FEATURED STORY FROM THE Best of BG – 2018 ISSUE
Everyday People Cafe:
Everyday People Cafe Features Great Food, Friendly Atmosphere
For Patrick McDermott, owner of Everyday People Café, opening his new business in the summer of 2017 was not only a dream come true, but a natural step in the career of what most would say is one of Bowling Green’s most experienced foodies. McDermott, who has been a local resident since 1994, has worked at several local restaurants, and more recently at the iconic Corner Grill until it closed in February 2016 following a kitchen fire.
“Working at the Corner Grill, my dream was always to buy the grill and do it better,” McDermott says.
Doing it better meant crafting a menu that drew from his work at the Corner Grill, but with inspiration McDermott drew from working at Cohen and Cooke, which McDermott describes as “probably the most high-end place this town has seen in a really long time. I worked there for two years and the chefs there showed me that it’s not just a job. There’s an art to even something just as simple as a plate of eggs and potatoes.”
Somewhere between the experience at the Corner Grill and the high-end food service of Cohen and Cooke, McDermott knew what he wanted to do. “My dream for this place was to take my Corner Grill experience and that Cohen and Cooke mentality and just smash the two together,” he said. Let’s do really simple comfort food, but let’s take those extra few minutes and that little bit of extra labor and love to make it a better product.”
The only thing missing from his dream was the capital to make it happen and that was solved with a partnership with Nate Cordes, Michael Wahle and Troy Myers. What they have created is a place that McDermott describes as “family-friendly and relaxing, with a homey atmosphere including the business partners and their families growing up and a handdrafted mantle and counter, built from the ground up. The menu features a wide variety of breakfast and lunch items including made-from scratch pancakes, a wide assortment of eggs and sides combinations plus several specialty omelets.
For lunch, the restaurant offers a large assortment sandwiches, including classic hamburgers and cheeseburgers, a pork chop sandwich, varieties of chicken sandwiches and BLTs and a Dagwood, scribed as containing “a whole lot of everything.” Everyday People Café also offers gluten free cupcakes and muffins, a gluten free bread made in house and a gluten free flour that can easily make pancakes. But equally important to the menu, is the atmosphere that McDermott strives to create with his café. The restaurant features a small, tight-knot staff that likes to get to know its customers.
“It’s the little things, like remembering how this person likes their coffee or that person likes their food a little crispier,” McDermott says. It’s getting to know the people that come in— remembering the little ticks to everyone—is his favorite part of the business.From made-from-scratch pancakes, to meaningful conversation, this local café has been a hit with its customers and McDermott hopes to continue to become an integral part of Bowling Green. “I want to be part of the community and campus life here,” he says.
Everyday People Café is open 6 a.m.-3 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday. It is closed on Monday.