Frank W.
Yelp
I recommend Angelo's with enthusiasm tinged by nostalgia. I went to law school at University of Michigan back in the day, graduating 1991. A buddy and I used to go there for breakfast. We would have the deep fried raisin bread French toast and an omelet, splitting them, and we'd still have leftovers. I recall I'd return to my room and take a nap. The meals here are delicious, but, like much that is enjoyable to eat, an indulgence -- the name alone should indicate what you are in for, what with the "deep fried" preparation. In an earlier review, I mentioned there could be a wait. It was always busy, bustling, and simply fun, because hanging out like that is integral to the experience of a quintessential college town. They make their own bread. They have other dishes. But it is the deep fried raisin bread French toast that defines them. Everything else is very good albeit standard fare. My recommendation is to share. Then you can have other flavors and avoid excess.
I recently had an opportunity to dine there again, some 32 years after I was enjoying the place regularly. I had been invited to give a speech on campus. I walked on a dark winter morning, from downtown to north campus, which is a good two miles, with snow on the ground and ice on the sidewalks. I had not planned to stop in, but I could not help myself when I went by moments after the 7am opening. The novelist Thomas Wolfe is famous for his phrase, the title of his Great American Novel, You Can't Go Home Again, one of those terrific works of a time and a place (with such details as a description of Alexander Calder, fictionalized as "Piggy Logan," and though they were friends the depiction is unkind). That is such a poignant sentiment, because of course almost all of us, however we may try not to be sentimental, yearn to return to our youth, believing we can feel again what we felt then, perhaps secretly hoping it will even be better, or we ourselves will be, thanks to everything which has transpired since then. Yet you cannot eat your memories. You no doubt will try whatever anyone says. I still loved that I was able to taste for a moment not only what I put in my mouth but the recollections that came back, impressions more than details. I sat on a stool at the counter, and I could pretend my future was still to come. I had not noticed then -- I have improved a bit as a human being in this regard, being more in the moment and less in a hurry -- the photos on the wall celebrating tradition. Angelo's is one of those classic Greek diners, if you are attentive to the signs, and they have omelets with spinach and feta and the salad to prove it.
That friend, ironically, has a daughter who has just enrolled at U of M. I will suggest to the family that she try Angelo's.
