce and flowers find their way onto plates and into the shop. Corey also works with other local producers, buying cheeses from Evergreen Lane Farm & Creamery and blueberries from Pleasant Hill Farm, which is more than 40 years old. “They flash-freeze blueberries to use them year-round,” she says. “Blueberry pancakes are a staple item at Pennyroyal since my grandpa would take me to breakfast and that’s all he ever ordered, so we have them all the time. The blueberries are well-grown by John and Joan.”
While you can eat the blueberry pancakes year-round, other offerings change seasonally. The accompaniments for the campfire trout, a butterflied fish topped with a slice of speck, switch up regularly, and while sometimes you’ll find carrot cavatelli, other times there’s Parisian gnocchi alla norma. “Though right now breakfast and lunch are more popular, the dinner menu is more exciting to me,” Corey says. “I’m able to change it so much more often with the seasons. It’s where you can see the hyper-seasonality, which really drives the restaurant.”
Looks like another perfect day: To be sure, the L.A. Metro is often the butt of jokes, but it can be an inexpensive and convenient way to get around the sprawling city. In The New York Times, Frugal Traveler columnist Elaine Glusac explores Los Angeles by subway, with stops at Eggslut, Sarita’s Pupuseria, Kura, Cha Cha Chicken, and more.
I’m just drinkin’: Oregon-based producer of nonalcoholic spirits Wilderton plans to open a tasting room and distillery this summer, writes Julie Evensen in the Portland Oregonian. The company’s lineup includes an aperitivo (which we’re fans of here at American Weekender), a bourbon substitute, and a floral, white spirit that can act as a stand-in for gin.
Love is all around: The Minneapolis Star Tribune has team coverage of some of the new dishes on offer at this summer’s Minnesota State Fair. And this fair has everything: Pickle lemonade. Pickle popsicles. Mango punch pickles. Bacon-wrapped waffle dogs. Pickle fudge. Cheese curd-stuffed pizza pretzels. Dill pickle cheese curd tacos. Lutefisk. (It’s that thing where dehydrated cod is rehydrated, hoisin glazed, and served on a steamed bun.) The fair runs from Aug. 24 through Labor Day.
Put on your weekend clothes, turn on the rock n' roll: It’s hard to beat a drive down scenic Highway 30A in the Florida Panhandle, writes Blane Bachelor in Garden & Gun. Highlights include crab cakes at The Red Bar, key lime doughnuts at The Donut Hole, Hemingway daiquiris at The Pearl Hotel, and the Caribbean jerk snapper served at George’s at Alys Beach.
— Compiled by Kenney Marlatt
Pennyroyal is just one of our favorite spots in Saugatuck. As a paid subscriber, you have a few more days to download a complimentary copy of our Saugatuck Field Guide. This month, paid subscribers can head over to our website and use the discount code WHITEFISH at checkout to download your free Saugatuck Field Guide. Our digital dining guides are formatted for your phone and are the perfect companion on your next road trip.
We’ll be back next week with a new featured destination for September: Charleston, South Carolina! It’s long been one of our favorite places to eat, plus all month our Charleston Field Guide, which features a multi-day itinerary highlighting the best places to eat and drink, will be available as a complimentary download for our paid subscribers. Want more? Follow us on Instagram @americanweekender.
