DECATUR – Delaware Street Grill, Bakery and Coffee Co., 107 W. Delaware, on the right just before the central business district of this Van Buren County community, offers the best of its neighbors’ worlds, plus sweet potato fries.

Delaware Street Grill opened Jan. 9 and also offers nine-inch personal pies in the former pizza parlor and more than 50 flavors of syrup at the espresso bar, plus fresh baked goods.

German chocolate cake? That’s a beverage.

So are Tiramisu (Italian cake), toasted marshmallow, caramel pecan, cookie dough and, Tuesday’s special, frosted cookie mocha, which tastes of gingerbread and white chocolate.

Subway across the street promotes its sandwiches as “eating fresh.”
McDonald’s down the street toward Dowagiac serves burgers and fries.

Delaware Street Grill does both.

“People come here,” said cook Markus Chevalier, “we can be a one-stop shop. A lot of times when you get a group of people to go out to lunch, somebody can’t eat burgers, so they have to go to different locations. The whole group can eat here.”

Chevalier, an Upper Peninsula native, previously ran a coffee and sandwich shop for three years in Kalamazoo, where he and Dowsett met through mutual friends.

“We’re getting really good response from people so far,” said Chevalier, who oversees a staff of three to four people.

Comment cards are placed on each table to rate the experience.

Dowsett is a chiropractor in Dowagiac, where he is president of the Chamber of Commerce.

Dowsett graduated from Dowagiac Union High School in 1985.

“So far we’re very happy with the reception,” Dowsett said Tuesday afternoon. “Once we get our legs, we’ll expand into dinner. We hope to have something for everyone.”
Sweet potato fries “are one of my favorites,” he added.

Hours are Monday-Saturday, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m., for breakfast and lunch.
Delaware Street Grill closes Sunday.

Breakfasts consist of “grab-and-go” bagel or biscuit sandwiches with egg, cheese and applewood bacon or sausage, biscuits and gravy, French toast stick, and mini-potato pancakes.

Besides third-pound burgers made fresh from never-frozen patties, they carry a line of deli sandwiches named for Decatur streets, hot dogs, a grilled four-cheese sandwich, barbecued pulled pork, shrimp and chicken strip baskets, onion rings and skin-on fries.
While pizza aims at the lunch crowd, Chevalier said, “It could be a breakfast entree if you want to eat pizza for breakfast. You’ll have to wait a little longer for the ovens to get up to temperature.”

Delaware Street’s club sandwich is named for Edgar Bergen, the ventriloquist whose daughter, Candice, starred in movies and as TV’s “Murphy Brown.” Candice Bergen’s first performances were on her father’s radio show.

Bergen, born in Chicago in 1903, was 75 when he died in 1978.

He grew up in Decatur and taught himself ventriloquism from a pamphlet when he was 11.

His sidekick, Charlie McCarthy, was modeled after an Irish newspaperboy he knew.
There are also the Phelps (roast turkey, lettuce, tomato and cheese), the Sherwood (roast ham, lettuce, tomato and cheese), the Delaware (applewood bacon, lettuce and tomato), the Williams (chunky seafood salad, lettuce and tomato), the St. Marys (chunky chicken salad, lettuce and tomato) and the vegetarian Farmers Market (lettuce, tomato, cucumber, green pepper, onion and cheese.

Custom condiments include Southwest mayonnaise, horsey-dill mayonnaise, basil-pesto mayonnaise, cranberry-curry mayonnaise, regular mayonnaise and yellow mustard.
Fresh soups and salads are featured.

This week served chili and chicken noodle, but last week was Italian wedding soup, with spinach and sausage.

Beverages include a full line of espressos, coffee, chai, juices, sodas, real fruit smoothies and Italian and French sodas.

“A lot of the drinks are espresso coffee mixed with milk and flavorings,” Dowsett explained.

“It’s not just black coffee and flavorings.”

“Sweet treats” include jumbo muffins and cookies, brownies, scones, cinnamon rolls and key lime tarts.

“All baked in-house,” said Dowsett, who invested in the building a couple of years ago.
It also includes Moss Chiropractic and apartments upstairs, with a third unit for another tenant.

There is a full basement that could lend itself to a banquet facility or meeting place.
Catering is a possibility down the road, since Chevalier used to do that with his mother.
Dowsett lives in the Decatur area. His Dowagiac practice, Dowsett Chiropractic Health Center, 101 Commercial St., faces Beckwith Theatre and is across New York Avenue from Dowagiac District Library.

“I have a lot of patients from here,” Dowsett said, as well as from Marcellus, St. Joseph and South Bend, Ind.

Chevalier is working toward wi-fi and a Web page where customers can preview his menu, including special drinks and soups.

“We’ve been working on this for a good six months,” Dowsett said. “We saw a need in Decatur for another variety of eating establishment. You have some good factories here in town that have been here for ages and survived the recession.”