Annie's Place

I felt like some good pie so I went to Annie's Place for lunch.  I know I've been before, but for some reason I never wrote a review for my blog. I did, however, write one for the Washburn Review in 2011, and you can read it HERE.

When I walked inside it was nice and cool and the hostess sat me immediately. It wasn't very busy so my waitress was right over.

I ordered iced tea to drink. I must say, it's some good stuff. The waitress said it's brewed daily, and it's strong, too. I don't usually add sugar to weak tea, but this stuff was strong enough to hold up to some sweetness, so I added a pink one. I even got a to-go cup to take it with me because I didn't want to waste it.

The menu offers a nice variety of items including, salads, appetizers, soups, sandwiches, hot dogs, burgers, dinner entrees and specialty items. Can't forget the bakery that churns out various pies, brownies and desserts. There's also a breakfast menu, which I've never tried. I hope to try it sometime soon.

I went for the Guacamole Burger and asked to add lettuce, tomato and pickle. I got chips because I didn't feel like fries. The chips were just crinkle-cut potato chips that are probably from a bag. The burger was good, but after putting my "salad" on my burger I took a huge bite and got a bad surprise. The pickle chips were not dill pickle chips, they were sweet pickle chips. Bleh. Not what I was expecting on a guacamole burger. It was pretty awful, (which one can argue would still be awful with dill pickles). I pulled the rest of them off of the burger and continued.

The guacamole was creamy, with no real chunks of avocado in it. It wasn't spicy and I kind of wish it had just a little more jalapeño flavor to it. Spiciness aside, I like guac on my burger and I would order it again. Although, next time I may eat it a little differently starting out. No pickles and I should try to plan out how I'm going to eat it so it's less messy. I ended up with guacamole all over me, the table and my plate. The guac shot out both sides of the burger the first time I sank my teeth in, covering my cheeks in avocado and dripping all over the plate and table. Awesome. I was lucky it wasn't busy and nobody saw me.

The bun was one item that stood out to me, mostly because they are made in-house. It was fluffy, a little dry (as opposed to chewy), but in a good way, and it held up to my messy burger. The guacamole just slid all over the place and would have caused most buns to become soggy or rip. This one did neither and I was able to eat my burger sans fork all the way to the end. Plus, the bun tasted good and that's what really matters. It durability was an added bonus.

I wasn't done with lunch, I wanted dessert.

This time, I ordered the Mile-High Apple Pie, which is essentially apple pie a'la mode. Oh yum. In
my last article I only ordered the apple pie but this time I added ice cream. The crust was my favorite part, because it's sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar it seems crunchy, but in a good way. At first I thought the ice cream was made in-house, but after asking I found out it wasn't. The scoop they give is a pretty generous one, and I like lots of ice cream on my pie. The apples were tender and sweet, with just enough cinnamon for me. I felt like there was a good texture combination in this dish -- soft apples, crunchy crust, doughy bottom crust, creamy ice cream and rough sugar-crust. Yum.

I think my only complaint for the menu would be the pricing. I spent $18 on my meal, dessert and a drink. For lunch, that seems a little pricey. I did get the pie a'la mode, but that was $6 of my meal. Subtract that completely and I'm still paying around $12 for lunch. I think they have the same prices for dinner, so there's that. I don't mind spending a little bit more money for good food, which it was, and most of it's made right there, in the restaurant every day -- such as the homemade hamburger buns. I would recommend trying Annie's Place for lunch some time or just dessert. (They even sell whole pies.)