This Mother Bear’s Deep Dish pizza had ground sausage, imported pepperoni and mushrooms. We had just moved Sophie into her dorm room at IU and we negotiated until I got to choose. (No fear, Heidi got her McAlister’s Deli fix the next day.)

I hadn’t been to Mother Bear’s, which is located at 1428 E. 3rd Street in Bloomington, since the 80s. It is right next to the IU campus and if you have a Sharpie Marker, you can leave your name or a message.

I digress, let’s get back to the pizza. It reminds me of a Noble Romans deep dish with the blob of sauce on each individual piece. The best part may have been the dark crunchy edges where the cheese melted and made a crust.

Since Heidi and Sophie ordered a deluxe, I had this for lunch, dinner and breakfast the next morning!

“Farm To Curb” is the theme at The Mug, located at 117 Apple Street in Greenfield, Indiana. They attain all of their meat products locally from Tyner Pond Farm, which raises their products “the old-fashioned way” with no antibiotics. They also use fresh local products when in season and available.

I tried the breaded tenderloin and branched out with the bacon-wrapped apple slices which were deep-fried, sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar, then drizzled with caramel sauce. However, the best item was the Garlic Fries!

The kitchen area was open and I was able to watch the entire process. The fresh cut fries were tossed in a large silver bowl with olive oil, fried, then seasoned with parsley and fresh garlic. The aroma alone peaked my attention. They were golden brown, crunchy, and delicious.

For some history while in Greenfield, be sure to visit the James Whitcomb Riley home where “The Hoosier Poet” was born. Or, “The gobble-uns ‘ll git you, Ef you don’t watch out!”

On my fantasy football draft trip to Nappanee I had to visit the Rise’ N Roll donut shop. My neighbor, Larry Schneider, had brought us some from his trip to Shipshewana a couple of weeks ago and they are as good of a donut that I have ever had. They are made from scratch and are preservative free. My friend and Nappanee native Mike Wagner refers to Rise’ N Roll donuts as “Amish Crack.”

These treats are so amazing that they ship them from Middlebury in northern Indiana to a store in Greenwood.

Starting top left and going clockwise: Crunch Delight Bismark, White Cream with Chocolate Frosting, Bavarian Cream with Cinnamon Caramel Topping, Bavarian Cream with Caramel Frosting and Apple Fritter. Melt in your mouth goodness.

5054 US 31, Peru, Indiana is where you will find the McClure Apple Orchard, Cafe, and Winery. I was road-tripping to Nappanee for the Ice and Stretch Fantasy Football draft at the home of my college friend Jay Heckaman and decided to see if McClure’s might have an apple dumpling for me. (* Please note that my team, Ball U 85, is the reigning champion of this competitive league.)

Yes, they did! In the pounding rain and at 10:00 a.m., I was the only customer in the cafe and had the hostess’ undivided attention. I asked if they had ice cream as well and she said “Would you like cinnamon or vanilla?” To which I replied, “How about one of each.”

The steaming hot dumpling was served with an incredible apple cider carmel sauce and the ice cream was melting at the side of the bowl. ( I really like ice cream melting on my hot fruity desserts!) I cut the dumpling in half and placed the ice cream on top of the dumpling and it was fantastic!

Since it was a winery, I thought I might sample a couple and bring Heidi a gift from my day on walkabout. I chose the Sweet Mead, a honey flavored wine and I think she will like it. We recently decided to experience the Indiana Wine Trail and this is something we can do together and with our friends as our children have become quite independent and hardly need us anymore.

I really had no intention of eating out, but, when the opportunity to dine at The Town House at 206 East Fourth Street in Seymour arrives, I jump on board. I was in town to do some yard work for my Mom and she always likes to reward me with food. She usually has leftovers for lunch the next day and we get to spend some more time together. Win/Win.

Meet “The Train Wreck.” A crispy breaded tenderloin topped with a scoop of mashed potatoes and then cover that with that white gravy that I love so much. (You can get fried chicken if you like and it is tasty as well.)

For dessert, Mom had a slice of Sugar Cream pie, which is “The Official State Pie of Indiana.” I went with my usual, peanut butter pie.

Jade almost always takes care of us and she refuses to bring me my pie until I have finished my meal. I mean, come on Jade, I’m with my Mom and she doesn’t care anymore. Also, there is a sign in the restaurant that says, ” Life is short, have dessert first.”

I arrive home from school to find a freshly baked lattice topped peach pie sitting on the stove top. Still warm. How does this happen? Well, it all starts with marrying the right woman, a.k.a. Heidi Hackman Wintin. Having scored this awesome wife gains me access to Nina Hackman. a.k.a. The Best Mother-In-Law Ever.

Nina’s brother Barry Melloncamp brought her some peaches picked from his peach trees. She said they needed to be eaten soon so she made a couple of pies.

Homegrown peaches from a mile down the road, golden brown crust, strips of dough form the lattice pattern on top and then sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar. Then delivered to my kitchen. Quite the set up I have landed, huh?

I also had just enough ice cream to make it perfect. Wintin Scores!!!

My advice to you guys out there looking for a mother-in-law like mine…I believe the secret is to love her daughter and grandchildren. If you accomplish that, the rest is easy and you get to eat like a king.

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My friend Dave Goecker is usually bailing me out of some home improvement situation or fixing something for me that I don’t know how to do. So today, I was more than happy to help him out by driving a stranded vehicle home from Madison after he attended Ribberfest.

1. While there, we meandered through some antique shops as he was shopping for some beer signs to decorate his pool bar. (He decided on a Bud Light bottle cap tin sign.) We also found the Scoops Ice Cream Shoppe located at 115 West Main Street in Madison. I decided on the Salty Carmel Truffle and Chocolate Brownie Blitz in a waffle bowl. The Salty Carmel was creamy with streaks of carmel and carmel filled chocolate truffle candy bites. The Brownie Blitz was loaded with nuggets of Brownie in the rich chocolate ice cream all filling the crunchy waffle bowl! We relaxed outside on the metal mesh furniture on the sidewalk in no hurry at all. And before the day is done, Dave is coming over tonight to fix my roof!

This is a Smoked pineapple, Canadian bacon, and BBQ sauce pizza on the Weber Grill. While I lit the charcoal, Heidi baked the Kroger crust for about five minutes. After baking, she added the toppings and having been semi-baked, that made it easy to slide onto the grill. Before placing the pizza on the grill, I added applewood chips. It was on the Weber for about 6 minutes.

The crust was very crispy and all of the toppings were hot. The significance is, when you raise the pizza to your mouth to take a bite, you get that smoky applewood flavor that you don’t get from the oven. Smoky, crunchy, pineapple, and BBQ flavor put this slice over the top! Highly recommended! (We did make a sausage and pepperoni pizza for Liam and his friend Carter Waskom. They really didn’t care because we got the new REMC high speed fiber optic internet today and they couldn’t be bothered while playing Fortnite.)

Heidi and I discussed it and the last stop of the day would be the Doughnut Burger. A bacon cheeseburger between what looked like two Krispy Kremes. My sweetheart wife agreed to get the lettuce, pickle and tomato on the side because I am mostly a plain burger kind of guy. We enjoyed the sweetness of the doughnuts with the bacon and cheese. It was $9.00, but we wanted to try it once so we didn’t mind the price. The only other possible drawback for me would be that it was messy with the glaze covering my fingers and there was no place to sit.

All the food we tried was high in calories and high in satisfaction. Also, if you made it to the end of my “Walt’s Diner” blog debut, I’ll let you know that my beautiful daughter Sophie Kreis won the State 4-H Fashion Revue Dress Up Wear modeling category for the second year in a row! The outfit that she not only modeled, but made.

 

*Footnote: Roll Call- Characters mentioned today are: Heidi- the wonderful woman that puts up with me. RaeAnn- daughter. Sophie- step-daughter…and let’s give a shout out to Liam- step-son that stayed home today because of football practice and Lawyer- son.

I may buy it or I may make it myself, but I am for sure going to eat it!…Walt Wintin

The family attended the Indiana State Fair in support of our daughter, Sophie, that was modeling the outfit she made in the 4-H Fashion Revue. No one had eaten breakfast so we headed straight to the Indiana Dairy Farmers building for a grilled cheese. But this isn’t your Momma’s grilled cheese. The bread of the “Inside Out” grilled cheese sandwich looks like French bread, cheddar cheese encrusted on the outside and Swiss cheese in the middle. Simply genius! $3.50. And rounding out the  breakfast of champions, who doesn’t like a thick vanilla milkshake in a Holstein cow cup? $3.50.

After the Fashion Revue a large ear of roasted sweet corn on a stick caught my eye. $4.00 The folks at Wilson’s Roasted Sweet Corn peel back the husk, wrap the stick with foil and a napkin and dip the entire ear into a can of melted butter and hand it to you. As it is dripping butter, you then take it to a table and add any combination of sea salt, seasoned salt and parmasean cheese. My hands were full and I went simple with just the salt. Heidi, Rae, and Sophie all tried it and it was unanimous. We will go there again.