Harbor View Cafe — Restaurant in Charlevoix

Here we go! Little chunky monkey here is on a road trip, which means...fooood! Let's get this first review out of the way!

Looking for a breakfast place in Charlevoix, after enjoying a friend's wedding the night before, I settled on the Harbor View Cafe. Mostly because I wanted your basic, down home style breakfast. I wasn't looking for frills or fancy dishes. That's exactly what I got here. It's just a little diner amongst other shops in a strip mall setting. Because of this, there isn't a ton of seating, but oddly enough the wait isn't that long either. So far, the hole-in-wall-ness requirements checks out. But sadly, the buck kind of stops there.

Here's the rub. Unless you really mess up my food, like really just somehow take my order and BOTCH it like a thrift store face lift, I'm not going to put up a fuss. Which always makes these kinds of reviews tricky, because everything was mid, at best. I ordered the 2x2x2 (two eggs, two bacons, two sausages, and potatoes), plus two silver dollar pancakes. And because I'm a little piggy, I also ordered a half order of biscuits and gravy. The eggs were good, basic scrambled, salt and pepper. I dug them. The American Potatoes were pretty good as well. The bacon was medium thickness, which I liked, because sometimes bacon is paper thin, which is hard to cook floppy, which is the only style of bacon I'll eat. And if it's too thick, then it's just ham. The sausage links were eh. Not much flavor. If sausage shape, why not sausage flavor? The pancakes were actually really good. I would go back right now just for an order of pancakes. The real drop off here were the biscuits and gravy. I love biscuits and gravy. These looked fan-tas-tic. But for some unknown reason...the gravy had a slight tang at the end. Like, the initial bite was great, but after a few chews...a little zip. It threw me off to the point where I couldn't finish them.

The other thing that got a little spicy was the service speed. We sat for just under an hour before we got our food. Our drinks were brought out in shifts. Refills were almost nonexistent. This all seemed weird simply because it wasn't a large seated restaurant.

I'm never looking for an out of this world experience with food unless it's highly recommended by someone or it's supposed to be a special dish or something that is regarded as the "best" or "tastiest" or "has no zing". I just really felt like this was middle of the road, could get it anywhere, didn't make my tastebuds do backflips.

Pancakes 10/10 Thiccc bacon 8/10 Service 3/10 Sides of bread toasted when asked...

So glad we stopped here for breakfast!

Staying in the area, we wanted to have breakfast at a place that included sweet and savory meals. The Harbor View Cafe has good reviews and their menu has classic staples and homemade items like bread and pastries.

We decided to check it out, and the outdoor seating area was perfect. It was well shaded, and you could see the water! They also allowed dogs outside, which was ideal for us, as we were roadtripping with our dog.

We ordered the biscuits and gravy to share, I ordered the California eggs Benedict and my husband ordered the Three of everything.

The gravy was piping hot and well seasoned. The hashbrowns could have been cooked more thoroughly, even after requesting well done/extra crispy, there were soggy parts. I was able to request substitutions on the eggs Benedict, which was great because I subbed the English muffin for their homemade sour dough, its amazing! Highly recommend ordering their homemade bread, it made a difference in my experience. And this was probably the best Hollandaise sauce I've had at any restaurant, I ordered extra! The tomatoes were tasty and I was able to get the avocado on the side

Boden offered the best service by far! They were attentive, and everything was exactly as we requested. Get a table where they are your server!

After breakfast, being able to walk across the street and enjoy the park and...

We went in to have an enjoyable breakfast. Seated ourselves as the sign said. We waited and waited to even be acknowledged. Finally we were given a menu and asked if we wanted coffee. My daughter asked if you had half n half. The waitress said its right in front of you. My daughter then said, no that’s coffee creamer. She was told. “That’s our version of half n half”!!!! A simple no is all that was needed. We had a paid for tour scheduled and I asked the waitress if it would take a long time to be served. I mentioned the tour. ( I only asked because we wasted 20 minutes waiting for a menu.) Her response was, “ the food is not premade, we have to cook it. “ Once served she never returned. I had to catch her at another table to ask for jelly or jam. She replied, it’s on the table. I indicated that we had noon. She took some from another table and rudely sat it on our table. I’m not experienced with rude service and it certainly got our day off to a bad start. As for the food, it was prepared well. No problems there. Just the waitress. We were visiting Charlevoix for the first time. Your restaurant was recommended but we will never return and will not recommend...