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| - There are two things which Downtown Phoenix arguably has too much of. Pizza and coffee. There's a restaurant serving pizza around every corner and there's a coffee house around every corner (remarkably, not one of which is a Starbucks). Let's face it, we all know pizza has no ceiling in America. But increasingly it seems like the corner coffee house doesn't either. To be fair, there's plenty about The Grand that differs from the numerous coffee houses in Downtown. In fact much of what you find here is radically different. I actually came here to meet up with a local organization for a Facebook event, but took a little time to peruse as this was my first visit.
The Grand occupies one space in what (until recently) was a row of nightclubs along Central Avenue just south of McKinley. Amsterdam nightclub occupied this space for years with a couple of other nightclubs next door (both of which are still open). Now this space is Downtown's newest 24/7/365 coffee house. With relatively few 24/7 businesses Downtown, this is a welcome sight. The space is enormous (at least 10,000 square feet) including a sizable outdoor patio on the north side of the building. The Amsterdam space could pack in hundreds and so The Grand can at times feel pretty cavernous with a lot of unutilized or underutilized spaces. According to the owners the inspiration behind the interior was that of Grand Central Station, with various time pieces and a menu board substituting for a train schedule. That qualifies as different I'd say.
Up until recently the menu was pretty limited to coffee, booze, and baked goods. Of late they've been slowly rolling out an all day food menu covering breakfast foods all the way through late night munchies. I will say however that they're still a little disorganized on the food front. Between the food menu, coffee menu, baked goods, and booze list, I feel like The Grand probably should change their business model to that of a full scale restaurant rather than a coffee house. When I got in line up front to order my food, there was no menu to look at other than the one (and only) menu at the register. There was a couple of folks in front of me and each (understandably) took well over a minute to look through everything and put down their order. For a place as large as The Grand, it would be wise of them to instead just have hostesses find them a table and use waiters and waitresses to take people's orders. Hob Nobs has struggled with a similar problem and it was partly responsible for a bad experience I had there.
After looking over the full menu, I went with their house made burger named (appropriately enough) The Grand Burger. Also got a glass of New Belgium Blue Paddle Pils. Total cost including tax came to $15. The specs on the burger: ground short rib, white cheddar, a bacon-shallot gastrique, arugula, garlic aioli, and tomato with a brioche bun. I was a big fan of the gastrique and the bun was toasted perfectly. Tasty burger, though for $10 I was kind of disappointed it didn't come with a side.
At this juncture it seems like they're still feeling out the food phase of this place. They're completely good to go as far as their coffee and the booze selection at the bar is pretty impressive (including more than 20 beers on tap, a dozen wines by the glass, and a fair number of cocktails to choose from). But as I mentioned earlier it seems now as though The Grand is a full scale restaurant masquerading as a coffee house. I get wanting to maintain that coffee house feel, but there's nothing wrong with just being a good go-to 24/7 restaurant. With time, hopefully they'll get the logistics fine tuned. I'll give The Grand credit for taking a big gamble with a 24/7 business that seems truly unafraid to take risks with their food and drink menu. I hope the gamble pays off.
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