City of Mackinac Island Restaurants

Windermere Hotel

The Dog House at Windermere Point.

Our choices are weighted not just for food quality and value, but also for setting and live entertainment, a big thing on the island. More entertainment notes are at www.mackinacisland.com See the weekly Mackinac Town Crier newspaper for specifics. The famous Pink Pony Bar & Grill (906-847-6494) at the Chippewa Hotel books well-known acoustic acts. Comedian Stu Stuart's popular standup act draws on his experience as an island porter and his travels across the U.P. (He also writes for the Porcupine Press, the U.P.'s most Yooper publication. He appears some nights at 9 p.m. at The Lilac Tree Hotel (906-847-6575). $15, $12 for students and seniors. Suitable for children.
   Many of our selections are less expensive family spots. Don't forget, up in Fort Mackinac, the Tea Room by the state's oldest building (1780, with walls three feet thick), where you can enjoy food from the Grand Hotel on a terrace overlooking the harbor and village of Michigan's most historic and picturesque town. This year the tea room is open until 7:30 p.m. in summer.
   Restaurants are arranged from west (at the Grand and by the Star Dock) to east. Expect a crowd in season. Get reservations if possible.

GRAND HOTEL
(906) 847-8300
All Grand Hotel restaurants are open to the general public. The $10 admission fee to the hotel building is needed only from 9 to 5. After that, anyone can come for dinner or drinks — provided that they are dressed for the occasion: men in coat and tie, ladies "at their loveliest" — now interpreted as dresses or pantsuits, but ladies are cut a little more slack than men, and pants with a dressy top should do. The Grand's food is almost always good and surprisingly cutting edge. (Just who thought of teaming collards with truffles?)
Sample menus are on the Grand Hotel web site. Add an 18% gratuity to all prices.
♦ GRAND HOTEL MAIN DINING ROOM
Dining on a grand Victorian scale, served by elite Jamaican waiters, includes the possibility of Victorian-style gross over-indulgence. But "most of our guests would never do that," a key Grand staffer told us. Vegetarians can always eat well at the Grand Hotel.
    Breakfast ($30) is from 7:30 to 9:30. Fresh fruits and juices, pastries, sides, plus entrées like asparagus and tomato pie, or New York strip steak with apple fritters, or whitefish with spinach. From 9:30 to 11 many breakfast items are served in the adjacent Geranium Bar.
     Grand Buffet at lunch ($45, with $10 credit from general admission). Two hundred feet of beautifully presented salads, hot meats and seafoods, and pastries. (This is not part of the modified American plan included with rooms for hotel guests.)
     Dinner ($75) consists of five courses followed by demitasse in the Grand Parlor. On this year's menu, among the appetizers are porcini-eggplant ravioli, and lamb carpaccio with arugula, pine nuts, and horseradish oil. Some entrées are grilled duck breast on black truffle grits, and beef tenderloin medallions with shrimp sauté and bordelaise sauce. A sommelier is on hand to assist with wine selections.
♦ AFTERNOON TEA in the PARLOR ($25 for guests and non-guests alike). Teas, sherry, and champagne with finger sandwiches, scones, and pastries - accompanied by chamber music.
♦ CARLETON'S TEA STORE on the Grand Hotel carriage level is open for lunch. It serves beer, wine, and sandwiches like a roast turkey and swiss croissant with potato salad ($10), soups, and salads like chicken-avocado Cobb ($12). Soup and half a sandwich is $9.
♦ The JOCKEY CLUB is the Grand's casual spot for lunch, dinner, drinks, and snacks. It's by the first tee of the Jewel Front Nine across Cadotte Avenue from the Grand Hotel side entrance. Local people, including one man who runs a respected island restaurant, mention it as a favorite. The foot-long hot dog ($6), whitefish and chips ($12), and BBQ chicken and red onion marmalade bruschetta ($9.50) are popular at lunch. There are also soups, salads, and appetizers like hummus and olive plate ($7.50) or potato gnocchi with wild mushrooms and watercress sauce ($8). Dinner plates can be herb-crusted rack of lamb with roasted turnips and eggplant caviar ($29), broiled whitefish with potatoes and spinach ($19), and a skillet half chicken with braised collards and sweet corn pudding ($19). The Grand Pecan Ball with special fudge sauce ($6) is a tradition big enough for two. There's jazz piano many evenings.

MightyMac.org

The Tea Room at Fort Mackinac offers wonderful food from the Grand Hotel kitchen and a terrific terrace setting.

♦ TEA ROOM and Restaurant at Fort Mackinac: see Fort Mackinac.

WOODS RESTAURANT and BOBBY'S BAR
(906) 847-3699
Woods is the Grand Hotel restaurant back by the Jewel golf course's "Woods Nine," a bike or carriage ride from town. It is similar to the Jockey Club in menu and price, but not the same. The German hunting lodge setting, with interior designed by Carleton Varney, isn't at all like a German restaurant in Frankenmuth (or in most of the U.S.), but will be quite familiar to travelers in Germany: checked tablecloth, lots of antlers and stenciling, and a comfortable, casual ambiance. The food's not German. Evenings bring jazz piano solos. An extra bonus at Bobby's Bar: you can bowl what's thought to be the nation's oldest duckpin alley.

WINDERMERE DOG HOUSE
(906) 847-6586
This prime waterfront spot at Windemere Point just south of downtown has picnic tables, umbrellas, and a great view of the Round Island Light. Koegel's hot dogs (plain, Polish, bratwurst) are from $3 to $3.50. 50¢ extra for kraut or chili. Also available: pop, iced tea, and soft-serve ice cream.

CARRIAGE HOUSE at HOTEL IROQUOIS
(906) 847-3321
Many discriminating island residents regard the Iroquois Hotel restaurant as their favorite place to splurge. The setting is luxurious and intimate, with a Straits view on 3 sides looking at the Round Island and Passage lighthouses. Service is outstanding. Great care is taken for details of preparation and presentation. And the ingredients, changing with seasonal availability, are the best available, almost always organic.
     Lunch salads and sandwiches mostly around $13, dinner entrées with seasonal accompaniments of vegetable and starch are mostly $30 to $39. It's famous for whitefish, caught daily, filleted here, $11.50 as a lunch sandwich on homemade dill bread with fries, $28 at dinner. Staff picks include pan-seared diver scallops with lemongrass and leeks ($36) and exceptionally presented lamb chops with rosemary ($38) and surf and turf with petite filet mignon ($60). Sample menus with prices are on the Iroquois web site.
     A limited menu (desserts $9, soups $8, appetizers, some sandwiches ($12.50) and large salads ($13) is served on the veranda, with the same harbor and lighthouse view. Jalapeño mayo and avocado are on the "best BLT." Signature dessert: 3 pastry shells with ice cream and fudge sauce. Extensive wine list and select whiskeys. There are an extensive wine list and nightly piano music by Grammy-winning Darryl Dybka, who has played with Chet Atkins and Frank Zappa. Google "Victoria magazine Iroquois" to see a spring 2010 spread on lilacs and the Iroquois. Reservations taken; recommended for large parties.

MARY'S BISTRO
(906) 847-9911
Mackinac's newest restaurant is owned and operated by the Island House hotel. It has an intimate, comfortable fine-dining atmosphere (more relaxing than many downtown restaurants) with a good wine list and wide selection of alcoholic beverages from Europe as well as the U.S. The rear patio is quite close to the harbor. Wood-grilled chicken ($18 with mashed potatoes and vegetables) is its signature dish. Appetizers are good, too. nFor a quick lunch there are changing soups ($4/bowl), burgers ($8), and chicken Caesar salad ($10). Occasional acoustic music concerts.

VILLAGE INN
(906) 847-3542
A local institution considered by many the best Northern Michigan restaurant, the Village Inn is famous for whitefish, planked or as a sandwich. They serve certified Angus beef, far more delicious than ordinary Angus. The bar is quite a gathering place, but the V.I. is also a big family spot. Booths are in the adjacent dining room. Extensive wine list.

HORN'S GASLIGHT BAR & RESTAURANT
(906) 847-6154
The island's year-round nightspot, with music every night, is a Southwest-flavored restaurant by day and suppertime. Going beyond burgers (a bacon burger with fries is $8.50) and steak, house specialties are fajitas; spinach and crab quesadillas; pasta with shrimp, chicken and roasted peppers in cream sauce, and supernachos ($14 for 2). Horn's Bar goes back to 1933 and an earlier billiard parlor/dance hall, started by Amos Horn, who worked at the lighthouse, and his wife. Now their granddaughter and her husband, Patti Ann and Steven Moskowitz, have built on Horn's reputation to create "an eclectic dancing scene with islanders, summer workers, tourists, and conventioneers" and build a mini-empire (Horn's, the well-regarded Yankee Rebel around the corner on Astor Street, and now the Mustang). Wifi.

PATRICK SINCLAIR'S IRISH PUB
(906) 847-6454
In addition to Irish-themed items like Irish whiskey, corned beef sandwiches ($11-$12), an lamb and beef shepherd's pie dinner ($20), and bangers and colcannon (sausages with mashed potatoes mixed with cabbage, $23), the pub is known for its whitefish sandwich ($14 with fries), whitefish Reuben ($9), and oysters on the half shell ($15 and $20). Also cedar shake salmon, burgers, hand cut fries, and European beers on tap. Dinner specials can be quite inventive. The menu tells in detail the tale of Patrick Sinclair, the island fort's first commander, and his fall from grace.
This is an island music standout. Summer brings live bands on Mondays and weekends, trivia on Tuesdays, and a deejay on Sundays spinning American pop music and then, after 10, international dance music for Jamaicans and other island help.

ICE HOUSE Bar & Grill
(906) 847-3347; theislandhouse.com
Tucked back in a hidden garden behind the Island House hotel, this charming spot is half inside, half outside beneath umbrellas. Inventive favorites on the casual menu include fresh soups ($6/bowl), a chopped salad ($11), grilled rotisserie turkey club sandwich ($11), and a char-grilled version of Chicken Mackinac on a crusty roll ($10). Wide selection of beers.

1852 GRILL ROOM
(906) 847-3347
Windows on the curved front of historic Island House Hotel's dining room look out on one of the island's prettiest views: first the marina, then two lighthouses, the shipping channel, and Bois Blanc Island. The setting is clubby, with white tablecloths and dark wood paneling, and banquette seating. There's also a front terrace with umbrellas. Popular favorites include prime rib dinners ($33 and $38) and the signature Chicken Mackinac ($23), sautéed chicken breasts and mushrooms with smoked bacon and gruyere cheese in velouté sauce. The $43 prix fixe dinner includes salad and dessert plus a prime rib, chicken, or fish entrée. Select list of wines and drinks.

J.L. BEANERY COFFEEHOUSE
(906) 847-6533
This charming, friendly coffeehouse with espresso and coffee drinks has a fabulous view of the marina, harbor, Round Island lighthouse, and fort. It has some inexpensive menu items—a blessing, especially for families, on this expensive island. There are breakfast sandwiches ($3.75) and burritos ($2.25), oatmeal, and granola along with muffins and light pastries, soups and sandwiches for lunch. Smoothies are $5. Also for sale: coffee beans, mugs, coffee pots, teapots and such.

SEABISCUIT CAFE
(906) 847-3611
"A Mediterranean café with an American spin," Seabiscuit gets high marks for its soups ($5-$10), sandwiches ($8-$10), and light entrées ($9-$15-$18). Owners and staff are from the French Outpost, whose space is now given over to a Grand Hotel restaurant. Staff favorites include the whitefish Reuben with coleslaw and Swiss on grilled rye, engineered so it's not soggy, and a falafel pita with roasted red peppers and feta, with olive tapenade. Burgers, fish and chips with fries are for the less adventurous. Reservation system allows for window-shopping while waiting.

PINK PONY BAR & GRILL
(906) 847-3341
The epitome of Mackinac entertainment, energy, and fun, the Pink Pony (a name inherited from another restaurant elsewhere) is also an all-around restaurant and breakfast spot overlooking the harbor, with a very competent staff. One bar frames the harbor strikingly at water level, another is above. Nightly entertainment varies from the house musician singing pop songs on request to various bands. Sailboat races, funny pink ponies set the décor theme.
     For breakfast, Eggs Benedict ($10) are fabulous. Other highlights include a smoked whitefish appetizer to share ($11), Gorgonzola salad ($11), pasta Angelina ($23) with broccolini, pancetta, and shrimp, and several whitefish dishes, mostly $24. Summer staff love to relalk with the "rum runner" frozen drink.

ROUND ISLAND BAR & GRILL AT EURO GARDEN CAFE
(906) 847-3312
Each of these moderately priced, casual lunch and dinner spots at Mission Point looks out at Round Island and offers a good look at freighters passing between Lake Michigan and the St. Marys River at Detour, headed for the Soo Locks and Lake Superior. The views are so fine, that one downtown restaurant manager comes here to unwind. The Round Island Bar is up higher, so the view is better, but smokier. Tables are by the windows. Its menu is basic American. There's evening entertainment. The Euro Garden Café, on the ground level, has a mainstream menu with German or Swiss touches like goulash, schnitzel, bratwurst, and more, served inside or on a very pleasant terrace. There's acoustic music on the terrace, weather permitting. Sample menus are on Mission Point's web site, but hard to find at the moment. Go from Home to Resort Attractions, then find “fine dining” in small print and click for individual restaurants and menus.