Our Up North series highlights good eats to seek out on your weekend roadtrips as you head Up North – that ambiguous, nebulous region in Michigan where everyone has, or has a friend that has, a cottage on a lake somewhere.
To escape the heatwave last week, we headed to the cooler waters of northern Michigan. Our route took us along US-31 between Elk Rapids and Charlevoix, with a few detours along the way. We managed to find some amazing Cajun & Creole food in Elk Rapids, freshly fried cherry donuts and apple pie at an orchard, classic grilled burgers in Charlevoix, and learned exactly what broasted chicken is in East Jordan.
Our first stop was Pearl’s in Elk Rapids. My buddy DG tipped me off to Pearl’s a couple years ago and I’ve been meaning it check it out ever since. It had come highly recommended to him by his boss – a New Orleans native who claimed it was some of the best Cajun food he’d had outside of New Orleans. With high expectations firmly established, we went in with empty stomachs.
