I've been wanting to review TOPH for awhile and on my fourth visit I figured it was about time. Hit or miss on other visits, my fourth time was here was the kicker.
First, the place doesn't look like a pancake house. With a little more wood paneling, this place could be confused with a steak house if you weren't aware of where you were. Beautiful light fixtures hang from a high ceiling, and high, wood framed archways welcome you into the restaurant. Easy listening music play softly in the background.
I looked over the menu and decided on a short stack of buckwheat pancakes and a cup of coffee. For those of us worried about caloric intake TOPH lists calories for each meal (sans syrup) and a short stack (3) of buckwheat is 560 calories. Pancakes are my comfort food, my indulgent meal.
The cakes were hot off the griddle, steaming and just a little undercooked in the middle which added to their tenderness. The syrup added the sweetness needed and complimented the the buckwheat pancakes to a tee. Did I detect a touch of cinnamon in the syrup or was it in the batter? Who cares, it was delicious. The coffee was nothing special even though the menu exclaims it's award winning and they sell if on premises for home brewing.
The place is overly noisy, no acoustic absorbing ceiling tiles to keep the customer's conversations from bouncing off the walls. For convenience, at the bottom of the bill they give a gratuity calculation or 18 or 20%. Way better than Eat N Park, Denny's and King's, my only issue is the parking lot, smallish and way undersized for a restaurant this size. Avoid this place on a Sunday morning, as I'm sure it's packed to the rafters. My bill was 8.56 for three cakes and endless coffee.