review of flapjack willy's
TRANSCRIPT
8/4/2019 Review of Flapjack Willy's
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P r s r t . S t d
U . S .
P o s t a g e
P A I D
W o r c e s t e r , M A
P e r m i t N o . 2
T HE C HRONICLE OF S TURBRIDGE C OUNTRY L IVING STURBRIDGETIMES
THE
MAGAZINE
A UGUST , 2011
8/4/2019 Review of Flapjack Willy's
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12 T HE C HRONICLE OF S TURBRIDGE C OUNTRY L IVING THE STURBRIDGETIMESMAGAZINE
FINDING FLAPJACK WILLIE’S
WAS AN ACCIDENT. It is not on
the Main Street, but on the residential
side road that starts at the east side of
the Quabaug Rubber plant up in
North Brookfield. I passed by it a sev-
eral times before realizing it was not
part of the variety store next door.
Then again, if you’re not looking for
something, it might take a while to
find it.
Find it we did, however. When I fi-
nally looked at the sign, it was the
name that caught my eye. Maybe I
would not have been tempted if it had
just been, Larry’s Lunch. Then again, though, I’d heard of f lapjacks all my
life, I’d never actually had one.The first thing you notice on walk-
ing through the door is the décor. It
can only be described as retro. It is
neat and clean but has none of the glitz
of chain restaurants. Though they
serve a good cup of java, as we found
out soon enough, there is none of the
Starbucks style coffee shop culture. It
is an old style American breakfast andlunch spot with counter or
table service.
My daughter,
Bríd, and I came
in late morning
looking for some
breakfast. The wait-
ress asked us if we wanted
a menu or wished to choose from the
many specials posted on the wall. She
didn’t say like a townie, but she could
probably tell, we weren’t. We asked for
coffee and menus. She quickly
brought both, and the bottomless cup
was refilled as needed.
Pancakes are at the top of the menu
and I went no further than to request
one large blueberry instead of a stack.
Along with that, I had a side of TexMex home fries. My daughter or-
dered the sweet potato pancake.
The blueberry pancake was large
and tasted fine with the syrup. The
TexMex fries were spicy. The hit of the morning was the sweet potato
pancake. The waitress thought it too
small and brought out another one.
We were happily surprised when we
saw the check. It was more than fair.
In our next foray, I stayed with
breakfast and Bríd did lunch. She or-
dered the fried scallops with French
fries and was pleased. It was time forme to be able to claim I had
a flapjack at least once
in this life.
Willie’s flapjacks
are with filling
cooked into the
buttermilk pan-
cake. The choices are
ham, bacon or sausage, with a cheese
filling as well. If you are really hun-
gry, the Meat Lovers Flapjack has all
three pork products in the dish with
the cheese. It would only be fair to
try that. Yes, it was a bit overboard,
but with the syrup liberally applied,
the pangs of hunger were absent for
the rest of the day.
I had not yet had lunch with
Willie, so on our next visit, I ordereda wall special, the Italian Meat Loaf.
It was stuffed with potato and cheese
and topped with sauce. In truth, I
William Holmberg, proprietor of Flapjack Willy’s in North Brookfield.
© 2011 SturbridgeTimes photo by R ichard Murphy
Flap jack Willy’sBreakfast at
Yep, them’s good pancakes ...
S OMETHING D IFFERENT
B Y R ICHARD MURPHY , S.I.G.*
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13T HE C HRONICLE OF S TURBRIDGE C OUNTRY L IVING THE STURBRIDGETIMESMAGAZINE
did not get the potato part being associ-
ated with Italy. Other than gnocchi,
how many other Italian dishes have
spuds? No matter, there was culinary li-
cense at work. It went even better when
the chef handed me a bottle of Tabasco
to go with it.My daughter reverted to breakfast and
had sourdough French toast with choco-
late chips. Excessive maybe, but I am the
last one to complain.
Flapjack Willie’s is not an emporium
of haute cuisine. Not that the epony-
mous Willy isn’t capable of such work.
William Holmberg is originally from
Worcester, but has kicked around a bit
to get back to the region. Years ago, after
a hippie phase, he learned to be a chef
at Lake Tahoe. He trained under some
of the country’s highest paid chefs and
fed a lot of people. It was there that he
learned that in making a 60-gallon batch
of soup, “a half teaspoon of caraway
could make all the difference.”
He came back to run restaurant in
Gilbertville, but abruptly left it to travelthe world for 20 years. His job was not
in the kitchen. No, Willy worked teach-
ing the Internet until the whole planet
learned it. Back to Massachusetts, he is
the only chef and is in the kitchen seven
days a week at FlapJacks.
What Willy purveys is not for the di-
eters amongst us. Then again, a couple
of leaves of lettuce would never be re-garded as comfort food. Above the
counter are pictures of diners who have
been awarded a sticker recognizing their
love of breakfast. If you eat the Big Guy
Special, consisting of two large pancakes,
bacon, ham and sausage, home fries,
three eggs and toast, you too can be im-
mortalized with the sticker that reads, “I
ate the whole durn thing.” If you fail,
one of the waitresses, either Kim or
Karen, will happily pack it up to take
home. Either way, you can leave feeling
fulfilled.
Flapjack Willy’s is at 37 Grove Street
in North Brookfield and is open seven
days a week from 6:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
You can catch up with them on face-
book.
* The editor and publisher of The Stur-
bridge Times Magazine awarded me the
title “Sage International Gourmand” with-
out ceremony or emolument in the Octo-
ber, 2010 issue.
Morning morsels# Breakfast tells your body to break the
fast and get going for the day. It gives
you energy and revs up your brain.
# Kellogg’s was the first company to usetelevision advertising as its primary
mode of advertising.
# One third of American adults will have
bacon and egg for weekend breakfast.
# Cereal was invented when colonial
housewives served popcorn with
sugar and cream for breakfast.
# Instant coffee has existed since the
middle of the 18th century.
# The first breakfast cereal was created
in 1863 in New York by a vegetarian.
# Cheerio’s is the number 1 breakfast
cereal purchased in the U.S.
# In Burma, a traditional breakfast is
fried rice with boiled peas. An alterna-
tive is steamed banana leaf with peas,
served with a sprinkle of crushed and
salted toasted sesame.