The Rules

I would like to credit Bob with the discovery of this endeavor.  He has been mentioning this idea for at least a year.  I initialized the blog.  Great joint effort.  How will we visit the towns of CT?  What order?  What if there is no restaurant in a particular town?  All great questions.

The Rules:

We will visit all towns and cities in CT based on the following list found online:
     http://www.ct.gov/ctportal/cwp/view.asp?a=843&q=257266


Between 1 and 4 restaurants will be visited each month.

Towns and cities will be visited in alphabetical order.

Neither Bob, Barbara nor Anna may have previously visited the chosen eatery

If there is no restaurant in the selected city or town, it must be skipped.

The eatery must be valid, in other words, no gas station food bags or quickie marts.

Fast food is valid, if that is the only option in a town.  Some fries are better than others!

Andover: Hop River Cafe & Bakery

Trek number one was to Andover. Thank goodness the first town was close, otherwise who knows when we would have gotten the motivation to start this journey. As we were driving the 23 minutes to get to our destination, Bob and I were both guessing if we knew where this cafe was, and sure enough, we pinned it for a little "strip mall" for lack of a better term. All three restaurants in Andover are in this strip mall. Pizza, Chinese and Hop River Cafe & Bakery.

We chose right!  How cute is this place with the frog logo?  Reminds me of the frogs on the bridge in Willimantic.  Hop River Cafe & Bakery also provides catering services.

As we walked into the cafe, we were a bit confused if we were supposed to order at the counter or sit and be waited on.  We were offered to sit down and be waited on and also they let us know where the high chairs were for Anna if we needed one (yes we did).  As you can see to the right, there is a wide variety of coffees to choose from to match your breakfast to stay or take it with legs (to go).

 

        

The menu featured many yummy breakfast items and a perfect assortment of lunch choices.  I ordered the Tuna Bagel Melt on a wheat bagel and Bob ordered the WRAPTASTIC Steak and Potato.  Both were wonderful!  But alas, I almost forgot the beet soup Bob started with.  Wonderfully smooth and seasoned with salt.  While we were waiting, we conversed with who we suspect were the husband and wife owners.  Very friendly!  You can tell that customers who go there go there often, as the owners were well versed in the ongoings of some other customers current affiars.

 

Anna enjoyed the visit to Hop River Cafe & Bakery as well.  She had a taste of the beet soup and part of my pickle that came with my sandwich. 

Hop River Cafe & Bakery can be found on Facebook.

We give this Andover local restaurant a 2 thumbs up and would definitely return back... after we finish the rest of CT's town tastings.