The girlfriend and I went to the Grove Cafe in Ames. This is the kind of place that has no need of a website, and as far as I could tell, doesn’t have one, but a quick google search will point out it is the kind of place people write about. Go ahead, do this search: “Grove Cafe”+Ames. Or just click the link, since I’ve done it for you.

Even NPR got in on the action:

The Splendid Table for Saturday February 16, 2008
Jane and Michael Stern are at the Grove Cafe in Ames, IA and cheesemonger Steve Jenkins introduces us to the cheeses of the Pyrenees.

Well, it was the day after her birthday (or if you believe the calendar on the wall still was), and she made a joke about getting a bunny shaped pancake for her birthday. She was pretty well mortified when I asked the waitress, “Can she get a bunny shaped pancake?” I was expecting the waitress to do something besides say, “Ok,” obviously nonplussed by the request. Now we were expecting a round pancake with a couple of long ear things, sort of like a Mickey Mouse™ Pancake, but with rabbit ears (obviously). What we got instead was art. This guy is the Da Vinci of pancakes. You really need to go to the gallery and look at the big picture of the bunny cake. The detail is way cool. He even gave it a beady little rabbit eye!

Now, if you’ve never been to The Grove Cafe, one of the first things you’ll notice (if you order a pancake) is that it is orange, and big, and you only get one (one is enough). No one knows what makes them this way. Well, ok, the owner does, but I think it is a secret more guarded than the recipe for Coke™. It would take Samuel “Sandy” Berger to get this secret. I’ve heard everything from pumpkin, to orange juice, to plain old food coloring posited as possibilities. Don’t think you’ll get it out of him. Even his employees don’t seem to know (or so they claim).

Personally, I don’t think I want to know. I’m just glad they can come shaped like bunnies.

I love me some bunny! =:-)